Scientist speculates on speciation of colonial humans on planet Mars.
In recent years, many prominent futurists have been discussing the need for humans to seriously consider the potential colonization of Mars for numerous reasons, from protecting our species to advancing technological and scientific discovery (eg. Elon Musk, Stephan Hawking, Buzz Aldrin, etc...)
Speciation is a new subject that has drawn more discussion as of late. The idea of speciation is, more or less, the development of a new and distinct species through the process of evolution due to separation and environmental differences. On planet Earth, it takes 100s of generations of separation over hundreds of thousands of years for a species to change. Dr. Scott Solomon, evolutionary biologist at Rice University in Houston and the author of "Future Humans: Inside the Science of Our Continuing Evolution," has conjectured that, "... while speciation on islands can take thousands of years, the accelerated mutation rate on Mars and the stark contrasts between conditions on Mars and Earth would likely speed up the process. In just a few hundred generations — perhaps as little as 6,000 years — a new type of human might emerge." Yep, potentially 6000 years and we would have a completely different species that could no longer procreate - pretty far out projection if I may say so myself.
In addition, he speculates that bigger bones will be advantageous in evolutionary terms on Mars as gravity is only 38% that of Earth and that would favor humanoids that were born with bigger bones because it would result in fewer bone fractures and increasing survival rates for those with the high bone density. He also suggests that humans may develop orange skin as they would have less exposure to the Sun's radiation on Mars and human skin would potentially be pigmented by carotenoids instead of melanin as is the case with Humans on Earth (melanin protects us from radiation from the Sun), which would turn our skin orange (like a carrot - carrots are orange because of carotenoids...).
In other words, our cousins on Mars will be big headed and orange.
OMG - Could Trump be a Martian?
Kidding... kind of...
https://www.quora.com/Why-does-Donald-Trump-have-orange-skin-1#!n=24
Hahaha, nice work. I've heard people say speciation has never been observed because it takes so long and all we can see is adaptation or mutation. Is that true to the best of your knowledge?
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Nice nice nice
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For anyone that has had a statistics class whats the probability of assembling my DNA at random? There are 3,000,000,000 base pairs in the human genome and 4 choices (codons) for each of the 3,000,000,000 base pairs. So the number of ways to assemble my DNA at random with replacement is 4^3,000,000,000. So the probability is 1/(4^3,000,000,000). Now we have a problem. It would take longer than the age of the universe just to see my DNA assembled from random mutations. Therefore the process of how my DNA got here cannot be random. Something else is driving the process.
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I've heard this argument before. It's an interesting probability statistic, no doubt.
By no means do I desire to argue against your beliefs, but I would like to present a response.
My first point, there has been evidence gathered that life likely started from RNA and then evolved into DNA. RNA only has 300 base pairs, this significantly reduces the number of possibilities. Just like DNA, RNA is also made up of 4 different codons which creates a 4^300 probability calculation. This still would take longer to assemble by chance than the 13 billions years since the "big bang".
My second point, the problem with this calculation is that is over simplified and doesn't represent the current theory on the origins of life from a science perspective. It assumes that a single, unique RNA was assembled that life sprung forth from. Instead, it's more likely that many, many RNA strands were created and evolved together through a ligation reaction at a molecular level to be more likely to generate the catalyst that sparked life. Not only is this more likely, it has been scientifically tested and the results, although not conclusive, are reproducible and do support the theory.
By re-examining this with RNA replacing DNA AND assuming that evolution began even before life began and that RNA polymers evolved to be more likely to catlyze life we come to a calculation that would pass the smell test even in Statistics 101.
http://www.science20.com/stars_planets_life/calculating_odds_life_could_begin_chance
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My background is in physics. A standard tactic, in physics, when faced with extremely complicated problems is to make simplifying assumptions. Simplifying assumptions are very useful to determine whats reasonable and whats not. We see that life is here on earth and some postulate that it is here through a process of random mutations where the non-beneficial mutations are selected out. So the first thing that needs to be done is to see if this postulate is reasonable. If the postulate is not reasonable a lot of time and resources would be wasted going down a dead end research path. The above calculation is done with simplifying assumptions that over estimate the probability that life is here by chance. So what we can conclude is that; life is NOT here through a process of random mutations where the non-beneficial mutations are selected out.
Now where do we go? Like it or not there is only one direction to go. Life is here because it has to be here and life is the way it is because it has to be the way it is. We are forced down a deterministic road.
There is evidence that cells must avoid mutations and repair DNA and or RNA. This is the direction that life extension research is going.
Is there evidence that the development of life is catalyzed? Yes there is.
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My background is in IT... You're response is both interesting and will now lead me down many rabbit holes to gain further understanding. Thank you for that.
First my belief in the Big Bang Theory is shaken and now you're causing me to doubt evolution... This has been an interesting couple months. Conscious Incompetence ;)
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When I first did the calculation I realized that the theory of evolution is statistically imposable. If you look at the history of science you will find theories that today are considered false where taught as being true. That situation still exists today. My goal of the original post was to hopefully get someone who understands statistics to see the contradiction. I don't have all the answers but its fun looking for them.
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I've found some arguments against evolution being random chance.
What are your thoughts in response to this?
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Objections_to_evolution
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I don't like the argument it seems a bit incoherent. The argument wouldn't sway me in any direction. The statistical argument above is simple and only falsifies the random hypothesis. Note that I'm not proposing an alternative theory. I'm simply stating that if its not random then it must be deterministic. This is all that I can conclude from the statistical argument above.
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