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Does evolution contradict creationism?
Talk Origins ^ | 1998 | Warren Kurt VonRoeschlaub

Posted on 11/30/2004 3:53:55 PM PST by shubi

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To: Jehu

Archaeopteryx! OK, now click your heels together 3 times and say, "I wish I was in Kansas." That is an even better fantasy.

Look back in one of my previous posts for MY evolutionary professor who disagrees...kay, you guys boor me.

B: I did and already refuted it. First off, Feduccia does not, that I've read, claim Archeaopteryx is not a transitional form. Certainly the little snippet you provided doesn't indicate that. Feduccia argues that birds didn't evolve from theropods, but from a more primitive group of dinos known as, if memory serves me, Pelycosaurs. Second it is laughable to suggest that in order for science to come to a consensus all scientists must agree. In the case of the birds are dinos hypothesis, the overwelming majority of paleontologists as typified by the likes of Kevin Padian regard the issue as settled. The number of dissenters, like Feduccia, can be counted on the fingers of one hand. And given recent work on the development of bird embryos, Feduccia no longer has a supportable argument. He's an important scientist, so I figure eventually unless he comes up with a good argument to support his hypothesis, he'll eventually give up on it. Thats a hard thing to do when you've staked much of your professional career on it. There's no harm in being wrong, however.

B: Sorry, you still lose. But feel free to continue and play pretend you didn't read what I wrote.


861 posted on 12/21/2004 2:04:37 PM PST by bigdakine
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To: bigdakine

"But macroevolution is more than just *speciation*. "

Not really. Since speciation is the only step from one "form" to another, it is only speciation that macroevolution describes. When you get into Genus and above it is simply multiple steps of divergence through speciation.

OK?


862 posted on 12/21/2004 2:05:19 PM PST by shubi (Peace through superior firepower.)
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To: Thatcherite

Dr. Jonathan Wells who wrote "Icons of Evolution" is on the Michael Medved show right now.


863 posted on 12/21/2004 2:11:02 PM PST by Cinnamon Girl (OMGIIHIHOIIC ping list)
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To: Right Wing Professor
Never claimed special creation is scientific, just that observable data fits it better than evolution. Now tell me something...Since man is related to the apes, and men descended from apes, and yet, when born, apes come out face up.

But humans come out face down. The mechanics and chemical signals and specifics for such a little thing as this is stupefying. So did the axial rotation of how humans are born face down, versus face up happen all at once? Or by degrees?

What is the advantage of babies only rotating one degree, or two or twenty? Knowing that with our large heads we could be crushed at birth if not situated in the birth canal...just so. If all at once, what happened to barely discernible "natural selection?" If all at once, what accounts for such drastic change? Must have happened to some ape woman about 200,000 years ago.

And modern man "supposedly" being about 200,000 years old, has undergone spectacular, almost unbelievable changes:

True bipedalism

Tripling of brain size

Loss of fur or covering

All the mechanics for human speech

True opposable thumb

An incredible firestorm of evolutionary change...practically natural selection working at the speed of light.

Meanwhile at the same time:

Apes never change one iota.

Cockroaches are still EXACTLY the same.

Dolphins, sharks, whales...the same!

Crocodiles...the same!

But Giraffes suddenly appear with their enormously lengthened necks with all that entails...with no, absolutely not one, preceding hint of any fossil of anything even remotely like them!

Heck, and all the explosion of change for one species, the miraculous appearances of others, and the utter stability of others...all living under the same sun and all presided over by that incredible, magical, non-mathematically described force? thingy? collusion of forces? unaware idiot presider over complex biological processes? "Natural Selection!"

I hope your kids are smarter, otherwise we are doomed, won't be able to change a light bulb in another 50 years under evolutionary teaching.
864 posted on 12/21/2004 2:12:41 PM PST by Jehu
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To: bigdakine
I've never seen it fail, after evolutionists have their butts kicked they slink off to a room and perform intellectual fellatio with each other.
865 posted on 12/21/2004 2:14:42 PM PST by Jehu
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To: shubi

I think I understand macroevolution better than you do.
Besides being a minister, I am also a biologist.

Micro and macro are the same process. It is allele frequency changes in populations over time. Macro is simply the result of accumulations of micro changes.

IT IS THE SAME PROCESS!!! SAME!!!!!!!


B: I'm sorry, but you're wrong. Again parts of macroevolution do result from microevolution, speciation for example. But macroevolution sum toto, is not microevolution. Again, I strongly suggest you read the references I gave you. And the distinction between the two is not often stressed on the undergraduate level. I'm not a biologist. I'm a geophysicist who got his Ph.D. in the same Dept. where Steve Stanley teaches. So much of what I know about it came straight from one of the founders of macroevolutionary theory. If you want to argue that macroevolution is nothing more than an accumulation of microevolutionary changes, you'll continue to be in error. THis is true for speciation, but other processes like, mass extinctions, do not result from microevolutionary processes like drift or selection.

B: I realize that creationsits have greatly abused these terms, however, they are well defined by evolutionary biologists, and there's not point in ceeding our terminology because creationists have made a mess of it.


866 posted on 12/21/2004 2:15:50 PM PST by bigdakine
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To: bigdakine
B:Energy can't be destroyed, per se, but converted into mass and vice versa. THis is observed routinely. Yet again, realizing that he has no facts and no ideas, jehu resorts to his favorite chestnut, the argument from "Personal Astonishment". The basic problem with the argument from persoanl astonishment is that, when you're ignorant, just about everything astonishes you.

There is no "per se," about it, you incredibly smug moron. Energy cannot be destroyed or created...what is in the universe now, (energy wise) is fixed! If I was Right Wing Professor, Shubi, or Thatcher, I would disown your dofus self. At least they actually know the ignorant drivel they spout, you are simply a parrot, and not a very bright one at that. That energy and mass are convertible I will allow even an insufferable moron like you may know. How your mind ever grasped Einstein's equation is a marvel almost as great as 1 billion monkeys typing out a single meaningful sentence in 1 billion years.
867 posted on 12/21/2004 2:26:50 PM PST by Jehu
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To: derheimwill
I don't know what other Creationists are saying but, as a biblical literalist, I don't find enough historical time for macro.

Indeed so, as a biblical literalist you are in opposition with so much observed reality (physics, astronomy, cosmology, geology, biology) that your rejection of evolution barely warrants a mention on the "head in the sand" scale.

868 posted on 12/21/2004 2:28:03 PM PST by Thatcherite (Conservative and Biblical Literalist are not synonymous)
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To: Jehu

I see that jehu's ad hominem nastiness is proportional to the perceived intelligence and knowledge of the person who he abuses^h^h^h^h^h^h "refutes". Jehu just can't handle BDK's command of the material so he resorts to abuse. Fortunately I am not clever and knowledgeable enough ever to have attracted that level of venom. "insufferable moron"! LOL.


869 posted on 12/21/2004 2:31:48 PM PST by Thatcherite (Conservative and Biblical Literalist are not synonymous)
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To: Thatcherite
so much observed reality (physics, astronomy, cosmology, geology, biology...

That is your error.
Physics is not reality. A proton is.
Astronomy is not reality. Stars are.
Evolution is not reality. Mutation, birth, death, etc. are.

870 posted on 12/21/2004 2:35:40 PM PST by derheimwill (Love is a person, not an emotion.)
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To: shubi
Being a minister, how do you tell your congregates the necessity of Christ's sacrifice for original sin? We either descended from Adam...who sinned or we descended from apes. If the Genesis account is allegorical only, then what part of the Bible is not? How do you tell? If allegorical, how do you know the story of Christ is not allegorical also? If your faith is not specific then what is it based upon? Why actually bother?
871 posted on 12/21/2004 2:37:02 PM PST by Jehu
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To: derheimwill
Physics is not reality. A proton is. Astronomy is not reality. Stars are.

How do you know that protons exist and that stars are balls of hot gas like our sun? Theories of physics and astronomy tell us these things and many other things besides. You pick and choose the evidence that you want to accept according to whether it matches folk tales of bronze-age middle-eastern animal herders who were probably highly intelligent but had no conception of any of these things. They had myths that made sense to them but that make no sense in the light of modern physical knowledge.

872 posted on 12/21/2004 2:45:02 PM PST by Thatcherite (Conservative and Biblical Literalist are not synonymous)
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To: bigdakine
Give me the steps from scales to feathers. YOU propose how that came about. Archeopteryx is a bird. Or if you prefer call it a reptile. You don't even know if it was cold blooded or warm.

Or a thousand other things that would identify it as one or the other, or as something in between...it was lost with the DNA! So my bird expert is just as good as any of your LABEL game experts, no matter how much they stamp their evolved little hoofs and say, "it is settled!"


All you have are fossils, no DNA, you can only SAY it is a transitory species. It cannot be proven. Once again the ability of ToE to have the only evidence in science that cannot be falsified is a marvelous mechanism to keep this circular logic machine alive.
873 posted on 12/21/2004 2:46:41 PM PST by Jehu
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To: Jehu

Never claimed special creation is scientific, just that observable data fits it better than evolution. Now tell me something...Since man is related to the apes, and men descended from apes, and yet, when born, apes come out face up.

B: I'm not sure what Jehu is talking about here.

But humans come out face down. The mechanics and chemical signals and specifics for such a little thing as this is stupefying.

B: You haven't given any reasons why such a thing requires a large change in signals and specifics (whatever Jehu means by that). Perhaps it is simply that compared to chimp infants human babies have proportionally larger heads.

B: THere is no telling what creationists will say next. Every moment is like gift waiting to be unwrapped with these folks.


So did the axial rotation of how humans are born face down, versus face up happen all at once? Or by degrees?

B: Beats me. But it should be pointed out that enhanced encephlazation acquired during the course of hominid evolution did not occur all at once. Jehu again has nothing to offer other than his principle of "Personal Astonishment". All we get from Jehu is that " I can't figure out how this happened, ergo science must be wrong." Will somebody please inform Jehu, that the world doesn't revolve around him.


What is the advantage of babies only rotating one degree, or two or twenty? Knowing that with our large heads we could be crushed at birth if not situated in the birth canal...just so.

B: THis is precisely the same kind of muddled thinking that creationists always engage in. Again encephalazation was at best a step by step, if not a gradual process. Hence changes need to have occured all at once, one after the other, but concurrently. And to note, death during childbirth was a pox on humanity for a long time (it still is in many places). Indeed, did you think the designer couldn't have better made the female pelvis so that this wouldn't be necessary?


If all at once, what happened to barely discernible "natural selection?" If all at once, what accounts for such drastic change? Must have happened to some ape woman about 200,000 years ago.

B: Nobody says it happened all at once. Once again Jehu confuses his mishmash muddled thinking with scientific thinking.


And modern man "supposedly" being about 200,000 years old, has undergone spectacular, almost unbelievable changes:

True bipedalism

B: Again Jehu displays his abundant ignorance. Folks, I hope your paying careful attention here. Its not often one witnesses such ignornace coupled with hubris. It is a thing to behold.

B: True Bipedalism originated long before modern humans evolved. This is again one of those basic facts that Jehu continually gets wrong.

Tripling of brain size

B: Actually more than that. But following hominid evolution from Australopithicus to Homo Habilis to Homo Erectus to Archaic Homo Sapiens this increased brain size didn't occur all at once. Unfortunatley this increase in brain size did not benefit everybody.


Loss of fur or covering

B: That appears to relatively recent.

All the mechanics for human speech

B: What mechanics? Be specific. And post any information that claims what ever mechanics you're talking about had to happen all at once.


True opposable thumb

B: All primates have an opposable thumb. Opposable thumbs predate humans only by 65 million years.


An incredible firestorm of evolutionary change...practically natural selection working at the speed of light.

B: If one thinks 65 million years of primate evolution is "the speed of light".


Meanwhile at the same time:

Apes never change one iota.

B: Proof?


Cockroaches are still EXACTLY the same.

B: Proof?

Dolphins, sharks, whales...the same!

B: Proof? And aquatic mammals actually have a pretty good fossil record of their development. As evidence of your intellectual impotence you are writing blanks now.


Crocodiles...the same!

B: Proof?

( Rest of similar nonsense snipped)

I hope your kids are smarter, otherwise we are doomed, won't be able to change a light bulb in another 50 years under evolutionary teaching.

B: I hope yours are no smarter than you. Mine will need people to work for them.


874 posted on 12/21/2004 2:46:47 PM PST by bigdakine
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To: Jehu
Once again the ability of ToE to have the only evidence in science that cannot be falsified is a marvelous mechanism to keep this circular logic machine alive.

You still haven't said why the falsifications suggested in Theobalds article wouldn't falsify ToE. (eg finding modern creatures in old strata, or finding some creature with completely different DNA, or DNA species comparisons coming out unexpectedly, or finding duplicated mutations that didn't fit the phylogenetic tree, or finding ancient creatures in the wrong strata) To continue to assert that ToE is not falsifiable without doing so labels you a liar.

875 posted on 12/21/2004 2:55:40 PM PST by Thatcherite (Conservative and Biblical Literalist are not synonymous)
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To: bigdakine

You are wrong.


876 posted on 12/21/2004 2:57:00 PM PST by shubi (Peace through superior firepower.)
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To: Thatcherite
Go back and read some of his cut and paste drivel then. He deserved the slap upside the head. I am an accomplished engineer and for someone to lecture me about the Law of Conservation of Mass/Energy is ludicrous, but what is worse he was in error in his little lecture, there is no "per se," in proved physical law. I will reserve "per se" for evolution, since it has the most rickety mathematical scaffolding of any scientific theory. And some of the better critics and growing enemies of this "theory," are mathematicians! Who demand accuracy and specifics. Not the unbelievable evolutionist's practice of throwing shit on the blackboard and seeing what sticks "Punctuated Equilibrium indeed!"
877 posted on 12/21/2004 3:00:03 PM PST by Jehu
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To: bigdakine

Yes, macroevolution does involve some other concepts but it all comes down to the same process. Mass extinctions also change the allele frequency.


878 posted on 12/21/2004 3:00:09 PM PST by shubi (Peace through superior firepower.)
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To: Jehu

Give me the steps from scales to feathers.

B: Recent experiments suggest not too many steps needed. Second, I'm under no obligation to list a number of steps. You however, have an obligation to prove it can't happen. Second recent experiments suggest this happened fairly quickly. Bird feathers and scales are formed from the same proteins. It also appears that they are governed by a similar genetic regulatory cascade. Have you not ever observed a chicken's leg? It has both scales and feathers. But none the less, keep telling us that there is no link between birds and dinos. You sound very convincing. Not.

B: A little later I'll post an experiment in which scales were inadvertantly converted to feathers. Scales and feathers are the same stuff, but in different forms.


YOU propose how that came about. Archeopteryx is a bird. Or if you prefer call it a reptile.

B: I prefer to call it a transtional bird. Thats what it is. Reptile is not a useful taxonomic rank.


You don't even know if it was cold blooded or warm.

B: Most likely warm blooded.

Or a thousand other things that would identify it as one or the other, or as something in between...it was lost with the DNA!

B: Well, you're right there. We don't have any archie DNA. But our genomes contain much flotsam and jetsam acquired during our evolutionary history, as do birds.

So my bird expert is just as good as any of your LABEL game experts,

B: Your bird expert is outside the mainstream of evolutionary thought when it comes to bird evolution. Furthemore, you still haven't documented that Feduccia has claimed that archie is not a transitional form. Your attempt at argument from authority has failed. Either give us some reasons why we should not accept archie as a transtional form, or move on to another argument.



no matter how much they stamp their evolved little hoofs and say, "it is settled!"

B: It is. Only Feduccia can decide for himself when it is time for him to abandon his failed hypothesis. The vast array or data, from comparative genetics, homologies with therapod dinos, cladistic analyses, embryology and the fossil record are so heavily in favor of the bird theropod-dino link, its not funny.


All you have are fossils, no DNA, you can only SAY it is a transitory species. It cannot be proven.

B: Proof not required in science. THis is science 101. Theories in general can't be proven, only falsified. The simple fact is, is that Archeaopteryx has features common to either therapod dinos or birds. By any meaningful defintion, it is a transitional form between major taxons. Birds don't have boney tails. Theropods too. Theropods don't have flight feathers. Birds do. Either present data which refutes that or move on. Arguing the "data is wrong" not a good scientific argument.



Once again the ability of ToE to have the only evidence in science that cannot be falsified is a marvelous mechanism to keep this circular logic machine alive.


B: To be clear, the problem Jehu is having, is not the evolution is unfalsifiable, but that evolution is so far unfalsified.


879 posted on 12/21/2004 3:07:26 PM PST by bigdakine
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To: Jehu

As I am only a poor engineer too I don't understand your objection to the words "per se", and I don't see why you couldn't use it when referring to energy destruction/conversion and could use it when referring to evolution. I thought it just meant "as such" but I must have missed some pejorative sense carried by "per se".


880 posted on 12/21/2004 3:08:04 PM PST by Thatcherite (Conservative and Biblical Literalist are not synonymous)
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