David,
People will hear what they want to hear. Even if you present a marvelous argument, you will get the same questions put back to you.
Just as I lean towards a young earth creation. We could go back and forth on the age of the earth. You are now going back and forth with evolutionists.
People will keep getting bogged down in the minor details and miss the big picture as I see the discussion heading into micro-biology and who is deemed an expert to talk about it.
It doesn't take a rocket scientist to believe in Genesis. Even if one were a rocket scientist, they should also know that life does not get created in a laboratory with a group of non living material. Life that is claimed to be created in laboratories come from living things or things that already has the essense of life in it.
Pray for the evolutionists to see the light in that discussion you are engaged.
I do agree with you that evolution is not "science" but rather a belief system that is used to construct models to explain current observations. Because the foundational presuppositions are ultimately not observable or provable, it is based upon faith. Unfortunately, biological evolution is one of many applications of evolutionary philosophy and most individuals (and scientists) are not epistemologically self-conscious enough to even know what beliefs they accept on the basis of faith. Ultimately, evolution wars against the Gospel of Jesus Christ by denying the reality of sin, the need for a savior and the truth of Jesus' resurrection. In this regard, your debate is vitally important for those in bondage to their evolutionary belief system.
The term Evolution carries several connotations. Most people who object to biological evolution for religious or ideological reasons do so because they find the idea of common descent repugnant or contrary to literalist intepretations of religious text.
And particularly the idea that humans share geologically recent common ancestors with apes, primates, mammals, etc. is discomforting to some.
Before concluding that there have been no predictions made from the supposition of common descent, it might be a good idea to think about what you gentlemen would accept as a positive prediction. IOW, what would we expect to see in the observable universe if common decsent were in fact valid? To e-mail replace nospam with aol.
DarkSyde,
If evolution as you suggest were true such as the change of one life form to another (fish into lizards), where are the transitional forms?
There are millions of fossils found and those are distinct animal types (fish is fish and lizard is lizard). No where in the fossil records are the transitional forms. If evolution were true, there would be millions of transitional forms in the fossil record.
BTW, it's the theory of evolution, so let's not look at evolution as if it were fact.
So, for one to adhere to evolution, it in itself seems to be a religion of its own as its subscribers do so on faith alone.
Ok, Elvis correctly pointed out that one prediction of common descent would be transitional forms. I think it might be a good diea to get some kind of consensus of what we would expect to see in a transitional fossil species before discussing if a given candidate passes or fails that mark. Otherwise Elvis might be tlaking apples and I might be answering with oranges. But I agree Elvis, that is a plausible prediction and I'll set up a thread on my Comm Blog to discuss it further if you wish or I'll give you a brief answer here in a bit.
Can anyone think of what else we might expect to observe among extant species or in the record if common descent were valid?
"It is far too malleable and has little or no predictive power. And there is no reasonable test that might prove it false."
There are numerous lines of evidence that include both predictions and potential falsifications. Here is just one small sampling. Evolution may not be a perfect science; neither is quantum physics, which seems to escape popular criticism because of its supposed lack of ideological neutrality. To call evolutionary theory "far too malleable" or to claim it has "little or no predictive power" is to ignore a hundred years of research, discovery, and insight.
OK DarkSyde, I'll wait for your explanation on transitional forms.
You know, if there were transitional forms the evolutionists would have used those as their proof to validate their theory. Yet, no one is coming forward as there are no transitional forms to be found as there are none.
Jim, evolution is more faith than science.
Elvis what would be an acceptable transitional in your view? Not dead accurate and I'm not going to pounce on any lack of technical knowledge here. I'm not a biologist or even a professional scientist.
I'm curious however what kind of general characteristics you would accept as plausible evidence of transitional morphology?
Elvis, that's a fine platitude, but it doesn't address the link I posted (or the larger body of evidence it is contained in). HERVs are compelling evidence that humans and apes share a common ancestor. At least address that fact before calling evolution unscientific.
Also, Elvis, you might consider reading this before dismissing transitional forms wholesale.
Jim's link pointed to endogenous retrovirus as evidence for common ancestry. If instead they provide a benefit (i.e. are not just junk gentic material) then they can be postulated as a reused design pattern. Such is the case: look here
Perhaps, this is too simplified.
Let's say evolution were true. Some genetic change happened and a dinosaur produced a new animal to the earth, the bird as an offspring. What is going to mate properly with that new animal to produce other animals of that kind? Evolutionists going to say that some probability of the random change happened that is to benefit their survival and is going to produce a male and female that can mate to make more of that kind?
Maybe I've been sheltered, but as far as I know, mutation or genetic change that I've seen is a harmful thing such as the cancers.
As for defining a transitional form, I don't have a proper definition. Even the so called evolution experts have yet to make that determination and to produce one to validate their theory.
I just don't have the faith in evolution as I can't see it happening.
David, then you're left with the ad hoc hypothesis that for some unknown reason, the designer inserted that HERV into apes and humans, but not into their distant kin--and not only that, but used viruses as the "design" vector. Besides, of all the known HERVs, very few have known functions--and these have likely been coopted through evolutionary processes; others are involved in autoimmune diseases and, perhaps, schizophrenia, as the article's authors point out. In their words: "The ERVWE1 locus is a young element, as the HERV-W ancestor active element entered the primate lineage 25-40 million years ago. Our working hypothesis is that this element has been selected during primate evolution to play a role in placentation. However, it is also possible that this locus is a still-active pseudogene in the process of extinction, and that its activity in the syncytiotrophoblast formation is still a remnant of its original function for the propagation of retroviruses, but that has no real physiological role." Their research seems to support the former hypothesis, but nothing in the work suggests that HERVs are an instance of anything other than what evolutionary theorists believe them to be: the remnants of ancient viral activity, passed on for generations and modified through mutation and selection. (In fact, mutations seem to be responsible for ERVWE1's selective preservation, as the article mentions.)
"As for defining a transitional form, I don't have a proper definition. Even the so called evolution experts have yet to make that determination and to produce one to validate their theory."
Elvis, do you have any evidence to support this claim, especially given the link I posted?
Jim,
Fair enough, but the argument that very few HERVs have known functions is not persuasive--given that we were once told that none had any function. And that other junk DNA had no function. And that the appendix had no function. The body is replete with useful stuff once thought useless.
David, certainly, more functions could be discovered in HERV sequences. Conversely, even once-"necessary" DNA sequences have been knocked out in organisms with no deleterious effects. DNA is more plastic than pop-science would have us believe, and we still have much to learn.
However, HERV evidence is only one consideration that stacks up quite nicely with all the other lines of evidence, as I've linked to previously. Common ancestry is simply the most parsimonious explanation for the remarkable similarity between ape and human retroviral insertions.
Elvis my problem is that without a reasonably rough expectation of what you would accept as a transitional morphology I'm unable to determine where your educational level is on paleontology and my experience has been that folks who deny trannies don't want to give any definition up front so that they can rig the argument down the road or simply calim 'is not'. Now without a common understanding of what we're looking for we cannot proceed. Typically, trannies show morphological traits intermediate between two well represented clades in the fossil record or between extant taxa, or some combo. In most cases, though not all, this is limited to records of the bony or hard material of the specimen. All a fossil can really tell us is what an organism looked like and when it lived. Associated material can tell us about the environment, we can infer obvious traits such as carnivore Vs herbivore in many cases.
I can provide you a number, and I'm talking literally hundreds. of acepted trannies with the click of a mouse. But first we need some kind of consensus on what you would accept and what the fossil record can realistically provide. Do you understand?
David we observe viri insert them selves in the manner exhibited by ERV's, we've seen cells reproduce those ERV's faithfully in through mitosis, we can see places where LINE's and SINE's in the genome are overwritten. So yes, the most parsimonious explanation is that they 'really did' originate in this way. IOW, it makes sense to infer this occurred.
To replace common descent with IDC one would need to not only explain ERV's but also transitional fossils, atavistic and vestigial structures, biostratification of the fossil record, observed speciation, etc, each category composed of literally thousands of loosely interconnected sub disciplines and specific lines of evidence all of which converge on common descent, and IDC would have to do so under one, coherent, explanatory framework. This is the choice we are faced with in the IDC Vs evo discussion.
Your own position that neither IDC and evolutionary biology qualify as science is one I've seen before and it's certainly a welcome breath of fresh air to discuss that. BUt it's important to ebar in mind that regardless of our conclusions, evo will stay classified as a science and IDC will languish scientifically until enforced by political decree or supported by the evidence.
The trouble I see with defining a transitional is that it would seem to require knowledge of the nature of the transition. That is, we have to know what changes to what, and how. Archeopteryx comes to mind, since it is used in defense of the reptile->bird transition. But Archeopteryx, if it really is a transitional, is a fairly obvious example of one. I would expect most transitions to be much more subtle.
On the subject, I would also expect to see living transitionals, especially in species that evolved later in history. The same problem arises in this case. Namely, would I recognize a transitional if I saw it?
Well how about this:
1. We'd expect, given good representation in the fossil record, that we would find the transitional holotype later than the basal form and before the more derived modern form.
2. We'd expect the transitional to be grossly consisted with the known nested hierarchy.
3. We'd expect to find suites of features in the transitional which are derived from the basal form.
4. We'd expect to find suites of features in the transitional that are basal to the later form.
5. We'd expect molecular analysis of nuclear and mitochondrial genetic material to be grossly consistent with the phylogeny of the transitional as intermediate between the respective basal and derived forms.
That's a decent start I feel for a non-paleontologist. For homework, let's look at archaeopteryx as a candidate transitional between modern birds and earlier reptiles and see how it address each of those impromptu criteria I've offered.
David,
First, you might note that the sciences involved in the study of evolution are biology, chemistry, physics, physical anthropology, and geology. Evolution as a fact and theory is accepted within those disciplines, mainly because different independent and convergent lines of evidence point to biological evolution as the process responsible for biodiversity on earth.
I want to address one of your first points, the argument about natural selection as the "framework" around which evolution is constructed, specifically your post:
Evolution, by contrast, is framework built upon natural selection, with the plausible (and irrefutably true) axiom that a trait providing an advantage will "take over" as it were.
In response, the concept of evolution predates Darwin and Wallace's co-discovery of natural selection in the extant western literature by a considerable period of time. If you consider the original explanations of Anaximnader of Miletus, evolution has been around in western literature since around 530 BCE. The work of George-Louis Leclerc, Comte de Buffon in publication of his Historie Naturelle, comments on the common ancestry of humans and other apes over 100 years before Darwin. Buffon's other great work, Les Epoques de la Nature, discusses the great age of the planet and is a precursor to the later work of Lyell (Lyell's work also influenced Darwin and Wallace). Charles Darwin's own grandfather, Erasmus Darwin, wrote about evolution in his work Zoonomia , or The Laws of Organic Life over 60 years before Charles Darwin published anything about natural selection.
What does this mean? It means that your initial claim about evolution being built on a framework of natural selection is inaccurate. Discovery of natural selection as ONE of the mechanisms of biological evolution contributed to our current understanding of the process; there are other processes, just as important and not mentioned by you in your post.
Next point: the testability of natural selection and differentiation of natural selection from other mechanisms of evolution. The scientific literature is full of examples of testing natural selection within populations. I'm at something of a loss to decide where to begin with giving you specific examples. Here is a partial list from the recent literature:
Constraints on Adaptive Evolution: The Functional Trade-Off between Reproduction and Fast-Start Swimming Performance in the Trinidadian Guppy (Poecilia reticulata). By: Ghalambor, Cameron K.; Reznick, David N.; Walker, Jeffrey A.. American Naturalist, Jul2004, Vol. 164 Issue 1, p38, 13p
INDIVIDUAL-LEVEL SELECTION AS A CAUSE OF COPE'S RULE OF PHYLETIC SIZE INCREASE. By: Kingsolver, Joel G.; Pfennig, David W.; Phillips, P.. Evolution, Jul2004, Vol. 58 Issue 7, p1608, 5p, 2 graphs
Beaks, Adaptation, and Vocal Evolution in Darwin's Finches. (cover story) By: Podos, Jeffrey; Nowicki, Stephen. Bioscience, Jun2004, Vol. 54 Issue 6, p501, 10p, 2 diagram
NATURAL SELECTION AND THE ORGAN-SPECIFIC DIFFERENTIATION OF HIV-1 V3 HYPERVARIABLE REGION. By: SanJuán, Rafael; Codoñer, Francisco M.; Moya, Andrés; Elena, Santiago F.; Hey, J.. Evolution, Jun2004, Vol. 58 Issue 6, p1185, 10p, 2 charts, 1 diagram, 1 graph
VARIABLE PREDATION REGIMES PREDICT THE EVOLUTION OF SEXUAL DIMORPHISM IN A POPULATION OF THREESPINE STICKLEBACK. By: Reimchen, T. E.; Nosil, P.; Wrainwright, P.. Evolution, Jun2004, Vol. 58 Issue 6, p1274, 8p, 2 charts, 4 diagrams, 1 graph
Natural Selection and Molecular Evolution in PTC, a Bitter-Taste Receptor Gene. By: Wooding, Stephen; Kim, Un-kyung; Bamshad, Michael J.; Larsen, Jennifer; Jorde, Lynn B.; Drayna, Dennis. American Journal of Human Genetics, Apr2004, Vol. 74 Issue 4, p637, 10p
Frequency and Microenvironmental Pattern of Selection on Plastic Shade-Avoidance Traits in a Natural Population of Impatiens capensis. By: Huber, Heidrun; Kane, Nolan C.; Heschel, M. Shane; von Wettberg, Eric J.; Banta, Joshua; Leuck, Anne-Marie; Schmitt, Johanna. American Naturalist, Apr2004, Vol. 163 Issue 4, p548, 16p
AN EXPERIMENTAL TEST OF THE ADAPTIVE EVOLUTION OF PHOTOTROPINS: BLUE-LIGHT PHOTORECEPTORS CONTROLLING PHOTOTROPISM IN ARABIDOPSIS THALIANA. By: Galen, Candace; Huddle, Julie; Liscum, Emmanuel. Evolution, Mar2004, Vol. 58 Issue 3, p515, 9p, 2 charts, 3 graphs, 1bw
The citations refer you to literature reporting the results of testing natural selection; exposing your claim that natural selection is untested as a fallacy.
I hope that this post clarifies some of the misinformation you appear to possess in regards to evolution and hope that perusal of the literature gives you adequate reason to reconsider your prior conclusions.
Of course I cannot read these papers, I have to work -- and watch NASCAR. But at any rate, you missed my point.
The point was not that the field of genetics is not legitimate.
The point was not that natural selection does not occur.
The point was not to get into a debate about transitional forms.
The point was, using the same generalization I did before, is that statements along the lines of species X evolved adaptation Y in response to environmental stress Z, unless being applied to a controlled lab experiement, are mere speculation, are not falsifiable through testing, and are therefore not science, regardless of whether they are correct.
David on the header you stated in part that [paraphrasing] "the point is that evolution is not a science because it's not testable".
Then on your most recent post preceding this one you claim:
The point was not that .. genetics is not legit..
and:
The point was not to get into a debate about transitional fossils
Genetics and paleontology two fields which allows us to confirm or reject the very testable predictions you questioned. Thus, using your own words, genetics and transitional fossils are most certainly germane to your discussion as you yourself framed.
It's not at all clear what you think evolution is or what parts of evolution you reject vs accept.
Do you accept that humans and pongids share a geologically recent common ancestor as Micheal Behe, author of "Darwin's Black Box", states?
Do you accept that speciation has been observed as reported in several dozen reviewed and confirmed cases?
Do you agree that the material Fish presented offers in depth, highly technical, testing of predictions made by various components of the modern synthesis?
DarkSyde,
I concede that I could be more precise. Aspects of evolution certainly are testable. A more precise statement would be that:
Evolutionists [while being careful scientists and doing real science] are nevertheless free to engage (in peer reviewed publication) in untestable and thus unfalsifiable (even in principle, without a time machine) speculation that goes beyond science.
This is independent of what parts of evolution I accept. Untestable speculation is not science regardless of whether I agree or not. That’s why I agree that ID is not science. It is speculation that fits my world view, so I am free to engage in it. It is perfectly reasonable for me to do so, and it is perfectly reasonable and proper for evolutionists to speculate. It is also reasonable for scientific journals to reject it. If they rejected all speculation that could not even, in principle be tested, then there would be a level playing field.
As for your questions, though irrelevant,
I don’t accept that humans and pongids have a common ancestor. I don’t know whether I agree with Behe—I have not read much of what he has written, not even his popularizations. I am only familiar in general terms with his idea of irreducible complexity and I find it compelling.
I accept that speciation occurs.
I am not familiar with Fish’s work.
Sorry about hijacking the subject, David.
For the evolutionists, if you have so much "proof" of evolution, why is it still a theory?
For the evolutionist, tell me how life came into being? Can you take something that is devoid of life and create life in a laboratory? Don't use something that already has the essense of life in it and claim creating life as in genetic engineering. I mean take the non living elements and make a new living thing out of them. I thought spontaneous generation was debunked by Pasteur else the pasteurization process we use with milk (for example) would not work.
Perhaps, so many different animals resemble each other is because there is a common Creator (God) who made everything as in Intelligent Design...
Evolutionists [while being careful scientists and doing real science] are nevertheless free to engage (in peer reviewed publication) in untestable and thus unfalsifiable (even in principle, without a time machine) speculation that goes beyond science.
This is a weird statement since you have admitted that you know little about evolutionary biology. How then do you know what papers in the field are like? How many can you cite to support your statement?
I don’t accept that humans and pongids have a common ancestor.
How then do you explain shared molecular errors in their DNA, like unary pseudogenes? Biblical creationism offers two explanations for nature: "God did it" and "the fall did it." Such theology often argues that God created nature perfectly and corruption entered into the world after the fall. Such things like blind cave fish are explained as post-fall degeneration. Such theology often argues that any similarities observed between "unrelated" organisms are due to common design. However, this theology is unable to explain common design flaws. These are features that are clearly biological flaws, but are shared between organisms that are supposed to be unrelated.
Humans, chimps, gorillas, and other primates lack the ability to synthesize ascorbic acid and must eat a diet that includes it to survive. Other animals are unable to synthesize ascorbic acid because they have a complete metabolic pathway. However, humans et al. are missing a key enzyme, L-gulano-γ-lactone oxidase, which breaks the synthesis. We do have the non functioning remains of this gene still in our DNA, as do other primates which have been studied: chimps, gorillas, orangutans, and macaques. In all five species the gene is broken in the same way (deletion of same exons IIRC) and is found in the same place in our genome.
Biology explains this shared flaw by proposing that in an ancestor of all five species, a deletion occurred in the L-gulano-γ-lactone oxidase, rendering it non functional. This deletion was then passed to its descendents producing the pattern that we see today. Biblical creationism is unable to explain it because either God would have to have made a flawed creation or humans would have to be related to other species. Neither are options that biblical creationism allows.
BTW: “pongids” no long exist. Chimps, gorillas, and orangutan are now classified as hominids.
Reed, does evolution explain what you call flaws? I thought evolutionary thinking goes down the path that changes occur to perpetuate or improve survival that results in a new animal. So, how do imperfections and flaws as you say it fit into evolution as problems would end up killing the new animal?
I do not view God's creations as flaws. God's creation have that Intelligent Design where there is interaction with each other (such as the food chain) to survive.
Elvis,
Reed, does evolution explain what you call flaws? I thought evolutionary thinking goes down the path that changes occur to perpetuate or improve survival that results in a new animal.
Nope. Changes occur randomly, with out reguard to reproductive ability. Some of these changes will adversely affect individuals, causing them to tend to be eliminated from the population. Other changes will positively affect indiviudals, causing them to tend to be promoted in the population. Other changes will neutrally affect the individuals and will randomly drift through the population.
So, how do imperfections and flaws as you say it fit into evolution as problems would end up killing the new animal?
Problems that do end up killing the "new animal" obvious won't increase in frequency. Imperfections and flaws don't have to kill an organism, though. In the case I mentioned above, our ancestors were able to survive just as we do: by eating fruit in their diet.
I do not view God's creations as flaws. God's creation have that Intelligent Design where there is interaction with each other (such as the food chain) to survive.
Please explain how L-gulano-γ-lactone oxidase pseudogenes shared between, humans, chimps, gorillas, orgautans, and other primates fits into your view of God's creation.
Evolution means 'change' biological evolution could mean roughly 'change in species'.
A little more precisely, biological evolution has two basic definitions:
1. Viewed from genetics, 'a change in the frequency of alleles within a population over time'
2. Diversification/speciation from common ancestors
Note that biological evolution as given in either definition does not address how life first arose, or how the earth came to be, or how the solar system formed, etc.
The scientific discipline that does address how the first population of self replicating molecules may have arisen is called 'abiogenesis'. Abio is a fascinating field, but it requires a good bit of organic chemistry to appreciate. There is no over arching theory (I'm aware of) that is easily comprehensible to the 'average' layman which does for abio what evolution does for biodiversity. There's also a good deal of mystery in abio because the actual events which may have transpired likely left little or no discernable record. Thus, we may never know the precise details of how the first life arose.
Most folks who accept evolution also accept abio, but the two are not contingent on one another for validity. Somehwat like chemistry is not contingent on where the chemicals were purchased from or manufactured for the validity of chemistry.
Let me repeat myself.
For the evolutionists, if you have so much "proof" of evolution, why is it still a theory?
For the evolutionist, tell me how life came into being? Can you take something that is devoid of life and create life in a laboratory? Don't use something that already has the essense of life in it and claim creating life as in genetic engineering. I mean take the non living elements and make a new living thing out of them. I thought spontaneous generation was debunked by Pasteur else the pasteurization process we use with milk (for example) would not work.
Perhaps, so many different animals resemble each other is because there is a common Creator (God) who made everything as in Intelligent Design...
Cool beans on the pongid/hominid classification Reed. I wouldn't mind seeing a write up, a basic one for us weekend warriors, on De Rerum Natura. I'll link it to the EvC Comm.
It seems that David's main beef with evolution is that it's very much a historical science--a way of looking over eons' worth of data and interpreting it. But he keeps saying it isn't falsifiable, which makes little sense. As the link I posted to earlier shows, there are many potential falsifiers in every major line of evidence. For starters, finding a human skull in the same stratum as a dinosaur's femur would be a serious blow to evolutionary stratigraphy. Why else would YEC'ers trumpet the Paluxy "discovery?"
Elvis,
Evolution is both a theory and a fact. The fact is that over time, species have changed. The Theory of Natural Selection was the first workable model to explain why and how species change, split, and diversify, over time.
The same is true of other theories in science. There is the fact that planets move, and there's Keplers Theory of PLanetary motion. There's the fact of gravity, and Newton's Theory of Gravity, etc.
Unfortunately, science has a tendency to use the same term for the fact and the theory which can be confusing as hell.
It's common among non scientists to think of a theory as a wild ass guess and that's how many of use the term 'theory' in everyday conversation. But in science, a theory is something different and something much more certain. It's a highly plausible explanation which unites a range of facts under one explanatory framework and makes testbale predictions. Theories are made of and explain facts, but they don't ever 'grow up' and become facts.
Elvis,
Check out this article. Scientists actually are working on synthesizing artificial "life" in the lab.
For the evolutionists, if you have so much "proof" of evolution, why is it still a theory?
Because theories are what you get in science when you have evidence. Unlike in popular language, a scientific theory is not a guess or a hunch; it is a well developed and well tested explaination of natural phenomna. Evolution is both a fact and a theory. The fact of evolution is that populations of organisms change over time. The theory of evolution explains this fact.
"Proofs" are for mathematics and philosophy. Science only deals in disproof.
For the evolutionist, tell me how life came into being?
This is a typical misunderstanding about evolution. Evolution is about the origin of the diversity of life, not the origin of life. Since, the evolution of life cannot occur until after life does, your question is not one to be asked of "evolutionists."
Perhaps, so many different animals resemble each other is because there is a common Creator (God) who made everything as in Intelligent Design...
What is so intelligent about the shared L-gulano-γ-lactone oxidase pseudogenes?
Jim, your quote of "Scientists actually are working on synthesizing artificial 'life' in the lab."
Working on (trying) to come up with life is not life created. Big difference.
If spontaneous generation were true, then we would have billions of new life forms springing from our canned goods all around the world. The canned goods have all the elements needed and they are already formed with the proteins needed, yet we do not see a new type of life form generating out of the canned goods. We may have contamination that spoils the canned goods, but no new life form springs forth when you open up a can of beans.
Reed, so what becomes a LAW in science if theories don't require proof?
Elvis, I believe a Law is a specific subset of a theory that applies in defined and limited situations, usually one which is quantifiable. The Theory of Gravity in Newton's Principia leads to several Laws of Motion.
The term "Law' is a bit of an older term in science and I don't know how commonly that term is applied to reently discovered quantifiable relationships. Perhaps one of the actual scientists like Jim or Reed can chime in on that.
DarkSyde, I'm not an actual scientist, but I bow in flattery.
Elvis, I'm not claiming that scientists have outdone Frankenstein. I'm merely cautioning you to avoid discounting what scientists are doing in the lab to discover possible pathways of abiogenesis. Pasteur didn't disprove abiogenesis in toto; he merely showed that one particular form, flies-from-nothing, was absurd. Applying that experiment to the origin-of-life question is reasonable only insofar as a young planet Earth resembles a muslin-covered jar. Did you read the entire article?
Jim,
So, the pasteurization process is only for keeping out flies? I thought that pasteurization also shows how absurd it is for bacteria from nothing, too. Or, better put, how absurd it is to expect life to evolve from nothing without a Creator (God) to make life.
Anyway, we're hijacking David's thread into a whole different discussion.
Scientists can do what they do in the lab as in making their proteins and perhaps artificial DNA. However, the line is drawn with life as whatever the scientists create have no essence of life, else why pasteurize/sterilize canned goods, milk, surgical equipment, etc, to get rid of the bacteria if they just evolve from dead material?
Miller's Experiment was supposed to emulate a young Earth, but he biased his experiment to provide results that he wanted to show. Not a good thing for a man of science to do.
Scientists can be right and they can be wrong, too. Just because someone is labeled a scientist or an expert doesn't mean that they are always right. Who was the scientist with the black holes that changed his mind after 30 years? I'm sure there are other scientists who adhere to Hawkings' previous view of black holes who won't change their minds.
Elvis, you are correct in one respect: pasteurization kills bacteria, and thus we do not expect bacteria to live in pasteurized milk.
Pasteurization, however, does not show that life could not have arisen from non-life in entirely different circumstances. It is almost as if you are expecting a bacterium to pop out of primordial soup fully formed. No scientist would posit that as possible. What abiogenesis (as a field) studies are possible pathways from organic compounds to life, via self-organization, energy inputs (lightning, cosmic rays, heat, etc.), etc. The article I linked to showed just such a possible pathway--"lifeless" molecules acting like living forms, multiplying and communicating.
It is nearly impossible to replicate the conditions of a young Earth in the lab, a fact which hampers all abiogenesis research, from Miller-Urey onward.
And yes, scientists can be wrong. In fact, skepticism is the basis for all scientific progress. Find good evidence to overthrow evolution, and scientists will abandon it, just as they have abandoned phlogiston and geocentrism. We're not dealing with absolute mathematical proofs, as has already been pointed out. We're dealing with probabilities, the weight of evidence, parsimony, induction, and the scientific method.
I believe David's initial concern was that evolutionary explanations are so flexible they're difficult to falsify. And thus he feels that evolution is technically not a science even though it could well be valid.
I don't share his conclusion, but I understand the concern.
If we found birds in the Triassic, we'd simply push back the ave/reptile split and maybe trash the theropod model. If we found arthropods in the precambrian we'd figure out something to account for it.
So yes, it seems that evolution is very difficult to dislodge. But it could be done. I'll leave it to the board participants to think of ways to throw a huge curve-ball to evolution.
Reed, so what becomes a LAW in science if theories don't require proof?
Elvis, nothing "becomes" a law. In science a law is a concise discription of a behavior in the natural world, usually formulated mathematically.
I've already mentioned one: finding a fossilized human skull in the same stratum as a dinosaur's femur. Such a find would [pun] rock the foundations [/pun] of evolutionary theory, not to mention geology. Which is precisely what Young-Earthers have tried to do with the Paluxy footprints.
Some more stuff:
http://www.creationism.org/grigg...riggs/
index.htm
Anyway, there are other evidence for a Creator (God) and Intelligent Design versus evolutionary theory.
http://www.texasmusicguide.com/
c...ionevidence.htm
And, you know what, there is another group of people who would rather believe in aliens starting life on earth in their space travels to seed other planets. That group will use the same evidence in the same fossil record to support their spaced out theory.
David, has this thread been hijacked enough?
"That group will use the same evidence in the same fossil record to support their spaced out theory."
And Young-Earth creationists use that same fossil record to support their flooded-out theory. The fossil evidence is just evidence, without an explanatory framework--without a theory.
Thus, the problem is not the evidence. The problem is the use, or should I say the abuse, of evidence. Remember, abiogenesis (the origin of life on earth) is open to speculation. The theory of evolution, thanks to overwhelming evidence, is much less speculative, if not unshakeably so.
DarkSyde:
You characterized my objections better than I did.
Jim: You example of human bones and dinosaur bones is not what I mean, although it makes my point perfectly. If it would take something as overboard as that to rock the foundations of evolution, then evolution on this scale is not testable.
Elvis the YEC model is shall we say, i>highly implausible.
As far as hijacking the thread, those of us interested in the evolution vs ID/C issue found this post on David's Blog becuase he was participating in a discussion on an evolution Blog (In fact THE Evolution Vs Creationism/Intelligent Design Blog) and we followed his link. I can't speak for anyone else, but I'd be willing to speculate no one is interested in being a troll or 'hijacking' the thread. The thread was, after all, discussing evolution and mentioned the Panda's Thumb, and that's where we came from and what we're interested in.
David, you're misconstruing my remarks. DarkSyde asked what a potential curveball might be; I gave the most glaring example I could think of. It is hardly the only example. I've posted this link many times before; it's well worth reading all the way through. Read it all, and then we can talk about the merits of potential falsifiers and the testability of evolutionary theories. (To call it just "evolutionary theory" is as mistaken as referring to Einstein's "Theory of Relativity," as if there is only one.)
I'll quote myself: "We're dealing with probabilities, the weight of evidence, parsimony, induction, and the scientific method." Speculation, when it enters into the picture, is speculation, no matter who is responsible. (Speculation, to some degree, is, like skepticism, an engine of scientific progress.)
I am also curious, David, why you don't accept that pongids and humans have a common ancestor, even when IDer's like Behe do.
DarkSyde, I was referring to me hijacking David's thread in bringing up splinter discussions from his original train of thought. So, if anyone else thought I was referring to them, sorry, I am not and I was referring to myself hijacking David's thread.
Jim, the fossil record does support a flooded out theory. I would not say evolution has overwhelming evidence. If it were so, there would be no debate.
David,
One of the simplest ways to test evolution is to use an equation derived by Hardy and Weinberg and known as Hardy-Weinberg Equilibrium.
http://www.ndsu.nodak.edu/instru...gen/
popgen3.htm
The above link leads to a brief primer on Hardy-Weinberg Equilibrium and might be useful to you, if you desire to understand how some aspects of organic evolution are tested.
"Jim, the fossil record does support a flooded out theory. I would not say evolution has overwhelming evidence. If it were so, there would be no debate."
Elvis, this thread is hardly the place for me to debunk "flood geology;" others more capable than I have already done so. But the fact is, the overwhelming evidence notwithstanding, a small minority of people believe in a literal young-earth creation; for the rest of us, there "is no debate."
Elvis,
Try this simple experiment. Get a 5 gallon bucket, add a couple of large rocks, medium sized gravel, smaller gravel, sand, and clay (in equivalent quantities). Fill the bucket with water, stick a lid on it, then shake it vigorously for 5 minutes. Allow the bucket and contents to sit undisturbed for a day. Next, carefully siphon off the water and examine the distribution of the contents of the bucket. Unless density gradients have somehow come unglued in the interim, you will find large rocks on the bottom, medium gravel above that level, smaller gravels above that level, sand above that level, and clay on top.
How does this condition apply to your proposal that the fossil record supports the concept of a worldwide flood? It shows that what you should find after a flood is a density dependent deposition of fossils within strata, with denser fossils lower in the strata than less dense fossils. In other words, all the silicified remains of diatoms, bacteria, etc. should be found in the upper layers of fossil beds while the heavily mineralized bones of vertebrates should be located below them. That isn't what we find in the strata.
David I can think of additional ways to falsify evolution or at least to falsify common descent.
We could have found that heridity did work in a way that would allow for evolution. It turned out to be the case that genetics supported evolution in a multitude of ways, but that did not have to be the case.
We could have found the molecular evidence for degrees of relatedness between species we thought were closely related because of obvious morphological traits were completely out of whack, again it didn't have to turn out to be consistent with common descent.
As Jim notes, we could find large beds of completely out of sequence fossil organisms. That has not been found. We could have found that radiodates were completely out of whack with the biostratified fossil record. That did have to be the case, but it has been so far. etc.
Jim, I don't think that Creationists are a small minority. Do you include the "UFO" people (created by space aliens visiting earth) in your no debate evolution group?
There are also the experts who support the flood theory. How about Apollo 15 astronaut James Irvin for one?
http://www.trinicenter.com/World...ldNews/
noah.htm
Anyway, it is obvious that we must agree to disagree.
Corection: heridity did not work in a way ..
Elvis, they are certainly a minority among the scientific community, especially in the field of biology.
As to your link, you might notice the distance between the Black Sea and the "mountains of Ararat." Finding a building (not even a boat!) in the Black Sea might loosely support the Genesis narrative of a local flood, but in no way demonstrates the global flood necessary in YEC scenarios.
Jim, so we keep narrowing down the field on who believes in creation and who believes in evolution.
Who is considered the scientific community? I know many scientists who adhere to creation.
No, it doesn't come down to who believes in either creation or evolution; that's your narrowing-down, not mine. Intelligent, well-intentioned people often believe strange things, or believe the right things for the wrong reasons. The vast majority of biologists accept evolution not because it's a club for smart folks, but because the evidence for it is overwhelming. Celebrity endorsement--astronaut or otherwise--is a terrible test of truth.
To quote someone: "People will hear what they want to hear. Even if you present a marvelous argument, you will get the same questions put back to you."
Elvis, you're also ignoring the large number of theists who believe in creation and evolution, as presented in books like this.
Jim,
Believing in Evolution doesn't automatically make people smart.
Believing in Creation doesn't automatically make people not smart.
There are idiots on both sides. There are brilliant people on both sides.
On this overwhelming evidence that keeps coming up, if it were so, why the debate even among the scientific community?
Elvis, among the scientific community, there is plenty of debate about the mechanisms of evolution; there is little to no debate that it happened (and happens). (Did you read the link?) And, as always, there are a stalwart few who refuse to accept overwhelming evidence. (Most of the dissenters, like Behe and Dembski, aren't young-earthers, by the way.) They have their reasons; I would be the last to call them stupid. What you and I know as The Debate happens outside of science--on the internet, in school board meetings, in the news.
Jim, so what is the criteria that you adhere to your website for evolution? There are other websites that say other aspects that don't adhere to evolution. There are websites that present a great case for Intelligent Design. David Heddle of this blog site has a presentation mentioned a few posts ago that speaks to Intelligent Design.
Elvis, I'm not sure I understand your question, but I'll try to answer it anyway. I've already linked to an post that I think sums up the best evidence for common descent. I've read Intelligent Design sites, and found they offer the same argument over and over: evolution couldn't have happened for X reason. Eventually, doing a little research, I've found that X is either false, misleading, or misunderstood, in nearly every case. Most of the time, X involves misquoting articles or quoting them out of context; I've learned to read the whole article, especially the "discussion" or "conclusion" to see if it really supports the ID position. Ninety-nine times out of a hundred, it doesn't.
In other words, in my experience (and in the experience of its critics), ID has a poor research track record, and ID hypotheses (irreducible complexity, CSI, etc.) haven't stood up under scrutiny.
Jim, so you are saying that evolution holds up to close scrutiny?
Elvis, yes. Theories of evolution have been developed, tested, and refined over the past 150 years; evidence from fossils, genetics, etc. line up quite nicely.
I quote Christians Ted Peters and Martinez Hewlett: "Is Darwinism merely an ideology that parades as science? No. Genuine science is present and available. Darwinian evolutionary biology qualifies as solid science because it generates proressive research--that is, hypotheses based upon its assumptions lead eventually to new knowledge about the natural world... Darwinism is explanatorily adequate (p. 21)." (From Evolution from Creation to New Creation)
Jim, we can quote others to the contrary as well.
Elvis, I quoted them because they are, as I have mentioned, the scientists you have ignored in your false dichotomy between "creationists" and "evolutionists." They are sincere, intelligent believers (one is a minister; the other, a molecular biologist) who think that Darwinism is sound science, and that it doesn't lessen their faith.
I have to go; I've already spent too much time here. You're welcome to email me if you wish to continue the conversation. Take care.
David's initial question was whether evolution as a theory qualifies as science. Though he tries to focus his question by claiming that natural selection is axiomatic(soundly refuted by the small sampling of citations provided to articles in which natural selection is empirically tested), there seems to be a bit of remaining uncertainty about the nature of scientific testing. It might be helpful to recognize that there are two general approaches to empirical testing of hypotheses - one is experimental and the other is comparative. Arguments about the validity of evolution as a theory tend to be either unaware of or implicitly dismissive of the comparative method.
First, lets recognize that there is a large body of experimental evidence that supports evolution, including evolution by natural selection, as a valid explanatory framework for the observed diversity of life, both extant and extinct. Several of the citation supplied in previous posts are to articles reporting such experimental evidence.
Second, it does bear pointing out that the larger portion of evidence for evolution is comparative. The comparative method involves making predictions about patterns expected if a particular hypothesis is true. In the comparative method, those predictions are tested by making empirical observations of nature. While it may be argued that a experimental approach is desirable when possible, there is much about nature that we simply cant test by direct experimentation. Is biology a special case in this vein? No, entire fields of science like astronomy rely very heavily on the comparative rather than experimental method.
David, the simple fact is that evolutionary theory does provide a predictive framework of explanation for the diversity of life. The evidence is overwhelmingly consilient from the whole spectrum of natural sciences that bear on the theory. There is no vast conspiracy of philosophically commited naturalists trying to usurp the moral fabric of society by hiding evolutions inadequacies as scientific theory; scientists as a rule are far too competetive and self-interested to cooperate in such a manner. The really important question a person of faith might ask is, "given what we know about ourselves (including our origins and relation to other living creatures) and the material world through science, what is there to learn about our relationship to God in spite of our material origins?". My sense is that this approach might be much more productive and positive as a theological proposition than trying to deny scientific knowledge for the sake of preserving a particular theological view. We might learn more about God by giving God the freedom to be God, rather than by trying to fit the universe to how we want God to be.
Lets discuss decay. Is there any time decay does NOT occur? Doesn't everything constantly decay? If decay is the rule; how can anything become more complex while it is decaying? aggieb
You're confusing 'decay' with order. Mix oil and vinegar together they'll eventually settle into an ordered set of layers despite being mixed all up. Look at a tornado which arises out of chaotic, random, winds. Or the development of a chicken in an egg which progresses from a simple single large cell to a fully functioning complex cute little bird. One muct be careful with what one means by 'decay'. When stars burn through their hydrogen they embark on a cycle which ultimately produces much more copmplex elements as 'decay' products.
DarkSyde, one must also be careful to call what is simple and what is complex. As we take apart a single cell animal, we find that a cell is a very complex structure. So, a single cell organism is not necessarily as simple as some would believe.
I wouldn't bother with Panda's Thumb. They put everyone in two categories -- agreeing with them in every detail or being a 6-day creationist. I don't think that's an unfair characterization in any way. I spent a few days trying to make the point that Intelligent Design arguments are philosophical arguments and not dogmatic assertion of religious views based on special revelation. They responded by calling me a creationist and ignoring everything I said. I have no interest in bothering with people who don't know how to respond to what's actually said instead of repeating slogans that don't apply.
Jeremy
At least you admit that Intelligent Design is a philosophy not science.
Jeremy,
If the people who are promoting ID arguments consistently identified them as philosophical arguments as opposed to being basic universal principles, it wouldn't be an issue. The problem is that a community of largely non-scientists (Dembski and Johnson being two of the more vocal non-scientists) are trying to redefine what science is for the science community, on the basis of that philosophical argument.
Here is a question for the Panda's thumb folks, and it is a sincere one:
Is design something you see as inherently undetectable? I suspect the answer is no, but could you elaborate on this a bit?
Thanks for your time.
I must say, I'm impressed. Dark, Stu, Shaggy... may all the debates on the EvC comm board be this calm, coherent, and intelligent (no pun intended).
I think the one thing nobody has done, and what should have been addressed at the start, is the definition of "science". According to dictionary.com, science is:
a. The observation, identification, description, experimental investigation, and theoretical explanation of phenomena.
b. Such activities restricted to a class of natural phenomena.
c. Such activities applied to an object of inquiry or study.
So to say that evolution doesn't fall under the realm of science isn't accurate. You can apply the term of "science" to any subject of study... however, whether or not it can be considered valid science is another question entirely, and hinges on the reliability of the data and accuracy (and credibility) of those recording the data. The data that supports evolution (I won't get into the issues of "theory" versus "theory") is validated using different methods drawn from different aspects of scientific study, and therefore can, in most cases, be construed as valid.
David noted in his first post that one of his objections to evolution being termed "science" is that it has "little or no predictive power." Evolution predicts that when the environmental conditions of a population of organisms' ecological niche changes, that population will adapt to survive those changes or it will become extinct. What evolution does NOT do, and never will do, is predict exactly what those changes will be and how they will be expressed. If what you're looking for is a blueprint as to what a given set of organisms will look like in the next 1,000, 5,000, and 10,000 years, you won't get it. But the basis remains the same... if the environment changes, then so will the organisms in that environment.
To briefly address Aggie's comment, decay occurs when energy is no longer being added into the system in question, and the energy output exceeds the energy input. Things become more complex because they reproduce (and evolve) before they get to a state where energy stops being added. In other words, things reproduce before they die. This is why the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics does not apply to evolution (or life at all) because the 2LOT is only for closed systems in which no energy is being added. The earth is not a closed system.
For those evolutionists, how does one explain documented accounts of the following:
Petrified trees that span across the different rock layers. According to evolutionists, each rock layer should be a time frame of millions of years.
Cases where man made objects are found encased in coal and flint. According to evolutionists, it takes millions of years for coal to form.
Animals such as frogs and toads encased in coal and marble and lived for a while when freed from their encasing. Again if it takes millions of years for coal to form, yet it had a live animal encased. Are we say that the animal was also millions of years old?
This appears to be evidence for a young earth that is not looked at in the zeal to find that elusive transitory animal to substantiate evolution.
One point of clarification:
In classical thermodynamics an isolated system is defined as no mass or energy transfer across the system boundary. A closed system is defined as no mass transfer, but there can be energy transfer. So the 2LOT does indeed apply to closed systems, in fact it always applies. A process simply cannot take place without adhering to the first and second LOT. Refrigerators are just devices that create the correct criterion for the energy flowing the direction it does. But even in a refrigerator, the 2LOT is not being violated.
Brett, I apologize for mis-stating the process of the 2LOT. I do understand that a refrigerator is a demonstration and NOT a violation of the 2LOT. My point was that the earth itself isn't a closed system.
Elvis, the events you are describing do not violate the theory or fact of evolution. Some, like the petrified trees spanning several geologic strata, have been shown to be hoaxes, or simply cases of petrified trees falling into ravines or canyons and then being covered up. I'd also be interested to see your sources as to the live frogs and toads encased in coal. There are some animals, insects mostly, that can survive being completely frozen and then thawed, but I haven't heard of what you're talking about.
~~Kaett
Let’s see out of a few Reader’s Digest references:
1982: Te Kuiti in New Zealand, railroad workers digging in rock found a couple live frogs entombed in mudstone (a type of sedimentary rock).
English chronicler, William of Newburgh wrote about entombed toads in Historia Rerum Anglicarum (1196 - 119
.
16th Century surgeon to Henry III, Ambroise Pare, gave a first hand account of finding a toad in a rock and was told by the quarrymen that it was a common thing.
English naturalist, Dr Robert Plot wrote Natural History of Staffordshire (1686), how toads were found sealed in stone. French Academy of Sciences also reports the same kind of thing in 1719 and 1731.
British mineralogist, Dr E. D. Clarke (1769 - 1822), described in 1818 at Cambridge University, of three newts of an extinct species entombed in a chalk pit. Two died shortly of being freed. The third lived for a while longer.
Entombed toads also mentioned in Mrs Loudon’s work of popular science, Entertaining Naturalist (1850).
Sir Richard Owen (Isn’t he the guy who coined the term dinosaur?), was given many examples of animals encased in stone that he asked his wife to cope with them.
1856: French workmen working on a railway tunnel between St Dizier and Nancy lines found a large winged creature out of the limestone. It fluttered its wings and died immediately. Wingspan was at 10 feet 7 inches. It had four legs joined by a membrane. Talons were where the feet are located. Mouth/beak had an array of sharp teeth. Identified as a pterodactyl.
1891: Mrs S. W. Culp of Morrisville IL, was breaking up a lump of coal and found a gold chain inside a piece.
1901: Mr R. C. Hardman found a coin dated 1397 inside a lump of coal.
1791: Mr M Liesky in Hamburg GE found a brass pin inside of a piece of flint. Estimated that humans worked with brass around 1000 BC.
June 1968: Fossil footprint of a sandle shoe with a crushed trilobite in the heel area. Discovered by William J Meister in Antelope Spring near Delta UT.
American Journal of Science and Arts 1:5:223-31, 1822 describes a set of human footprints in limestone discovered around 1816.
Evolutionary theory would have one think that coal, limestone, and other rock layers would take millions of years to form. Yet, these rocks contain “recent” and living items.
There are many other examples that are too numerous to write up for this blog. Of course, evolutionists will not acknowledge the findings, because the examples don’t fit the mold of evolutionary thinking. And if the examples can’t be explained away to fit into evolutionary thinking (as in a tree could have fallen down a valley to span different rock layers - then again, the tree could have been caught up in Noah’s flood), they are either not talked about (hoping to be forgotten) or put into the category of aliens from another planet visiting earth.
How do live frogs in mudstone assail the theory of evolution? What is the creationist explanation for these animals being found live, encased in stone?
On polystrate trees:
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/
...polystrate.html
Please provide evidence for your incredible claim about a live pterodactyl being found in the 19th century!
The stones (such as coal) according to evolutionists would take millions of years to form, yet there are live animals encased and found. Are we to believe that these animals remained alive for millions of years waiting to be freed, or was the time line much shorter to better support Creation?
Oh, I forget, if an animal that is found in recent times that was supposed to have lived millions of years ago, it is called a living fossil like the coelocanths. How come these didn't "evolve" into something else?
I think the pterasaur claim is a morphed version of a Crazy Carl Baugh claim. Baugh said he saw a pair of pterasuars; I believe somewhere over Japan or China, years ago. It was at night, but he said he could see them because they glowed in the dark.
Elvis it would help us greatly, assuming you actually want to get to the bottom of what specifically you're asking about, if you would provide us a link to the original material. The way you've framed your query I can think of several folks right off the top of my head you might be referring to. One is crazy Ed Conrad, another is Kent Hovind. I don't really want to waste time on either one of those individuals, so it would be nice if you would source your material when asking us something ok?
DS, in the very top sentence of that post, it says the info came from Reader's Digest writings. The more specific book by Reader's Digest was called Bizarre Phenomena.
You just seem to center around one thing. How about the other items listed?
Elvis, nobody is trying to center on one particular claim or another. All of the requests have been for you to post the original material or give us links to the same. If we can determine the actual parameters of the incidents in question, we can provide explanations as to how these claims are either hoaxes or the data was misinterpreted, misunderstood, and misappropriated. I'll point out that many of your examples are from over 100 years ago when recording techniques were nowhere near as accurate as they are today, not to mention the fact that we must question the documenting authorities.
One of the biggest factors fueling IDC advocates is the argument from incredulity... most ID hypotheses will boil down to "I can't explain it so no other human must be able to explain it so therefore god must have done it." It completely ignores the fact that we have the capability to understand most natural processes and phenomena we see. It goes against human nature to simply dismiss unexplained phenomena, especially in today's society. Humans are curious, inquisitive creatures... we want to know why, when, and how. We strive to understand the world around us, and many, theists or otherwise, will not accept "goddidit" as a valid explanation. If we did, none of us would be enjoying the technological advances we have all come to take for granted now.
Kaett,
Okay, you will not accept "God did it" as an explanation.
What will you except as an explanation for the existence of the universe? The fact that there is something instead of nothing?
And do you accept parallel universe theories?
David, are you asking me what explanation I will accept for HOW the universe came into being or WHY the universe exists? Because you'll get two very different answers.
As to how the universe got here, I remember reading about a hypothesis which stated our universe was the result of a black hole in another dimension. We know that black holes have such intense gravitational pulls that all matter and energy get sucked into a singularity point, and we know matter and energy cannot be created or destroyed, so the hypothesis stated that the matter and energy would punch through into what becomes our dimension. It's a logical idea and makes sense to me. There's another theory which I can accept that states the universe is constantly expanding and retracting upon itself, going back down to a singularity point and then re-exploding. It also fits within the constraints of Einstein's relativity. As far as why the universe exists, it's an irrelevant question. The universe exists, whether we like it or not. I cannot stomach the human arrogance and mindset which would declare the universe was created for our own purposes and disposal, nor can I accept the idea that we are the only intelligent entities in the universe. It exists, we exist within it, and if none of it ever happened, who would know, or care?
I definetely accept the idea of parallel universes because I'm a big fan of Schroedinger's cat and quantum physics. The idea that every action by every organism in the universe has a cause and effect, and that the options every organism faces, whether concious or unconcious, can therefore lead to an infinite number of possible outcomes fascinates me.
Kaett,
You know, even Hawkings backed off on his original theory of black holes. Hawkings updated idea of black holes is different than how you described it.
Elvis,
Then I guess it's a good thing that science allows people to change theories and postulates in the face of new information, therefore spawning even more research, prompting others to ask more questions, and furthering our understanding of the universe we exist in, rather than branding anyone who dares question the established doctrine a heretic or blasphemer, forcing them to repent or drink laudanum, be disemboweled, then burned at the stake, only to be pardoned a mere 500 years later. The beauty of science is that while it maintains a firm ethical and operational structure, it is fluid in its acceptance and incorporation of new information.
David merely asked me what explanation I accept for the existence of the universe. I answered his question and am well aware that Hawkings has re-vamped his theories on the origins of the universe. I haven't had the chance to study his new information yet, and while I am nowhere near as educated as he, and many others, in the field of astrophysics, I am entitled to accept or eschew his theories as I see fit. It doesn't make him wrong, it doesn't make me right, but it is my prerogative to do so. And in fact, I am far more likely to believe someone who publically admits they were wrong and strives for truth than someone who knows their information is false, yet continues to forcibly pass it off as truth despite all evidence to the contrary.
Then Kaett, don't bash ID as science fits more into ID than does evolution. How people interpret things in the past as you describe should not be attributed to ID as people make mistakes and grow. Being a supporter of ID does not mean science is gone. Being an evolutionist seems to be more of a faith thing than does ID.
Exactly how does science fit more into ID than evolution? In all my years of debating creationism vs. evolution, I have yet to see an argument for either creationism or ID that uses factual, contextually-correct scientific data to support the claims made. Every argument attempts to tear down the claims evolution presents and either stems from incredulity, such as using probability figures against evolution, or they take one facet of one piece of supporting data, label it invalid under a given set of parameters that have nothing to do with the context at hand, and then claim the entire thing collapses in the process.
Faith is the belief in something without logical proof or material evidence. Faith exists when you believe something to be true despite lacking any valid information to support that belief. Or worse, you believe something to still be true despite every piece of evidence to the contrary. IMHO, faith is the pinnacle of self-deception. Evolution has both logical proof and material evidence to support it. Many people in the world do not have the educational background or resources to become experts in all of the scientific disciplines that provide support for evolution. Just because I am not educated in the formation of sedimentary rock, does that mean nobody in the world understands the conditions and processes that must take place for sedimentary rock to form? Does that mean that if someone is indeed an expert in geology, I cannot trust their understanding and accept their data as true? I do not have faith, I have hope, I have trust, I have acceptance that the information I am presented with is valid and makes logical sense.
There is one facet of evolution which does allow for faith, although I am loathe to use that word, and that is the belief that we will continue to find evidence which fits into the jigsaw puzzle depicting the history of life on this planet.
Kaett,
I have a question for you. Do you think that the folks at SETI are reals scientists and that they practice real science? I am not arguing anything here, I am truely interested.
Thanks,
Brett;
I'd have to say yes, the SETI team are real scientists. They're searching for and compiling data about the universe in an attempt to answer a question. They aren't falsifying or misrepresenting their data in order to propegate their own cause. Whether or not they actually find what they're looking for is another matter entirely, and popular opinion about their work is completely irrelevant.
My boyfriend runs the SETI program in the background on his computer... he says it's his contribution to science 
.
Kaett,
"logical proof?" What is that? Show me those transitional life forms of which there should be millions in the fossil record, yet not one is to be found to justify evolution. And that leads me to say those who adhere to evolution have a lot of faith versus science. Evolution is as much faith based if not more than ID.
so what is the SETI method for detecting intellegent life?
Elvis;
I seem to recall Darksyde asking you the parameters by which you define a transitional fossil. I also seem to recall you never answered him. The first thing that comes to mind is Archaeopteryx, an organism which provides us a snapshot of evolution in motion. It demonstrates both lizard and bird traits, possessing feathers and distinctly avian features - namely the braincase, along with a skeletal structure that in some ways clearly resembles an archosaurian ancestry. Or if you don't want to go back quite so far, mudskippers are an excellent example of transitional organisms... fish that have adapted to process oxygen both in air and water and in fact needing both environments to survive.
What you also must realize is that the fact that we have fossils in the first place is remarkable. Your attitude suggests that you expect to see a fossil of every organism that has ever existed on the planet, perfectly preserved, just waiting to be uncovered. What you're missing is that dead animals are often eaten by scavengers, the rocks housing the fossils get destroyed by natural (or non-natural) disasters, or we as humans are still in the process of uncovering the fossils you claim don't exist.
So by all means, Elvis, please provide for us what you expect to see in a transitional fossil.
Kaett, those animals you mentioned are not considered transitional forms. Even the platypus is not considered a transitional form. How does an animal come up with a characteristic that is not in their genetics to become a different animal (as in fish into lizard)? I don't exect humans to come up with gills because they can swim. I do not have parameters for transisitonal forms or what they should look like, but we know that we don't have transitional forms and no one reputable (even among evolutionary scientists) is claiming them to be transitional forms either.
Elvis, I find it interesting that while you cannot give me a definition of what a transitional fossil IS, you can certainly dismiss examples which the majority of the scientific community accepts as transitional easily enough. I'm also interested to know who you consider to be a "reputable" scientist in the field of evolution.
I didn't mention the platypus for a very good reason... it's one of the few biological anomalies that displays traits common to differing species, and I personally am not familiar with the biological lineage of the platypus to speak intelligently on it.
But to answer your question as to how an animal develops new traits, mutation of the genetic code is one cause, ERV's are another, but in many cases it is simply a matter of "adapt or die"... the environment which a population of organisms exists within may change drastically, causing members of the population with a certain set of traits to have a better chance of survival than previously apparent. You must also realize that these are gradual changes which take hundreds of thousands or millions of years to develop. The fossils we find merely provide individual snapshots, like single frames of a movie, by which we piece together the history of life on the planet.
Kaett, you are the only one that I know who claims to have transitional animals. Just because some animals have similar characteristics shared by other animals does not make them transitional.
Humans have been swimming for ages, how come humans haven't developed gills? Why are the so called living fossils still looking the same as in the coelocanth if evolution were true? Finding the coelocanth corrected many of the myths that scientists said of it based on their fossils.
Elvis,
The question of who claims transitional fossils is related to which theory of evolution you adhere to. Darwinian evolutionists will claim hundreds or thousands of transitions; punctuated equilibrium evolutionists will claim virtually none.
Elvis;
Brett is quite right, and I know I am not the only person to claim transitional fossils exist. You say humans have been swimming for ages yet we haven't developed gills... the answer to that is humans do not spend the majority of their lifespan in a liquid environment, therefore the development of gills is not necessary for survival. If you want to be really technical about it, every organism we see in both the fossil record and living today is a transition between the prior form and the ones yet to come... just like you are a transition between your parents and your children.
If I haven't stated this before, I will now... evolution is a process by which organisms adapt in order to survive changes in their environment. If the environment doesn't change, then there is no need for the population of organisms to adapt beyond minor decorative changes. As far as the coelocanth goes, comparing the fossil to the organism is much like comparing an x-ray to the actual person. The x-ray may be a technically accurate representation of their structure, but it won't tell you what color their eyes or hair is, or what shade of blue looks best on them.
Survival is what drives evolution, not intelligence.
you have to give elvis some credit for getting lots of folks ramped up. his only source is reader's digest, and you still will argue with hime. go elvis! and how many evolution supporting books have you read? and cliff notes don't count.
Commenting by HaloScan
