If you’ve ever thought about doing a video game let’s play video or livestream, consider *Niche: A Genetics Survival Game* - I know some gamers on RUclips have played it, but I think your knowledge of the subject would make your commentary particularly fascinating.
The drawings and illustrations that have been used to show the Tree of Life and similar concepts have done nothing to clarify the concept of 'change over time' if you ask me. So often we would see a definite forking -= that gave the impression instantaneous divergence. There is a documentary I watched years ago that I am looking for. It showed the slow change very well. From the formation of the eye through light sensing cells to the creation of a bony hand. The very end of the documentary starts with the 'primordial goo' and flies down a path to homo-sapien. If anyone knows this documentary, please let me know.
Yay! The new episode! This is great. Are you familiar with the RUclips channel acapellascience? He writes a capella covers of pop songs, but rewrites the lyrics to explain scientific concepts. Back in 2017, he did a parody cover of "Despacito" called "Evo-Devo," that is now running through my head.
I was homeschooled for religious reasons. Because girls didn't need to be educated, I wasn't taught much math and my education stopped at the 9th grade. I understood most of this video, and I feel proud of that. Thank you.
You should be proud, and it is why Forest is so wonderful, he can get these slightly more complex concepts across to the layman and give you a foot in the door to learning even more!
hell yeah ! Thankfully that wasn't my case and I studied math and biology, but I know it can be tricky to learn. Best of luck on your journey of education !
I made a simple comment about my lack of education a month ago... And I have actually cried at the kindness people have shown me. I've signed up for A. B. Education classes starting in January. You guys will be going to class with me. Just know that your support has become an education.
I wish you success. Remember: lack of education is nothing to be ashamed of. Those who refuse to be educated because they think they know better should be ashamed.
The analogy I like to give for speciation is *"going for a long hike":* _You start out fresh and keen, but you arrive tired and worn out. Which step was the one where you suddenly switched from one state to the other? But of course there wasn't one. Same goes for speciation._
Kent "I proudly beat my children and lie about everything else" Hovind: Getting tired is a religion. You believe that a single cell changes from being fresh and keen to tired and worn out in a single step. Everyone would be dead tired all the time if that happened. Even a child can see that fresh and keen cells are always fresh and keen cells. You just _believe_ that people get tired over longer periods of time, _it's a religion._ It's fine if you believe that, I just don't want my tax dollars to be used to teach those lies to the kids.
Oh, and I love how purple was his example :D It's not even an existing colour in the colour spectrum of visible light, like the many concepts in biology they're just how we make sense of things that are not as straight forward as haploid genotypes. Purple mountain rooster: **nods** Me: You don't even exist. Stay out of this. Purple mountain rooster: **crows** Me: My point exactly. Do be careful with which mushrooms you put in your soup.
To teach this I bring in a bunch of dry leaves from different trees with different sizes and colors and have students separate them. They come up with categories. Then I ask about the categories they picked to guide them to refining their categories. Thus they are preforming science just as how species are decided on.
Man, in 37 minutes you explained evolution better than any semester-long high school class (and I haven't even seen the first two episodes). This should be required viewing for every creationist.
Holy shit, how bad is the education where you live??? Where I live this was basically a month or two of biology classes repeated every two years 6th-12th grade (all subject courses are cyclical in my country, most topics repeating every two years while progressively adding more detail (at least for some of them, we weren't taught how genetics worked outside of single gene induced features and half of the class wouldn't be capable of comprehending genetics exercises anyway) and most of the video basically felt like I was back in school
@@miglek9613 In America the education system is notoriously dog poop . In my personal experience, we are taught how to pass the next test and not practicality.
@@miglek9613 where I am in America we had about a month talking about evolution as a "theory" (mostly just learning how to debunk it) and that was considered controversial so you could opt out or have a parent opt you out.
@@SMK-bp1zr holy shit, it's so sad that extremists can literally just force teachers to teach bullshit in US. I thought schools in my country were useless and way too involved with the church because 1. We can have religion class instead of ethics class, as well as get our sacrament preparations planned by our schools 2. We literally just get our brains crammed with information with little to no ways to actually use it or critical thinking skills but it seems like american children have it even worse
Hey, so I'm a 21 year old kid who, yes, was, in fact, homeschooled by my Christian parents. I would like to thank you. This has been an eye-opening experience. My mother glossed over almost all of this, every bit that was too close to evolution. Thank you, thank you. You have done me wonders in my understanding of what I can only assume should have been the basics. Now, to look at my faith in a new light.
They are basically legos. They aren't totally alive, they use others to multiply themselves, they hurt AF, they are diferent of one another, and they can be found inside some people, and the particles that they are made of are everywhere...
I met the Latin->French analogy many times before, but the color gradient is so ridiculously straightforward that I cannot understand why it isn't more widespread. I'm stealing it Forrest. You're awesome!
I just wanted to thank you for this series. In school I hated chemistry and biology because my teacher sucked. But with finding your channel, I have gotten so interested in it! Because of you, I've gotten so interested in biology and evolution! Even though because of my disabilities I can never fully study it, I'm still enjoying my time learning
Yes I think a vast majority of people get drawn or conversely get put off by good or bad teachers, often this leads to interest or unknown interest in subjects like once you discover a better teacher.
4:08 "A species isn't actually a real thing"" "Life is what life is" Thank you so much for starting with that one! Nature doesn't care about "species". It's just an arbitrary label that helps us putting things in boxes.
Humans do love putting things in boxes. Like, all the time, throughout all of known history. Ordered lists are literally the first pieces of writing we've found.
I think this is one of the concepts that can be really hard to grasp when learning about evolution; it seems to be especially a stumbling block for creationists and religious believers. It is a very human tendancy to sort and label things, and to expect those things to stay in their neat perfect categories forever. But, reality doesn't care about that! LIfe is so weird and diverse and messy and strange, and it refuses to be easily sorted or categorized by any mind so tiny as a human's. Nature is more strange than anything we can imagine, and it doesn't like to be tied down by the limits of the human mind. Life is a spectrum, a gradiant, a rich tapestry--and that's beautiful and wonderful and worth studying, from every angle!
@@The_Serpent_of_Eden To me, it seems absurd to expect anything in nature to conform to out limited and very personal beliefs. But I also like to think about the fundamental atoms blipping around and how truly random all aspects of life really are. It becomes less random a step up from atom to proteins and amino acids, these typically do certain things in controllable ways, but it's still all molecules just randomly bouncing around. To expect controlled randomness to conform to tidy labels is not a reasonable stance.
As a linguist, I'd even say the parallel evoked later on (5:33-5:56 ; 6:16-6:28) works with languages, historically-and, to a lesser extent now, geographically. Labels on individual languages are a product of national myths. You don't even have to fetch exotic languages to see how geographical variations blend in each other, or how enormously each supposed “one language” varies (on populations of millions).
One Google search says otherwise. Species: the largest group of organisms in which 2 individuals of the appropriate sexes can produce fertile offspring.
There you go - in a span of 1 school period, explained very clearly, what many schools can't manage in years. There is no excuse for not teaching EVERYONE at least the rough concepts. Not everyone needs to know the technical details, but the way this is explained here - everyone should know this much.
I knew about 90% of this (glad to say that I learned a few new things today) but even if I knew 100% of it I would still watch this for the way Forrest presents it. Everything is accessible; neither dumbed down nor excessively complicated and Forrest's enthusiasm for the subject really shines through. I would recommend this video for everyone.
Forrest's passion and excitement for what he does is such a great thing. It's so inspiring to listen to a teacher who is interested in the subject matter. We need educators like Forrest! Emotions are infectious. If you listen to anger or fear, you become angry or fearful. But if you listen to joy and curiosity and interest and excitement, then you feel those things too. It's one of Forrest's best qualities! Live your passion, man!
Calculating the allele frequency in a diploid configuration just by looking at the population with the recessive trait was mind blowing! I've seen you say multiple times that it takes just some amount of algebra to derive conclusions on this topic, and now I can finally see it for myself. Loving this series!!
This made no sense. How could you possibly know how many are heterozygous without actually looking at the genome? Couldn't two populations have the same ratio of red vs blue rabbits while having a different ratio of heterozygotes? Couldn't NONE of them be heterozygous? The example doesn't even make sense, he used that fact that there are 3 blue and 2 red to determine that 14% are heterozygous... which equates to 0.7 of a rabbit??? Okay, just a problem with using such a small population as an example but... something still isn't being explained properly here. Is it just a statistical estimation or something??
@@ahall9839 We are looking at probabilities here, which is why we get results like 0.7 of a rabbit. Each individual copy of the gene has a certain chance to have the blue allele, and a certain chance to have the red allele. Since there is no relationship between the two copies an individual has, which allele each copy is doesn't depend on which allele the other copy is, so it is simple to calculate; except we work backward, instead of having the chances and calculating the result, we have the result and we calculate the chances. So for example, let's say each copy of a gene has 50% chance of being a red allele and 50% chance of being a blue allele. A rabbit therefore has only 25% chances of having only red alleles and 25% chance of only having blue alleles, while it has 50% chances of having one of each. If we have 100 rabbits, there would be about 25 blue and 75 red, with 50 of them being heterozygotes; and if we have a population of 100 rabbits with 25 blue rabbits, we can use the math in the video to figure out that each allele has 50% chance of appearing.
@@ahall9839 we know which ones have 2 copies of the recessive traits because that’s the only way recessive traits can appear. Meaning we know B^2 in the second formula. From there were can calculate B (just square root B^2) and then use that to calculate R. Then we can square R to get R^2 and multiple R and B to get RB.
Finding this series 8 months after it was released and wondering why it only has 68K views and not 68M views. Forrest's explanations, examples, and enthusiasm make it so easy to understand concepts that often get bogged down in confusing terminology and lackluster pedagogy. Please keep up the solid work, it is greatly appreciated.
Dear Forrest, Thank you very much for this incredible series of videos! As a biologist I am really glad to see such complex subjects as gene networks, the calculation of allele frequency, how environmental factors can lead to speciation and the evolution of complex structure, and so many more explained in such a simple and understandable way!!! I must say that I couldn't help but feel very nostalgic of the days that I first read of those concepts at Uni! You are really awesome keep up the great and much needed work that you do!!!
If they're anything like the ones I know they would spend the whole time bashing it either because he's an atheist, or he's "of the devil" and only trying to lead people to hell (which makes no sense since he's an atheist), or because confirmation bias would lead them to just argue with everything because people like Ken Ham or Ray Comfort told them to
This is such a small detail, but I LOVED that you put up definitions for all of the new terms!!! I saw someone suggest that on an earlier episode and it’s really cool to see that it was accounted for here.
I came upon a milk snake in our back yard that I did not recognize. I looked it up on line by its looks and found 'copperhead'. The snake I found had dark areas on both sides that did not meet on the back where on the copperheads, they meet on the back. Also, it was lying in dead leaves and was 'wagging' the tip of its tail so that it sounded a bit like a rattler snake. I too am impressed by Batesian Mimicry.
Currently deprogramming from my homeschooled upbringing, I watched the first episode and I can’t stop, this is so good! It’s so fascinating how all of science fits so perfectly with the other studies, how our world isn’t a closed system my any means. Thank you so much!
I’ve always held that most people who actually understand how evolution works believe in it, and most people who don’t believes in it have massive misunderstandings about how it actually works. And it’s was to see why there are so many misconceptions. Even if it weren’t for creationists putting disinformation out there, many kids find biology classes incredibly boring and thus don’t pay attention. By making science digestible and making learning fun, you are helping people learn these things in ways that classrooms cannot. Thank you Forest.
RUclips’s algorithm sucks. You should have 1M+ subscribers by now so that informational content like this can be seen by more people. I love the way you back up your statements with examples. Instead of just arguing from authority, you back up your comments with examples to illustrate your point.
It really is nice to take a break from calling out creationists and just focusing on the wonders of evolution. This is a very nice change of pace, and I’m sure I’m not the only person who really appreciates the time you take to educate and teach us about biology :)
I like the analogy of languages. Latin evolved to French, Italien, German, Englisch. But French and Italien are closer to each other than to either German or English . Furthermore, take the example of French. It changed a lot in the last 150 years. Has the old version of French died out completely? No, in Quebec, Canada, they are still speaking a kind of archaic French (too few people top really evolve a complete new strain). So both French in France and French in Canada coexist, like different kinds (I am so sorry for that word 🙃) do in nature.
Actually, Latin didn’t turn into German, they are actually different families. Latin was the language of the Romans while German (or at least it’s ancestor) was the language of the Goths
@@TheNinthGeneration1 You are absolutely right, I was to sloppy with my statement. Latin evolved into the Romanic (is that the correct english word?) languages and had a massive impact on the germanic dialects. This way quite some latin grammer jumped species and became integral part of German. 🙃
I've studied evolutionary biology on my own and as an elective in college and even when you are explaining things I understand already, you have an amazing ability to make it make even more sense. You are a very gifted educator.
1. I love your example of Linguistic Evolution because it is _also_ driven by Population Dynamics and Selection Pressure. 2. Assessing the allele frequency in a diploid population, using...pretty basic...algebra; AWESOME! 3. I liken the roll of Regulatory Networks to that of light switches. Imagine a mansion with one light switch per room. Some are On/Off, and some are dimmers. Some rooms have colored lights while others have basic white. Some are wired in series, such that "B" only turns on if "A" is on, but "A" can be on _without_ "B" being on. The number of possible combinations is staggering.
I’m sad to see that this series isn’t doing as good in the algorithm than your other videos, I’ve found it much more interesting than debunking idiotic creationists. I hope you continue this series!
Another awesome video, loving this series! Just a tiny nitpick, at 26:16 you talk about the sequence of DNA ahead of a gene, calling it a "promotor" (and pronouncing it like the motor in a car), but it's actually a promoter, as in it promotes the RNA polymerase to bind there.
Love small corrections like this. It helps keep the integrity of the video as high as possible. I’ve put together very technical presentations before and the amount of arguing you can do between experts is crazy. But I always walk away better for it because I either understand their point or I concede that the point is still opaque.
Sorry if this is a dumb question, but in the calculation of allele frequencies, I'm a little confused about why the equation should be squared. What I mean is, even if we know the number of recessive expressing individuals, how do we know what proportion of the dominant expressing individuals is homozygous, and how many are heterozygous? How do you come to that particular ratio?
I believe the calculations are only applicable at the Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium, but I could be mistaken. I think that with entire populations you assume that you have an equilibrium.
I was confused by that also. I *think* I've made sense of it, but am not absolutely certain. My working idea is that r and b represent the percentage of the alleles in the population that are red and blue respectively. We don't start out knowing those numbers. But, there are four possibilities for any individual: rr, rb, br, or bb. If r is the probability of getting a red allele from one parent, r^2 is the probability of getting one from each parent. The terms of the binomial expansion give you the weighted probability for each option. The middle term is 2rb, because there are two ways to get one of each, depending on which parent gives you which allele.
@@JRMcCarroll Yes there are 2 ways to get ab and that is why it is times two. However it still doesn't make sense to know the genotypes from that little information. I am fairly certain he used the equations that apply to a large number of individuals, where statistically you would get an equilibrium, as he was working with a population. What is confusing is the fact that in the scenario he presented, there are only 5 individuals, wich doesn't represent a population.
Forrest, when you go from r + b = 1, then state “each individual has 2 alleles so we’re going to square this equation” that takes a huge leap of faith. (Why not “… so we’re going to double it, 2(r + b) = 1”) Dude, you’ve already done plenty of videos about the dangers of following leap of faith arguments. But hey, I wouldn’t be making this comment if I thought your videos weren’t great.
@@ernieM Pretty sure it's the correct math and he just didn't explain why, for the sake of time and simplicity. My comment above tries to explain why I think it works. I don't think I can explain it any better without diagrams, and I'm also not totally sure that I'm right about it.
Despite all I've already learned about evolution, biology & genetics, it never ceases to surprise me when I learn something new. Just listening to you explain things makes concepts which seemed to have taken forever for me to grasp, so much simpler to relate with each other, so thankyou for that.
The way you explain somewhat complicated issues and break them down is genius. Lots of former Christians here who didn't have a proper education. You are helping us to catch up!
Just started watching. Gave the video a thumbs up before I watched it. At this point Forrest hasn't made a video I didn't enjoy. So I like them before I forget.
Wow... I used to think I had a pretty decent understanding of evolution (fancied myself one of them "college educated" people the pastor is always warning his flock about), but Genetic Drift was a concept that I thought about and I knew the term, but didn't realize that it was the name for the concept. This is such an awesome series, and I'm so glad you're presenting it Forrest. Such a fantastic Science Communicator.
A great way to see the changes in a species over time is to take a photo of yourself every day (or for someone else to do it) and make a timelapse of your life, and compare the results. Day to day (aside from cutting your hair or taking noticeable injuries), you won't look different. But if you take the first and last pictures, or you take one picture from every five years, you can notice a large difference, while still noticing the similarities.
Forrest, I'm on my first year of my biology major with a shit ton of personal problems and a mountain of percieved academic failures. Your videos are my personal reminder to find a reason to everything that I am learning and how it is going to be used in my future. Thank you for doing this.
Don't worry some still have leg buds. Especially boas. So its possible for them to get their back legs again if it somehow becomes evolutionarily viable.
I think I had had a lot of "promiscuous proteins" when I was was a young adult.... Seriously though, Forrest, THANKS so much for this! You have a great talent for explaining things that makes this actually pretty easy to understand. I know there's a lot more to everything than this, but I'm FINALLY beginning to learn how this works... and that makes me happy!!
One aspect that I feel is left out of most discussions: the number of objects involved. Before we get to evolution, consider the emergence of the first self-replicating molecules. This happens in a population of atoms of hydrogen, oxygen and carbon where there are many many orders of magnitude of atoms. This makes it seem inevitable that many different molecules can come together within the temperatures near the surface of the earth. Eventually replicating combinations begin to self-propagate and we're up and running.
Really loving this series! While watching, I was reminded of an animal I've encountered that fakes a trait to make other animals think it is more dangerous. I was hiking with my brother when I heard a warning rattle. The snake was less than 3 feet away and I backed up Quick. However, it turned out to be a bull snake and didn't have a rattle on it's tail at all. Bull snakes can mimic the rattle sound just by hissing! It's not a venomous snake, but dang if it doesn't work like a charm 😆
Loving this series! Keep it up! I would love to know more about epigenetics, and hox genes. That image of the fly with limbs growing from it's face was mind blowing. I've often wondered how our bodies know where to grow everything. How deeply is this all understood? What are some of the unanswered questions when it comes to evolution?
A video on hox genes would be so cool. A lot of this is pretty well understood but there are always new questions coming up. I'd love to see him do a video on this.
Wow, that was a lot! A very informative video, and one I hope people will watch as many times as they need to to understand the many fascinating topics you touched on!
@@johnsheehan5109 I've heard people say that they don't think he would have understood it but I have no idea why they say that. Obviously Darwin was quite an educated man.
@@georgeparkins777 Having read most of Darwin and also Mendel's paper I'm quite sure he would have understood it but also would have shared it with Huxley.
This video reminded me so much of the channel Primer which has done a bunch of cool simulations on evolution(and other things) I would recommend it to anyone who liked this video
Have always loved the language example, especially when you said you aren't using 'thee and thou and thine' because here in Yorkshire those words are still in common usage demonstrating the overlap!
Wrote it already, a poodle breeder wanted to "create" new, stable colour variants for poodles. He did that methodically, doing EXACTLY what Forrest describes here. He used mice, as there all goes quicker. Took standard mice and bred for colour variations and then how to stabilize these variants. After a number of years, he knew enough that he knew how to proceed with his dogs, So to speak, a directed disruptive selection
Hey Forrest! You've spoken about those caterpillars that look like a snake on the end of their bodies before. On Twitter someone put up a clip of 2 that had the exact same markings (same "snakes" on their tails), but one was green and the other orange. I saw that you were tagged by someone asking why they were different colors (are they different "species"?), is there any way you can do a video or TikTok about it? (I don't have TikTok, but I always watch the compilations 😊
I love the fact that Forrest has to explain evolution in a way that focuses on debunking misconceptions in a way that you dont have to for other theories, because he knows hes gonna get attacked by creationists.
Another AMAZING video on evolution. I love this topic but I'm not that well versed in it. With every video, I feel myself actually learning, and I love it. Super excited for episode 4. P.S. I think a cool idea would be for you to make a bonus video, call it something like "Batesian Mimicry | The Light of Evolution - Bonus Episode 1". The idea would be to focus on specific areas of evolution that aren't part of the main course. Topics you find cool/interesting that you'd like to share. And I can only imagine how interesting a video like that would be, if it's one you specifically picked out.
The color analogy at the 5 minute mark is a brilliant way of explaining this concept of graduation to people. I've often thought that kind of visual could help Kent Hovind and Matt Powell figure a few things out. Give them each a massive box of colored pencils, like a 100-pencil set. Ask each to sort, independently of one another, a pile of JUST blue pencils, and a second pile of JUST green pencils. I guarantee you they will not divide the pencils the exact same way, and their little pinheads would explode. It would be hilarious. Another home run from Forrest. You're the best! Love your stuff, you are an amazing educator and your passion lights candles.
As someone raised in a creationist cult, your content has helped me de-program on something I was never even aware of. It has made the word make more sense than ever and gives me hope.
I have been a scientist for decades. I have two science degrees. I have read countless popular books on Biology in general and evolution in particular. I am amazed at the info I am leaning from you and so excited learning things I did not know about _topics_ I did not even know. Thank you so much. Well done.
What, and place even the slightest possibility of risk on their tax free status? 😄😂🤣🤣🤣 That's the funniest thing I've heard all week. Sure, it might only be nearly Tuesday, but I'm confident it'll still be up there...
Love this series, even as someone quite familiar with evolutionary biology I learn so much. It's explained so clearly and simply but covers more than just the basics. Also the sheer amount of passion you have for this subject makes this series easy to listen to and engage with. This is definitely shaping up to be one of the best educational tools for evolution, up there with Aron Ra's "Systematic Classification of Life" series.
I always considered peacock tails to be a kind of flex. "Look art this liability I have on my rear, and consider how awesome I must be to still be alive"
@Forrest - Im a physical therapist assistant for 20 years. So if you want to get into some A&P let me know. Favorite body part Omohyoid. Least favorite - Brachial Plexus. ❤️ you dude!
My least favorite part (and forgive my layman wording) is the forearm. Just seeing how the bones cross when you twist your wrist gives me the heebie jeebies. And now I have to look up Omohyoid and Brachial Plexus
ok looked up Brachial Plexus and I personally hate that nerve cluster because I've recently had an episode where I think mine misfired because basically my fingers attached to each of those nerves basically made each pair (pinky/ring, index/middle, and thumb) to kind pair up and cross and just had little control over those fingers for like 5-10 minutes and it was scary as hell to me. That, and my left Ulna loves to just make my pinky/ring finger get all tingly for long periods of time, although doing some of my physical therapy exercises seems to help.
I'll admit that I knew a lot of the basics this covered already... However I must say that this was THE MOST COMPREHENSIVE AND ACCESSIBLE PRESENTATION OF THIS SUBJECT THAT I HAVE EVER SEEN. This is absolutely wonderful - and should be required viewing for anyone who takes high-school biology (or who AVOIDS taking high-school biology).
I love the comparison to linguistic evolution because it's so wonderfully apt. And the awesome thing is it goes deeper than that: we can talk about Old English, Middle English, Early Modern English, and Modern English, which are very noticeably the same language, but different stages of that language's evolution. Likewise we can talk about different stages of evolution within a single species. For example the earliest homo sapiens have marked differences to modern homo sapiens as we've continued to evolve.
The Way you explain all this is really easy to understand for me, even though I'm not a native English speaker. And your videos always make me go " SCIENCE. IS. SO. COOL."
Keep exploring at brilliant.org/ForrestValkai/. Get started for free, and hurry-the first 200 people get 20% off an annual premium subscription!
Some of your videos should be on Brilliant.
If you’ve ever thought about doing a video game let’s play video or livestream, consider *Niche: A Genetics Survival Game* - I know some gamers on RUclips have played it, but I think your knowledge of the subject would make your commentary particularly fascinating.
The drawings and illustrations that have been used to show the Tree of Life and similar concepts have done nothing to clarify the concept of 'change over time' if you ask me. So often we would see a definite forking -= that gave the impression instantaneous divergence.
There is a documentary I watched years ago that I am looking for. It showed the slow change very well. From the formation of the eye through light sensing cells to the creation of a bony hand. The very end of the documentary starts with the 'primordial goo' and flies down a path to homo-sapien. If anyone knows this documentary, please let me know.
Yay! The new episode! This is great.
Are you familiar with the RUclips channel acapellascience? He writes a capella covers of pop songs, but rewrites the lyrics to explain scientific concepts. Back in 2017, he did a parody cover of "Despacito" called "Evo-Devo," that is now running through my head.
Your hair is overexaggerated.
I was homeschooled for religious reasons. Because girls didn't need to be educated, I wasn't taught much math and my education stopped at the 9th grade.
I understood most of this video, and I feel proud of that.
Thank you.
You should be proud!
You should be proud, and it is why Forest is so wonderful, he can get these slightly more complex concepts across to the layman and give you a foot in the door to learning even more!
hell yeah ! Thankfully that wasn't my case and I studied math and biology, but I know it can be tricky to learn. Best of luck on your journey of education !
Never stop learning! It's true power!😊
I love hearing that!
I made a simple comment about my lack of education a month ago... And I have actually cried at the kindness people have shown me. I've signed up for A. B. Education classes starting in January. You guys will be going to class with me. Just know that your support has become an education.
I wish you success. Remember: lack of education is nothing to be ashamed of. Those who refuse to be educated because they think they know better should be ashamed.
Best of luck! ✌
Absolutely the best!
Sweet!! I love to hear that! Good luck! Never stop being curious and ask a lot of questions.
Hope it is going well.
The analogy I like to give for speciation is *"going for a long hike":* _You start out fresh and keen, but you arrive tired and worn out. Which step was the one where you suddenly switched from one state to the other? But of course there wasn't one. Same goes for speciation._
Kent "I proudly beat my children and lie about everything else" Hovind: Getting tired is a religion. You believe that a single cell changes from being fresh and keen to tired and worn out in a single step. Everyone would be dead tired all the time if that happened. Even a child can see that fresh and keen cells are always fresh and keen cells. You just _believe_ that people get tired over longer periods of time, _it's a religion._ It's fine if you believe that, I just don't want my tax dollars to be used to teach those lies to the kids.
Oh, and I love how purple was his example :D It's not even an existing colour in the colour spectrum of visible light, like the many concepts in biology they're just how we make sense of things that are not as straight forward as haploid genotypes.
Purple mountain rooster: **nods**
Me: You don't even exist. Stay out of this.
Purple mountain rooster: **crows**
Me: My point exactly. Do be careful with which mushrooms you put in your soup.
To teach this I bring in a bunch of dry leaves from different trees with different sizes and colors and have students separate them. They come up with categories. Then I ask about the categories they picked to guide them to refining their categories. Thus they are preforming science just as how species are decided on.
Thats actually a cool analogy
Have you ever seen an organism become anything other than what it is? Have you ever seen U238 complete one of its half-lives?
Man, in 37 minutes you explained evolution better than any semester-long high school class (and I haven't even seen the first two episodes). This should be required viewing for every creationist.
Holy shit, how bad is the education where you live??? Where I live this was basically a month or two of biology classes repeated every two years 6th-12th grade (all subject courses are cyclical in my country, most topics repeating every two years while progressively adding more detail (at least for some of them, we weren't taught how genetics worked outside of single gene induced features and half of the class wouldn't be capable of comprehending genetics exercises anyway) and most of the video basically felt like I was back in school
@@miglek9613 In America the education system is notoriously dog poop . In my personal experience, we are taught how to pass the next test and not practicality.
@@miglek9613 he's prob is from US,where education is really bad😒.me,being from romania,also learned all this in 1 semester of middle school lol
@@miglek9613 where I am in America we had about a month talking about evolution as a "theory" (mostly just learning how to debunk it) and that was considered controversial so you could opt out or have a parent opt you out.
@@SMK-bp1zr holy shit, it's so sad that extremists can literally just force teachers to teach bullshit in US. I thought schools in my country were useless and way too involved with the church because 1. We can have religion class instead of ethics class, as well as get our sacrament preparations planned by our schools 2. We literally just get our brains crammed with information with little to no ways to actually use it or critical thinking skills but it seems like american children have it even worse
Hey, so I'm a 21 year old kid who, yes, was, in fact, homeschooled by my Christian parents. I would like to thank you. This has been an eye-opening experience. My mother glossed over almost all of this, every bit that was too close to evolution. Thank you, thank you. You have done me wonders in my understanding of what I can only assume should have been the basics. Now, to look at my faith in a new light.
I love how viruses don't care about our definitions of life
Me too
Me too
Me too
They are basically legos. They aren't totally alive, they use others to multiply themselves, they hurt AF, they are diferent of one another, and they can be found inside some people, and the particles that they are made of are everywhere...
@@jopsbek The triple comment 😆 i guess a mistake?
I met the Latin->French analogy many times before, but the color gradient is so ridiculously straightforward that I cannot understand why it isn't more widespread. I'm stealing it Forrest. You're awesome!
The evolution of modern English gets even wilder :)
I just wanted to thank you for this series.
In school I hated chemistry and biology because my teacher sucked.
But with finding your channel, I have gotten so interested in it!
Because of you, I've gotten so interested in biology and evolution!
Even though because of my disabilities I can never fully study it, I'm still enjoying my time learning
Have you seen Professor Dave? He has some very good videos on it as well.
Yes I think a vast majority of people get drawn or conversely get put off by good or bad teachers, often this leads to interest or unknown interest in subjects like once you discover a better teacher.
Also try Crashcourse, it have many STEM courses
hell yeah! I'm so happy you found out you actually like these topics, a good teacher can be everything :)
4:08
"A species isn't actually a real thing""
"Life is what life is"
Thank you so much for starting with that one!
Nature doesn't care about "species". It's just an arbitrary label that helps us putting things in boxes.
Humans do love putting things in boxes. Like, all the time, throughout all of known history. Ordered lists are literally the first pieces of writing we've found.
I think this is one of the concepts that can be really hard to grasp when learning about evolution; it seems to be especially a stumbling block for creationists and religious believers. It is a very human tendancy to sort and label things, and to expect those things to stay in their neat perfect categories forever. But, reality doesn't care about that! LIfe is so weird and diverse and messy and strange, and it refuses to be easily sorted or categorized by any mind so tiny as a human's. Nature is more strange than anything we can imagine, and it doesn't like to be tied down by the limits of the human mind.
Life is a spectrum, a gradiant, a rich tapestry--and that's beautiful and wonderful and worth studying, from every angle!
@@The_Serpent_of_Eden To me, it seems absurd to expect anything in nature to conform to out limited and very personal beliefs. But I also like to think about the fundamental atoms blipping around and how truly random all aspects of life really are. It becomes less random a step up from atom to proteins and amino acids, these typically do certain things in controllable ways, but it's still all molecules just randomly bouncing around. To expect controlled randomness to conform to tidy labels is not a reasonable stance.
As a linguist, I'd even say the parallel evoked later on (5:33-5:56 ; 6:16-6:28) works with languages, historically-and, to a lesser extent now, geographically.
Labels on individual languages are a product of national myths.
You don't even have to fetch exotic languages to see how geographical variations blend in each other, or how enormously each supposed “one language” varies (on populations of millions).
One Google search says otherwise.
Species: the largest group of organisms in which 2 individuals of the appropriate sexes can produce fertile offspring.
There you go - in a span of 1 school period, explained very clearly, what many schools can't manage in years. There is no excuse for not teaching EVERYONE at least the rough concepts. Not everyone needs to know the technical details, but the way this is explained here - everyone should know this much.
The sxiest peacock gets to reproduce......" Forrest, had me vanquishing from laughter instanteouly after those words exited his buccul cavity.
I knew about 90% of this (glad to say that I learned a few new things today) but even if I knew 100% of it I would still watch this for the way Forrest presents it. Everything is accessible; neither dumbed down nor excessively complicated and Forrest's enthusiasm for the subject really shines through. I would recommend this video for everyone.
Forrest's passion and excitement for what he does is such a great thing. It's so inspiring to listen to a teacher who is interested in the subject matter. We need educators like Forrest! Emotions are infectious. If you listen to anger or fear, you become angry or fearful. But if you listen to joy and curiosity and interest and excitement, then you feel those things too. It's one of Forrest's best qualities! Live your passion, man!
You're terrifically right. I'm awarding you with my cornucopia of delights 🎉
As long as you're making videos, I'll never stop learning. 😊
Calculating the allele frequency in a diploid configuration just by looking at the population with the recessive trait was mind blowing! I've seen you say multiple times that it takes just some amount of algebra to derive conclusions on this topic, and now I can finally see it for myself. Loving this series!!
Agreed.
The next time I have a kid ask me what are they ever going to use algebra for I am sending them to watch this.
This made no sense. How could you possibly know how many are heterozygous without actually looking at the genome? Couldn't two populations have the same ratio of red vs blue rabbits while having a different ratio of heterozygotes? Couldn't NONE of them be heterozygous? The example doesn't even make sense, he used that fact that there are 3 blue and 2 red to determine that 14% are heterozygous... which equates to 0.7 of a rabbit??? Okay, just a problem with using such a small population as an example but... something still isn't being explained properly here. Is it just a statistical estimation or something??
@@ahall9839
We are looking at probabilities here, which is why we get results like 0.7 of a rabbit. Each individual copy of the gene has a certain chance to have the blue allele, and a certain chance to have the red allele. Since there is no relationship between the two copies an individual has, which allele each copy is doesn't depend on which allele the other copy is, so it is simple to calculate; except we work backward, instead of having the chances and calculating the result, we have the result and we calculate the chances.
So for example, let's say each copy of a gene has 50% chance of being a red allele and 50% chance of being a blue allele. A rabbit therefore has only 25% chances of having only red alleles and 25% chance of only having blue alleles, while it has 50% chances of having one of each. If we have 100 rabbits, there would be about 25 blue and 75 red, with 50 of them being heterozygotes; and if we have a population of 100 rabbits with 25 blue rabbits, we can use the math in the video to figure out that each allele has 50% chance of appearing.
@@ahall9839 we know which ones have 2 copies of the recessive traits because that’s the only way recessive traits can appear. Meaning we know B^2 in the second formula. From there were can calculate B (just square root B^2) and then use that to calculate R. Then we can square R to get R^2 and multiple R and B to get RB.
Finding this series 8 months after it was released and wondering why it only has 68K views and not 68M views. Forrest's explanations, examples, and enthusiasm make it so easy to understand concepts that often get bogged down in confusing terminology and lackluster pedagogy. Please keep up the solid work, it is greatly appreciated.
Amazing content again. So concisely delivered and easy to follow. You’re a great teacher. Keep it up Forrest!
"The sxiest peacock gets to reproduce......" Forrest had me vanquishing from laughter instanteouly after those words exited his buccul cavity.
Dear Forrest,
Thank you very much for this incredible series of videos! As a biologist I am really glad to see such complex subjects as gene networks, the calculation of allele frequency, how environmental factors can lead to speciation and the evolution of complex structure, and so many more explained in such a simple and understandable way!!! I must say that I couldn't help but feel very nostalgic of the days that I first read of those concepts at Uni!
You are really awesome keep up the great and much needed work that you do!!!
Forrest, you produce some quality videos and they are really appreciated.
Excellent as every, thanks and please keep it up. You do help so many.
Hell yeah. I wish a few of my "God did it" coworkers could sit still long enough to watch this.
If they're anything like the ones I know they would spend the whole time bashing it either because he's an atheist, or he's "of the devil" and only trying to lead people to hell (which makes no sense since he's an atheist), or because confirmation bias would lead them to just argue with everything because people like Ken Ham or Ray Comfort told them to
Wish my parent (god-did-it-ers) could sit and watch this without scoffing thinking it’s wrong despite bring hella ignorant about how anything work 😫😫
This is such a small detail, but I LOVED that you put up definitions for all of the new terms!!! I saw someone suggest that on an earlier episode and it’s really cool to see that it was accounted for here.
I came upon a milk snake in our back yard that I did not recognize. I looked it up on line by its looks and found 'copperhead'. The snake I found had dark areas on both sides that did not meet on the back where on the copperheads, they meet on the back. Also, it was lying in dead leaves and was 'wagging' the tip of its tail so that it sounded a bit like a rattler snake.
I too am impressed by Batesian Mimicry.
@Brandon Letzco I think I would much rather see the milk snake up close and personal.
My milk snake brings all the boys to the yard.
Currently deprogramming from my homeschooled upbringing, I watched the first episode and I can’t stop, this is so good! It’s so fascinating how all of science fits so perfectly with the other studies, how our world isn’t a closed system my any means. Thank you so much!
I’ve always held that most people who actually understand how evolution works believe in it, and most people who don’t believes in it have massive misunderstandings about how it actually works. And it’s was to see why there are so many misconceptions. Even if it weren’t for creationists putting disinformation out there, many kids find biology classes incredibly boring and thus don’t pay attention. By making science digestible and making learning fun, you are helping people learn these things in ways that classrooms cannot. Thank you Forest.
So happy for this. Thanks Forrest. Your an amazing science communicator.
RUclips’s algorithm sucks. You should have 1M+ subscribers by now so that informational content like this can be seen by more people. I love the way you back up your statements with examples. Instead of just arguing from authority, you back up your comments with examples to illustrate your point.
Forrest Valkai, the ✨️new✨️ Science Guy.
Val, Val, Valkie the science guy!
The color gradient visual aid was brilliant
It really is nice to take a break from calling out creationists and just focusing on the wonders of evolution. This is a very nice change of pace, and I’m sure I’m not the only person who really appreciates the time you take to educate and teach us about biology :)
Absolutely
I like the analogy of languages. Latin evolved to French, Italien, German, Englisch. But French and Italien are closer to each other than to either German or English .
Furthermore, take the example of French. It changed a lot in the last 150 years. Has the old version of French died out completely? No, in Quebec, Canada, they are still speaking a kind of archaic French (too few people top really evolve a complete new strain). So both French in France and French in Canada coexist, like different kinds (I am so sorry for that word 🙃) do in nature.
Also Quebec is surrounded by Anglophones. That makes them guard their language more carefully.
Actually, Latin didn’t turn into German, they are actually different families. Latin was the language of the Romans while German (or at least it’s ancestor) was the language of the Goths
@@TheNinthGeneration1 You are absolutely right, I was to sloppy with my statement. Latin evolved into the Romanic (is that the correct english word?) languages and had a massive impact on the germanic dialects. This way quite some latin grammer jumped species and became integral part of German. 🙃
@@michaelnixda8143that’s more accurate, though it’s biggest influence was on English
@@TheNinthGeneration1 Who cares about English? 😁🙃😎
I think this was the best episode in the series to date -- everything clearly explained with excellent examples.
I've studied evolutionary biology on my own and as an elective in college and even when you are explaining things I understand already, you have an amazing ability to make it make even more sense. You are a very gifted educator.
Darwin used the term, "survival of the fittest," but evolution is really more like survival of the good enough.
"of the fittest" is basically good enough but ok
@@gdmathguy Agreed, but a lot of people misread "the fittest" as "the best."
Survival of the fattest
1. I love your example of Linguistic Evolution because it is _also_ driven by Population Dynamics and Selection Pressure.
2. Assessing the allele frequency in a diploid population, using...pretty basic...algebra; AWESOME!
3. I liken the roll of Regulatory Networks to that of light switches. Imagine a mansion with one light switch per room. Some are On/Off, and some are dimmers. Some rooms have colored lights while others have basic white. Some are wired in series, such that "B" only turns on if "A" is on, but "A" can be on _without_ "B" being on. The number of possible combinations is staggering.
There is no selection pressure in linguistic evolution. That's just not true.
I’m sad to see that this series isn’t doing as good in the algorithm than your other videos, I’ve found it much more interesting than debunking idiotic creationists. I hope you continue this series!
Those two little dots over Forrests shoulder make me wipe my screen every samn time! I keep thinking I've got some dust on my screen 😂
Another awesome video, loving this series! Just a tiny nitpick, at 26:16 you talk about the sequence of DNA ahead of a gene, calling it a "promotor" (and pronouncing it like the motor in a car), but it's actually a promoter, as in it promotes the RNA polymerase to bind there.
Love small corrections like this. It helps keep the integrity of the video as high as possible. I’ve put together very technical presentations before and the amount of arguing you can do between experts is crazy. But I always walk away better for it because I either understand their point or I concede that the point is still opaque.
@@BlowsTube Science always tries to change to the better, no matter how true it is. Truly fascinating
Sound the same to me so idk
Dude I love watching your biz. When I first heard you say "Oh my Glob" I instantly thought, "This guy could be my buddy" haha. Keep it up man
Sorry if this is a dumb question, but in the calculation of allele frequencies, I'm a little confused about why the equation should be squared. What I mean is, even if we know the number of recessive expressing individuals, how do we know what proportion of the dominant expressing individuals is homozygous, and how many are heterozygous? How do you come to that particular ratio?
I believe the calculations are only applicable at the Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium, but I could be mistaken. I think that with entire populations you assume that you have an equilibrium.
I was confused by that also. I *think* I've made sense of it, but am not absolutely certain. My working idea is that r and b represent the percentage of the alleles in the population that are red and blue respectively. We don't start out knowing those numbers. But, there are four possibilities for any individual: rr, rb, br, or bb. If r is the probability of getting a red allele from one parent, r^2 is the probability of getting one from each parent. The terms of the binomial expansion give you the weighted probability for each option. The middle term is 2rb, because there are two ways to get one of each, depending on which parent gives you which allele.
@@JRMcCarroll Yes there are 2 ways to get ab and that is why it is times two. However it still doesn't make sense to know the genotypes from that little information. I am fairly certain he used the equations that apply to a large number of individuals, where statistically you would get an equilibrium, as he was working with a population. What is confusing is the fact that in the scenario he presented, there are only 5 individuals, wich doesn't represent a population.
Forrest, when you go from r + b = 1, then state “each individual has 2 alleles so we’re going to square this equation” that takes a huge leap of faith. (Why not “… so we’re going to double it, 2(r + b) = 1”) Dude, you’ve already done plenty of videos about the dangers of following leap of faith arguments. But hey, I wouldn’t be making this comment if I thought your videos weren’t great.
@@ernieM Pretty sure it's the correct math and he just didn't explain why, for the sake of time and simplicity. My comment above tries to explain why I think it works. I don't think I can explain it any better without diagrams, and I'm also not totally sure that I'm right about it.
Despite all I've already learned about evolution, biology & genetics, it never ceases to surprise me when I learn something new. Just listening to you explain things makes concepts which seemed to have taken forever for me to grasp, so much simpler to relate with each other, so thankyou for that.
I think you and Aaron Ra should join up and take over the education system!❤
Aaron would make us handle snakes.
Add a good helping of Erika (Gutsick Gibbon) and you'd have an unbeatable trifecta !!
@@jwaustinmunguy I'm down
The way you explain somewhat complicated issues and break them down is genius. Lots of former Christians here who didn't have a proper education. You are helping us to catch up!
This is a really great video! Wonderful analogies, clear but concise explanations, and very informative. Great work!
The way you finish this series, 'never stop learning,' has been my goal in life for decades - not about to stop now!
Just started watching. Gave the video a thumbs up before I watched it. At this point Forrest hasn't made a video I didn't enjoy. So I like them before I forget.
Wow... I used to think I had a pretty decent understanding of evolution (fancied myself one of them "college educated" people the pastor is always warning his flock about), but Genetic Drift was a concept that I thought about and I knew the term, but didn't realize that it was the name for the concept. This is such an awesome series, and I'm so glad you're presenting it Forrest. Such a fantastic Science Communicator.
A great way to see the changes in a species over time is to take a photo of yourself every day (or for someone else to do it) and make a timelapse of your life, and compare the results. Day to day (aside from cutting your hair or taking noticeable injuries), you won't look different. But if you take the first and last pictures, or you take one picture from every five years, you can notice a large difference, while still noticing the similarities.
Forrest, I'm on my first year of my biology major with a shit ton of personal problems and a mountain of percieved academic failures.
Your videos are my personal reminder to find a reason to everything that I am learning and how it is going to be used in my future.
Thank you for doing this.
"We can all agree that having legs is better than not having legs."
*Offended snake noise*
Don't worry some still have leg buds. Especially boas. So its possible for them to get their back legs again if it somehow becomes evolutionarily viable.
I love listening to Forrest!
I think he can be enthusiastically talking about paint drying without getting boring.
I think I had had a lot of "promiscuous proteins" when I was was a young adult....
Seriously though, Forrest, THANKS so much for this! You have a great talent for explaining things that makes this actually pretty easy to understand. I know there's a lot more to everything than this, but I'm FINALLY beginning to learn how this works... and that makes me happy!!
One aspect that I feel is left out of most discussions: the number of objects involved. Before we get to evolution, consider the emergence of the first self-replicating molecules. This happens in a population of atoms of hydrogen, oxygen and carbon where there are many many orders of magnitude of atoms. This makes it seem inevitable that many different molecules can come together within the temperatures near the surface of the earth. Eventually replicating combinations begin to self-propagate and we're up and running.
Really loving this series! While watching, I was reminded of an animal I've encountered that fakes a trait to make other animals think it is more dangerous. I was hiking with my brother when I heard a warning rattle. The snake was less than 3 feet away and I backed up Quick. However, it turned out to be a bull snake and didn't have a rattle on it's tail at all. Bull snakes can mimic the rattle sound just by hissing! It's not a venomous snake, but dang if it doesn't work like a charm 😆
I really enjoy how well Forrest breaks the topics down for a layman to understand. It's so fascinating how evolution actually works.
Thank you, Forrest! You're my favorite teacher!
Holy sh*t. You summarized my whole semester of genetics 101 in a single video. Congrats
I was just thinking “Man, I can’t wait for the next Forrest Valkai video!” When a motif popped up announcing this episode! I’m so excited!
Loving this series! Keep it up! I would love to know more about epigenetics, and hox genes. That image of the fly with limbs growing from it's face was mind blowing. I've often wondered how our bodies know where to grow everything.
How deeply is this all understood? What are some of the unanswered questions when it comes to evolution?
A video on hox genes would be so cool. A lot of this is pretty well understood but there are always new questions coming up. I'd love to see him do a video on this.
Evolution has got to be the most fascinating subject in science. Thank you Forrest for making this easy to understand and fun to listen to.
Wow, that was a lot! A very informative video, and one I hope people will watch as many times as they need to to understand the many fascinating topics you touched on!
Many times I've heard you say that this part of evolution is you favorite. Lets admit it, it's all of evolution that is your favorite parts! Thanks
The irony of the genetic/evolution story is that Darwin had a copy of Mendel's paper but apparently never read it.
Almost certainly never read it. I believe it was unopened among his papers when he died
@@georgeparkins777 Talk about boats passing in the night...
@@johnsheehan5109 I've heard people say that they don't think he would have understood it but I have no idea why they say that. Obviously Darwin was quite an educated man.
@@georgeparkins777 Having read most of Darwin and also Mendel's paper I'm quite sure he would have understood it but also would have shared it with Huxley.
@@johnsheehan5109 I wonder if the modern synthesis of evolution would have happened sooner in that event.
This video reminded me so much of the channel Primer which has done a bunch of cool simulations on evolution(and other things) I would recommend it to anyone who liked this video
He broke it down so simple that anyone can understand it. But how much you wanna bet the Evolution deniers still won't understand this?
[6:12] "Tonight's main event matchup is Spidmunk vs Birboon. My money is on Birboon. Who you pickin', Mort?"
Bashing "irreducible complexity" without mentioning it 👍👍
Have always loved the language example, especially when you said you aren't using 'thee and thou and thine' because here in Yorkshire those words are still in common usage demonstrating the overlap!
Thx Forrest very informative video, I'm going to watch this video at lest two times more😊
Wrote it already, a poodle breeder wanted to "create" new, stable colour variants for poodles. He did that methodically, doing EXACTLY what Forrest describes here.
He used mice, as there all goes quicker. Took standard mice and bred for colour variations and then how to stabilize these variants.
After a number of years, he knew enough that he knew how to proceed with his dogs,
So to speak, a directed disruptive selection
Hey Forrest! You've spoken about those caterpillars that look like a snake on the end of their bodies before. On Twitter someone put up a clip of 2 that had the exact same markings (same "snakes" on their tails), but one was green and the other orange. I saw that you were tagged by someone asking why they were different colors (are they different "species"?), is there any way you can do a video or TikTok about it? (I don't have TikTok, but I always watch the compilations 😊
These videos are very informative! I learned more watching this series than I did in high school biology class. Thank you Forrest!
Forrest I'm going to level with you. I'm a gonna need a spider chipmunk plushie. It's so cute.
Thanks Forrest, now I can look forward to bird-baboon haunting my dreams.
Man. you were busy today, Forrest. Talk Heathen, Atheist Experience and posted your own video.
Bestest Sunday ever!
Yup. Here after watching that strong flex mic drop on TH following AXP ;)
Glad you're here, Forrest.
I love the fact that Forrest has to explain evolution in a way that focuses on debunking misconceptions in a way that you dont have to for other theories, because he knows hes gonna get attacked by creationists.
I love this series!!!
Not only are these videos top-notch, Forrest's pompadour game is top-notch. I'm talking Lyle Lovett-level.
Great stuff as always. Also great show on AXP I hope to see you there again.
Another AMAZING video on evolution. I love this topic but I'm not that well versed in it. With every video, I feel myself actually learning, and I love it. Super excited for episode 4.
P.S. I think a cool idea would be for you to make a bonus video, call it something like "Batesian Mimicry | The Light of Evolution - Bonus Episode 1". The idea would be to focus on specific areas of evolution that aren't part of the main course. Topics you find cool/interesting that you'd like to share. And I can only imagine how interesting a video like that would be, if it's one you specifically picked out.
watching this drop live on talk heathen was awesome. Learn something Tom?
No, Tom's mind is very, very closed.
Tom's not here, man.
Keep up the good work! The world needs more educators like you.
I can't upvote your videos enough Forrest, thanks!
Spot the redditor yall , haha but jokes aside friend, I agree . I can't like forrest's video fast enough , his videos are just that good
The color analogy at the 5 minute mark is a brilliant way of explaining this concept of graduation to people. I've often thought that kind of visual could help Kent Hovind and Matt Powell figure a few things out. Give them each a massive box of colored pencils, like a 100-pencil set. Ask each to sort, independently of one another, a pile of JUST blue pencils, and a second pile of JUST green pencils. I guarantee you they will not divide the pencils the exact same way, and their little pinheads would explode. It would be hilarious.
Another home run from Forrest. You're the best! Love your stuff, you are an amazing educator and your passion lights candles.
Love the content Forrest!
As someone raised in a creationist cult, your content has helped me de-program on something I was never even aware of. It has made the word make more sense than ever and gives me hope.
babe wake up forrest valkai just dropped another 40 minute banger
You really are one of the best teachers I've ever seen. I can't imagine how intelligent I would be if I had had you as my biology teacher in HS
I was coming here to write the same thing !
Thank you, Forrest, you certainly make me keep learning.
I have been a scientist for decades. I have two science degrees. I have read countless popular books on Biology in general and evolution in particular.
I am amazed at the info I am leaning from you and so excited learning things I did not know about _topics_ I did not even know.
Thank you so much. Well done.
Hey Kent and Matt.....please watch this and learn something!!! Maybe then you'll stop misrepresenting what evolution actually is
What, and place even the slightest possibility of risk on their tax free status?
😄😂🤣🤣🤣
That's the funniest thing I've heard all week. Sure, it might only be nearly Tuesday, but I'm confident it'll still be up there...
@@mr2atara indeed lol, good point
Love this series, even as someone quite familiar with evolutionary biology I learn so much. It's explained so clearly and simply but covers more than just the basics. Also the sheer amount of passion you have for this subject makes this series easy to listen to and engage with. This is definitely shaping up to be one of the best educational tools for evolution, up there with Aron Ra's "Systematic Classification of Life" series.
TRIGGER WARNING: Math
no tiktok pls no
I always considered peacock tails to be a kind of flex. "Look art this liability I have on my rear, and consider how awesome I must be to still be alive"
@Forrest - Im a physical therapist assistant for 20 years. So if you want to get into some A&P let me know. Favorite body part Omohyoid. Least favorite - Brachial Plexus. ❤️ you dude!
How on Earth is the brachial plexus your LEAST favorite part?! It's a big M that controls your arms! It's radical!
My least favorite part (and forgive my layman wording) is the forearm.
Just seeing how the bones cross when you twist your wrist gives me the heebie jeebies. And now I have to look up Omohyoid and Brachial Plexus
ok looked up Brachial Plexus and I personally hate that nerve cluster because I've recently had an episode where I think mine misfired because basically my fingers attached to each of those nerves basically made each pair (pinky/ring, index/middle, and thumb) to kind pair up and cross and just had little control over those fingers for like 5-10 minutes and it was scary as hell to me.
That, and my left Ulna loves to just make my pinky/ring finger get all tingly for long periods of time, although doing some of my physical therapy exercises seems to help.
@@RenegadeScienceTeacher because if an injury happens in that region it is a complete horror to treat. It can present itself as almost anything.
I wish that I would have had Forrest as my biology professor! Of course, this is impossible because I am older than he is! 😂
😂
I just want to say I love your videos! I wish I had teachers in high school with half the enthusiasm and eloquence that you display.
Forrest is giving us a fraction of a percent of his total biology knowledge and it alone is so beautifully complex I love it!
I'll admit that I knew a lot of the basics this covered already...
However I must say that this was THE MOST COMPREHENSIVE AND ACCESSIBLE PRESENTATION OF THIS SUBJECT THAT I HAVE EVER SEEN.
This is absolutely wonderful - and should be required viewing for anyone who takes high-school biology (or who AVOIDS taking high-school biology).
FYI: There are two spelling errors at 31:45.
Forrest, this is a fantastic series. You should be very proud. Keep it up, amigo!
I love the comparison to linguistic evolution because it's so wonderfully apt. And the awesome thing is it goes deeper than that: we can talk about Old English, Middle English, Early Modern English, and Modern English, which are very noticeably the same language, but different stages of that language's evolution. Likewise we can talk about different stages of evolution within a single species. For example the earliest homo sapiens have marked differences to modern homo sapiens as we've continued to evolve.
The Way you explain all this is really easy to understand for me, even though I'm not a native English speaker.
And your videos always make me go " SCIENCE. IS. SO. COOL."