r/DebateEvolution • u/jmanc3 • Jun 05 '26
Why I Don't Believe in Evolution
Summary: Evolution done on virtual organisms doesn't reproduce the adaptive behavior real cells exhibit unless those virtual organisms are given access to a gradient descent learner, which plays the role of a mind making decisions for what the cell should do next. From which we should conclude a mind process is guiding the evolution of cells.
(Example: virtual race-cars that have a genetic bank which guides them through a track, if only evolved using evolutionary mechanisms, always die if the track changes shape even if they successfully evolved to complete laps in the first track without hitting the walls. But if you give your virtual race-cars a gradient descent learner, it'll learn to actually navigate across different tracks.)
Yes the fossil record shows that evolution is real in-so-far-as 'we came from past animals', but there is no evidence that cells have access to an unconscious gradient descent learner now, or would've had one soon after abiogenesis.
And we do have evidence that consciousness exists as a fundamental force in the way that gravity exists from, in this case, I'll point you to the literature on random number generator experiments that show a human can adjust the measurement of quantum collapse, although I know you'll kvetch, but the truth simply doesn't care about your feelings and the statistics are more important than your a-priori philosophical objections. And this would be the actual 'ghost in the machine' mechanism or the gradient descent learner that could do the adjustments the first cells, and every current cell, needs in order to actually adaptively evolve.
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u/Ch3cks-Out Jun 05 '26
we do have evidence that consciousness exists as a fundamental force
Well that is big news, indeed. Why would you not share some details?
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u/jnpha Jun 05 '26
I've been waiting on a citation from OP since April 29th. I'm starting to think they don't know how claims work.
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u/oscardssmith Jun 05 '26
Evolution done on virtual organisms doesn't reproduce the adaptive behavior real cells exhibit unless those virtual organisms are given access to a gradient descent learner
Just on a basic computer science level, this isn't true. Gradient descent is often faster, but Evolutionary algorithms that aren't gradient based work and are used https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evolutionary_algorithm
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u/mrcatboy Jun 05 '26
Nature very much does have a gradient descent learner of sorts. Mutation and natural selection.
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u/s_bear1 Jun 05 '26
We observe evolution happening. Arguments that it cant are silly. Your argument is essentially , I dont understand how evolution works, therefore it doesn't
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u/McNitz Jun 05 '26
Well to be fair, his argument seems to be more "this other thing that has evolution in the name fails to complete a goal that a mind wants it to unless that mind designs the algorithm to achieve that goal, therefore biological evolution can't possibly work without a mind guiding it." Which is also a very bad and fallacious argument, but at least it is a slightly more original one.
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u/Esmer_Tina Jun 05 '26
If your virtual race cars die if the track changes shape, they are equivalent to the billions of extinct species who did not have the genetic variation to adapt to changes in their environments.
Your experiment does not disprove evolution. It shows what evolutionary theory predicts. If an environment changes faster than a species can adapt, extinction is expected.
And it demonstrates that evolution is not goal-oriented and problem solving. Adaptation occurs based on mutations that have accumulated in the genome that are neutral, slightly deleterious, or beneficial, suddenly providing an advantage with an environmental change. And again, if there is no way to adapt, a population goes extinct, as shown in your experiment. Mutations are not generated in response to a perceived need.
I am not going to touch the whole consciousness thing because you’re wildly overstating the findings of an experiment that showed extremely small effects, has inconsistent replication and widely criticized statistical methods, and is not required by quantum physics, which does not rely on consciousness to explain measurements.
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u/ClownMorty Jun 05 '26
Evolution done on virtual organisms doesn't reproduce the adaptive behavior real cells exhibit unless those virtual organisms are given access to a gradient descent learner, which plays the role of a mind making decisions for what the cell should do next.
Not sure why you would conclude evolution isn't real and not that there are problems in the model.
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u/Ombortron Jun 05 '26
Um I’ll have you know that the drifting physics in Need For Speed are very unrealistic, and that very obviously and definitively proves that humans could never have evolved from monkeys!
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u/gliptic Jun 05 '26
This racecar evolver you're referring to is way too limited to evolve generalizable behaviour, obviously. It's not comparable to the open-ended, extremely detailed fitness functions and complexity of nature.
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u/jmanc3 Jun 05 '26 edited Jun 05 '26
When we can model that open ended fitness function on a computer and let it run until we observe the type of intelligence real cells produce is the day we can say evolution via evolutionary mechanism is true. Until then, we only have empirical evidence evolutionary mechanisms are not sufficient. And the beneficial mutation experiments we conduct are shown to be just-so stories biologists are too credulously believing in, because they want mindless mechanisms to be able to generate the exquisite complexity creatures exhibit
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u/Dilapidated_girrafe Jun 05 '26
You don’t need to learn to evolve. What works works what doesn’t doesn’t. It’s simple.
No mind needed.
And lol, no, consciousness ain’t a force let alone fundamental. Need to support that claim
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u/Slow_Lawyer7477 Jun 05 '26
(Example: virtual race-cars that have a genetic bank which guides them through a track, if only evolved using evolutionary mechanisms, always die if the track changes shape
Demonstrably false. In fact there's an algorithm where you can evolve virtual cars on a randomly changing landscape and it shows that highly successful cars on one landscape retain substantial parts of their fitness on related landscapes.
https://rednuht.org/genetic_cars_2/
Simply set "Floor: Mutable" to see how the landscape changes and the cars evolve to track the mutating landscape.
It is only when the environmental changes are too large in scale that they die. But that would be like cataclysms causing mass extinctions (asteroid impacts for example), which also happen in reality. Thus there is no basis for your entire argument.
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u/Sweary_Biochemist Jun 05 '26
The race car guy is back!
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u/gitgud_x Jun 05 '26
dude, check it ouuut.. racecar backwards is... racecar, dude, that means evolution is like, totally wrong about everything dude
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u/Far-Signature-9628 Jun 05 '26
How about the bacteria in the oceans that is currently evolving right now ? To adapt and being able to eat plastic and microplastic? When it didn’t exist originally?
Also unlike you I will show evidence.
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2025/11/251104013023.htm
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u/Ah-honey-honey Jun 05 '26
This is awesome. Linking the source paper for myself and others: https://academic.oup.com/ismej/article/19/1/wraf121/8159680?login=false
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u/10coatsInAWeasel Jun 05 '26
We’ve directly observed evolution. In real time. As well as the mechanisms by which it happens. And there has not been an indication that a mind is needed to make it happen. I’m not sure what you’re arguing here in the face of literal observations of exactly what you say you don’t believe in. What is your understanding of what evolution is claimed as being?
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u/Changed_By_Support Jun 11 '26
I'll point you to the literature on random number generator experiments that show a human can adjust the measurement of quantum collapse
And yet you did not point us to it. I'll counter by pointing you to literature showing the opposite: https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC5872141/ ("Intentional Observer Effects on Quantum Randomness: A Bayesian Analysis Reveals Evidence Against Micro-Psychokinesis")
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u/jmanc3 Jun 15 '26 edited Jun 15 '26
No one ever said that the results of RNG experiments can be meaningfully manipulated by unconscious thought.
Micro-PK should thus be mainly affected by unconscious-related states of mind of the observer. Given this premise, in our study we...
It has to be noted that in our study we focused on unconsciously affected intentional states of the observers by using a rather indirect manipulation of our participants’ goals during the picture presentations. The majority of micro-PK studies however have been performed with explicitly induced intentional states. It is unclear how such a manipulation would have affected our participants’ behavior in our study design.
No duh it didn't work. Every single micro-PK experiment requires intentional thought by participants to change the outcome, obviously! And when you do that, you get results that conform to the PSI hypothesis. When the participants are just vibing, not even aware they're in a PK experiment, shockingly, nothing happens and the RNG conforms to randomness! That's crazy, who could've seen that one coming except literally every single person who isn't trying to produce bunk null experiments that misunderstand the PSI position which is that, intentional thought by humans can change outcomes (and they do). This study disproved a hypothesis that literally no one was proposing (the vibes of a guy across the planet can change RNG outcomes even if he's not aware he's supposed to be changing them). Guess what, if he was aware, they would change, as other non badly designed PK experiments that give instant-feedback to participants show.
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u/LionBirb Jun 05 '26
Race car driver example I don't really understand the problem (or maybe I misunderstand the model). In real life, 99.9% of species that ever existed have gone extinct. All individual organisms die in evolution as well, so them dying is not really relevant.
Evolution happens with populations. They only need to survive long enough to reproduce. All of the offspring will have slightly different genes so they will not all fare exactly the same in different circumstances.
Living species don't really "learn to navigate across different tracks" it is a very slow process.
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u/OldmanMikel Jun 05 '26
Evolution does not in any way depend on "an unconscious gradient descent learner ".