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Tom, The Dancing Bug
MSNBC ^ | 2 July 2005 | Ruben Bolling

Posted on 07/05/2005 7:07:57 PM PDT by balrog666




TOPICS:
KEYWORDS: adhominem; churchofdarwin; creationism; crevolist; darwin; evolution; fundamentalism; gratuituousabuse; liberalism; news; religion
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To: donh

So, you approve of stem cell research of humans? From the 2nd trimester fetus, zygote, and all steps in between?

And so what about the Trial of Galileo?

This was performed before simple things like "innocent until proven guilty" came about.

Talking about the judgement of someone so long ago is foolish. Especially if it's your only example.

Why don't we modernize that a bit, Eh? How about the 1930's in Europe. Evolutionary theory has been around for a while by then. As a matter of fact, many politcal parties adopted it as part of their platforms. Can you think of any of them? I sure can.

Or even a step away from evolution: secular thought and reasoning. Hmm, yup, got another party just east of that first one that came to mind.


121 posted on 07/06/2005 10:05:27 AM PDT by MacDorcha (In Theory there is no difference between theory and practice. In practice there is.)
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To: Michael_Michaelangelo; Ichneumon
The `biogenetic law' as a proof of evolution is valueless." W. R. Thompson, "Introduction to The Origin of Species," p. 12.

DUH! If the biogenetic law were true it would have to mean there is some mechanism which ensures that modifications in embryological development are always appended to the end of the process. IOW there would have to be some mechanism the actively prevents variations from occurring and becoming fixed in earlier stages of development.

Absent such a mechanism Haeckel's law would (if anything) tend to cast doubt on evolution, at least as a natural process, because it would appear that something had chosen to make modifications occur only at the end of development.

BTW, I missed the part where you refuted any of Ichneumon's rebuttal points.

122 posted on 07/06/2005 10:07:54 AM PDT by Stultis
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To: RadioAstronomer

This one isn't.


123 posted on 07/06/2005 10:10:55 AM PDT by swampfox98 (Michael Reagan: "It's time to stop the flood.")
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To: Ichneumon

I got something to say about that one too.

And it's the same problem I ahve with the first toon.

It's incomplete and arrogant.

I disagree with the simple statement "h2o freezes at 32 degrees farhenheit" based on this: You aren't accounting for pressure.

Half-assed statements like that, that are then used to smear other people are crude, deceitful, and igotistical.

I am yet to meet any one who believes that the Bible says that bacteria can't adapt. I am also yet to find one who disagrees with the fundamental idea of gravity.

I DO, however, find Darwinists who are willing to put forth only enough effort into making alternate thoughts look childish... but only to a child.


124 posted on 07/06/2005 10:12:13 AM PDT by MacDorcha (In Theory there is no difference between theory and practice. In practice there is.)
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To: RadioAstronomer

Hell, I'll agree with that, RA. (Is this a first? or did we find one in our history before?)

Evolution may indeed be a factor in our being that God put in us.

I only ask that (for Empericism's sake) we are presented with a direct observation of this theory. Not inferred thoughts about dead things with no DNA evidence remaining.

But the fact remains:

We agreed on something. The Bible may have been taken too literally (in English, anyway) by some,and for to long.


125 posted on 07/06/2005 10:15:50 AM PDT by MacDorcha (In Theory there is no difference between theory and practice. In practice there is.)
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To: Ichneumon

[Thunderous applause!]


126 posted on 07/06/2005 10:16:10 AM PDT by PatrickHenry (Felix, qui potuit rerum cognoscere causas. The List-O-Links is at my homepage.)
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To: Ichneumon

Gen. 27:11


127 posted on 07/06/2005 10:17:02 AM PDT by Gumlegs
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To: MacDorcha
A rat is only a rat. Except in evolutionary terms, where they can become cats.

A rat becoming a cat would contradict the TOE.

128 posted on 07/06/2005 10:26:04 AM PDT by Modernman ("Laws are like sausages, it is better not to see them being made." -Bismarck)
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To: MacDorcha
Good grief right back. Ever heard of an example? Or do you posit that that it not something claimed by evolution's teachings?

Yes (the later). A rat evolving into a cat, or vice versa, is incompatible with what is universally claimed and accepted by evolutionists. Rats and Cats both represent Orders of mammals (Rodentia -- rodents, about half of all mammal species; and Carnivora -- dogs, cats, bears & weasels, seals, etc). They are equal level taxa which (I believe) make their first appearance at roughly the same time. It has never been proposed, nor is it plausible, that one evolved from the other. They both share some earlier last common ancestor which would not be classifiable as either a "rat" or a "cat".

129 posted on 07/06/2005 10:28:54 AM PDT by Stultis
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To: RadioAstronomer
Also meant to ping you to the preceding.
130 posted on 07/06/2005 10:29:42 AM PDT by Stultis
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To: Stultis
He was sugar-coating it by saying it wasn't a "conscious fraud." I simply pointed out that it was indeed "conscious," as evidenced by the expert's statements I referenced.

The damage done to science in general and to the ToE by those drawings is immeasurable; furthermore, to make excuses for Haeckel is kind of silly, IMO.

131 posted on 07/06/2005 10:31:19 AM PDT by Michael_Michaelangelo (The best theory is not ipso facto a good theory. Lots of links on my homepage...)
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To: MacDorcha
Talking about the judgement of someone so long ago is foolish. Especially if it's your only example.

Slovokian priests, dressed in their livery, loaded slovakian jews up for the camps for Hitler's ovens. Followed by confession, and mass absolution. German and Austrian catholic churches collated and delivered their birth and death records to the SS, to help ferret jews out of the general population--something they were able to refuse to do, when it came to jews who had converted to christianity. Is that contemporary enough for you?

132 posted on 07/06/2005 10:33:55 AM PDT by donh (qua)
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To: Michael_Michaelangelo
[This is often taken as evidence of conscious fraud, but more prosaic explanations are possibilities as well. Haeckel may not have had actual specimens of those species at that stage of development, and drew what he actually believed they would look like, for example.]

That's because it was a conscious FRAUD....

Stamping your feet and declaring it so isn't the same thing as being able to support your belief, I'm afraid. Nor does the material you quote provide adequate support, since they are also consistent with the kind of unintended fraud I describe above. You should be really familiar with that kind of fraud, since creationists have done it *countless* times -- they make the mistake of believing that their presumptions are fact, and then cheerfully publish these unconscious frauds for the public. For just one example (out of literally *thousands* I've read), see Duane Gish's confident (but wholly fraudulent) claim about proteins:

One example is Gish's "bullfrog proteins." In 1983, in a PBS show on creationism, Gish claimed that while humans and chimpanzees have many proteins which are identical or differ by only a few amino acids, there are also human proteins which are more similar to a bullfrog or a chicken than to chimpanzees. Gish was repeatedly pressed to produce his evidence. Two years later, Philip Kitcher challenged Gish to produce his evidence or retract his claim in a debate at the University of Minnesota. Gish refused to respond. Kevin Wirth of Students for Origins Research (a pro-creationist organization) begged Gish to respond in the pages of Origins Research regarding the claim. He refused. (See Robert Schadewald, "Scientific Creationism and Error," Creation/Evolution XVII (vol. 6, no. 1, 1986).)
-- from Creationist Whoppers
And:

Duane Gish, a protein biochemist with a Ph.D. from Berkeley, is vice president of the Institute for Creation Research (ICR) and creationism's best-known spokesman. A veteran of perhaps 150 public debates and thousands of lectures and sermons on creationism, Gish is revered among creationists as a great scientist and a tireless fighter for the truth. Among noncreationists, however, Gish has a reputation for making erroneous statements and then pugnaciously refusing to acknowledge them. One example is an unfinished epic which might be called the tale of two proteins.

In July 1983, the Public Broadcasting System televised an hour-long program on creationism. One of the scientists interviewed, biochemist Russell Doolittle, discussed the similarities of human proteins to chimpanzee proteins. In many cases, corresponding human and chimpanzee proteins are identical, and in others they differ by only a few amino acids. This strongly suggests a common ancestry for humans and apes. Gish was asked to comment. He replied:

If we look at certain proteins, yes, man then -- it can be assumed that man is more closely related to a chimpanzee than other things. But on the other hand, if you look at other certain proteins, you'll find that man is more closely related to a bullfrog than he is a chimpanzee. If you focus your attention on other proteins, you'll find that man is more closely related to a chicken than he is to a chimpanzee.

I had never heard of such proteins, so I asked a few biochemists. They hadn't, either. I wrote to Gish for supporting documentation. He ignored my first letter. In reply to my second, he referred me to Berkeley geochronologist Garniss Curtis. I wrote to Curtis, who replied immediately.

Some years ago, Curtis attended a conference in Austria where he heard that someone had found bullfrog blood proteins very similar to human blood proteins. Curtis offered an explanatory hypothesis: the "frog" which yielded the proteins was (he suggested) an enchanted prince. He then predicted that the research would never be confirmed. He was apparently correct, for nothing has been heard of the proteins since. But Duane Gish once heard Curtis tell his little story.

This bullfrog "documentation" (as Gish now calls it) struck me as joke, even by creationist standards, and Gish simply ignored his alleged chicken proteins. In contrast, Doolittle backed his televised claims with published protein sequence data. I wrote to Gish again suggesting that he should be able to do the same. He didn't reply. Indeed, he has never since replied to any of my letters.

John W. Patterson and I attended the 1983 National Creation Conference in Roseville, Minnesota. We had several conversations there with Kevin Wirth, Research Director of Students for Origins Research (SOR). At some point, we told him the protein story and suggested that Gish might have lied on national television. Wirth was confident that Gish could document his claims. He told us that if we put our charges in the form of a letter, he would do his best to get it published in Origins Research, the SOR tabloid.

Gish also attended the conference, and I asked him about the proteins in the presence of several creationists. Gish tried mightily to evade and/or obfuscate, but I was firm. Doolittle provided sequence data for human and chimpanzee proteins; Gish could do the same -- if his alleged chicken and bullfrog proteins really exist. Gish insisted they exist and promised to send me the sequences. Skeptical, I asked him pointblank: "Will that be before hell freezes over?" He assured me that it would. After 2-1/2 years, I still have neither sequence data nor a report of frost in Hades.

[...]

In the same sentence, Gish claimed that he sent me his "documentation," and Wagner quite naturally assumed that meant at least the tape. But Gish sent me neither, nor has he sent copies of said tape or transcript to others requesting them. As with his chicken proteins, we have only Gish's word for their existence.

For the record, it is no longer important whether Gish's original statements about chicken and bullfrog proteins were deceptions or incredible blunders. It is now going on four years since the PBS broadcast, and Gish has neither retracted his chicken statement nor attempted to justify it. (Obviously, the lysozyme apologetic doesn't count, but it took Gish 2-1/2 years to come up with that!) And if the Curtis story is all he knows about his chimpanzee protein, on what basis did he promise to send me its sequence at the 1983 National Bible-Science Conference? Gish has woven himself into an incredible web of contradictions, and even some creationists now suspect that he has been less than candid.

Gish's steadfast refusal to acknowledge the facts seems to characterize creationism.

Nothing you've posted indicates that Haeckel's errors were the result of *conscious* fraud, as you emptily assert, versus possibility of the kind of *unconscious* fraud (i.e., believing your own incorrect presumptions) that creationists make so frequently.

For more information, see: Biology Textbook Fraud

WARNING

Anyone who actually goes to Michael_Michaelangelo's link in the hopes of finding "information" will be at imminent risk of filling their heads with falsehoods, misinformation, and lies.

Not surprisingly, since it's a creationist website. I counted over twenty blatant falsehoods before I gave up, and that was just on the first couple of screens.

Michael_Michaelangelo, again and again I have asked you to either learn enough about biology to be able to tell solid material from complete horse manure, or stop posting creationist material WHICH YOU HAVE REPEATEDLY DEMONSTRATED YOU ARE COMPLETELY UNABLE TO VET FOR EVEN THE MOST MINIMAL LEVELS OF ACCURACY, RELIABILITY, OR CREDIBILITY.

Why do you keep ignoring this advice? I'm getting tired of you presenting huge servings of lies to your fellow Freepers. You're doing them a huge disservice.

When you can't tell s*** from roast beef, it's really not a good idea for you to keep trying to bring everyone lunch.

133 posted on 07/06/2005 10:40:41 AM PDT by Ichneumon
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To: MacDorcha
And so what about the Trial of Galileo?

This was performed before simple things like "innocent until proven guilty" came about.

Let's just terminate this conversation, if you can't figure out why I mention the Trail of Galileo, with reference to what creationists are capable of doing to arbitrarily suppress scientific study if they become political ascendent. Innocent until proved guilty is a US constitional idea, and is not universally shared in Western Europe even as we speak. It is also, as best I can figure out, utterly unrelated to this argument.

134 posted on 07/06/2005 10:41:33 AM PDT by donh (qua)
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To: Modernman

OK, let me get this straight: A rat (or it's ancestors) diverging, and becoming a class of felines, and a class of rodents... contridicts TOE?

So, how would you say that two carnivor mammals do not share the same lineage? And that mammals did not start out small, and "rat-sized"?

(do keep in mind, this thread is read by othersthan us. This is why people use "Laymen's Terms")


135 posted on 07/06/2005 10:42:55 AM PDT by MacDorcha (In Theory there is no difference between theory and practice. In practice there is.)
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To: donh

I noticed you "terminated it" before coming to the part about politics.

I'll note that.


136 posted on 07/06/2005 10:43:42 AM PDT by MacDorcha (In Theory there is no difference between theory and practice. In practice there is.)
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To: donh

And was this... religious in nature? Or did the descent of man (and it's lineage) have anything to do with this?


137 posted on 07/06/2005 10:45:29 AM PDT by MacDorcha (In Theory there is no difference between theory and practice. In practice there is.)
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To: Ichneumon

Fabulous post.

It would be great if you had a copy on your personal page so the rest of us could refer to it from time to time.

There is more hard evidence in your single post than in all of creationism "science" and ID combined.


138 posted on 07/06/2005 10:47:34 AM PDT by 2ndreconmarine
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To: Stultis

Please see post 135.

Though thank you, for your civility.

I don't believe we've met before. Odd given the amount of time we've both been on.


139 posted on 07/06/2005 10:48:19 AM PDT by MacDorcha (In Theory there is no difference between theory and practice. In practice there is.)
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To: MacDorcha
OK, let me get this straight: A rat (or it's ancestors) diverging, and becoming a class of felines, and a class of rodents... contridicts TOE?

I'm not sure I get the question. Rats and cats, if you go back far enough, have a common ancestor. That ancestor, however, was neither a rat nor a cat. AFAIK, cats did not diverge from the rodent group (or vice versa).

So, how would you say that two carnivor mammals do not share the same lineage? And that mammals did not start out small, and "rat-sized"?

All those things are true- all mammals share a common lineage and they all come from small mammals. However, those original mammals weren't really cats, dogs or rodents.

140 posted on 07/06/2005 10:48:44 AM PDT by Modernman ("Laws are like sausages, it is better not to see them being made." -Bismarck)
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