Does breeding prove evolution?

[Marshalscienceguy]

The theory of evolution says that creatures evolve overtime. It does so since certain more beneficial traits will survive over traits that are not. If you have 12 black cats: 7 black and 5 white and suddenly there is a large period of nothing but snow the white cats will survive and black cats will die out. Breeding is the same concept as evolution. We breed animals with certain traits to have certain features and they change over a period of time thanks to selective breeding. So is this not proof evolution exists?

[Ringer]

Yes, it's called artificial selection.

[StringJunky]

Here's a real example of your scenario that occurred in Industrial England:

 

Quote

The evolution of the peppered moth over the last two hundred years has been studied in detail. Originally, the vast majority of peppered moths had light colouration, which effectively camouflaged them against the light-coloured trees and lichens which they rested upon. However, because of widespread pollution during the Industrial Revolution in England, many of the lichens died out, and the trees that peppered moths rested on became blackened by soot, causing most of the light-coloured moths, or typica, to die off from predation. At the same time, the dark-coloured, or melanic, moths, carbonaria, flourished because of their ability to hide on the darkened trees.^[1]

Since then, with improved environmental standards, light-coloured peppered moths have again become common, but the dramatic change in the peppered moth's population has remained a subject of much interest and study, and has led to the coining of the term industrial melanism to refer to the genetic darkening of species in response to pollutants. As a result of the relatively simple and easy-to-understand circumstances of the adaptation, the peppered moth has become a common example used in explaining or demonstrating natural selection.^[2]

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peppered_moth_evolution

Edited January 10, 2014 by StringJunky

[arc]

Does inbreeding prove evolution? Yes!

[delboy]

I wouldn't say it proves evolution on it's own, but it's one of the strongest pieces of evidence. The first chapter in Darwin's Origin of Species was 'Variation under Domestication'.

It seems to me that all the evidence from so may different sources proves evolution. I always feel uncomfortable that it's generally referred to as the theory of evolution. I know science has to be open to change but when does a theory become a fact. After all no one these days refers to the theory of a flat earth. Why do we have to pander to religion? They're not scientists. Would we still be calling it a theory if religion didn't exist?

[StringJunky]

delboy, on 10 Jan 2014 - 12:52 PM, said:

I always feel uncomfortable that it's generally referred to as the theory of evolution. I know science has to be open to change but when does a theory become a fact. After all no one these days refers to the theory of a flat earth. Why do we have to pander to religion? They're not scientists. Would we still be calling it a theory if religion didn't exist?

Calling an idea a theory in science is the very highest accolade that can be bestowed upon it in modern times. Science doesn't do "facts" because it only takes one piece of evidence to render an idea false or incomplete. It is a measure of the worth of the scientific method that it will not sit on its laurels about anything ...it measures the validity of ideas with degrees of confidence which can never be 100%. If it did, it would be no better than religion would it not?

[Phi for All]

I wouldn't say it proves evolution on it's own, but it's one of the strongest pieces of evidence.

 

Your instincts are spot on here. Science looks for supportive evidence, and it never looks for "proof" (proof is for maths). When evidence keeps mounting in support of a hypothesis, without any evidence refuting it (despite lots of trying), we gain enough confidence in the explanation to start calling it a theory. Especially when the hypothesis is so strong we can make predictions based on it like we can with evolution.

[delboy]

It is a measure of the worth of the scientific method that it will not sit on its laurels about anything ... If it did, it would be no better than religion would it not?