And, did they teach you that kind of reasoning in philosophy class?
I say, you have a right to demand a full refund of every penny you paid those b*st*rds to teach you to "reason" this way.
Come on, pal -- even a grade-schooler cannot fail to see the flaws in your logic here.
Indeed, your reasoning is so sloppy, I doubt everything else you claim about a supposed degree in Philosophy, etc.
Look at what you wrote!
You began by saying: "The default answer for most defenders of Darwinian evolution is..."
But just three sentences later, "default answer" has magically transubstantiated into "your reply is just a reiteration of Darwinian dogma".
Using "logic" like that, why not just transubstantiate the national debt into your personal income?! ;-)
And why, in your Philosophy classes, did they not teach you to pay close, close, close attention to the arguments actually made, instead of those which would have been made if you had been making them?
Enough. You asked a seemingly reasonable question regarding hair on mammals versus feathers on birds.
The simple answer, which I gave, is that mammals first appeared roughly 65 million years before the first birds.
Mammals have hair and hair works well for them, so hair came before feathers.
The question then is not: why don't mammals have feathers? (answer: because they don't need them), but rather rather, why don't birds have hair? -- answer: because hair doesn't work for birds.
Really, it's not that complicated, especially once you understand the sequence of events.
ARFAR: "I understand that any scientific theory is never 100% proved, nor can it be."
If you understand the elements of uncertainty inherent in the scientific enterprise, then none of this debate should faze you.
AFAR: "What I said was that there are some things that evolutionary theory implies must be true (such as one species evolving into another) that science cannot explain at the present time.
IOW, there is no mechanistic model which demonstrates the fact of one species giving rise to another, much less any model which demonstrates with any precision just how this could have occured."
You claimed above to have studied not only Philosophy, but also Biology, but then immediately demonstrate they didn't teach you much of that either.
Really, I think you could retire now on the money those people owe you for delivering a defective product! ;-)
I'm telling you, your problem here is a religion-based hang-up over the definition of the word "species".
And the answer is: in nature there is "no such a thang" as a "species".
And while we're at it, let's get rid of all the genera, families & phylums too. Out! They don't exist in nature.
All these biological classifications are just man-made constructs intended to help us understand what-in-the-world is going on in nature?
They were never intended to drive religiously devout people crazy, or drive mis-educated "philosophers" to false conclusions.
In nature one "species" doesn't "change into" another "species".
What happens is that breeding populations of a single type sometimes get separated from each other -- by water, mountains, deserts, etc., and now each sub-grouping is only breeding amongst itself.
Now Evolution facts (=confirmed observations) say that every generation First descends with modifications and Second is selected naturally for survival.
Over time -- millions of generations -- these small modifications can add up to the point where the various sub-populations, if reunited, could no longer interbreed.
Then scientists would arbitrarily call them separate "species".
But in nature, all they are is different populations which can or cannot interbreed.
And there are many intermediate examples of this, including horses and donkeys, brown bears and polar bears, etc.
ARFAR: "There are only extinct intermediary species, which scientists assume to be confirmation of what they already believe, namely, a small number of species giving rise to a greater number and variety of different species no longer able to interbreed.
But note please, this has never been observed to occur, nor does the paleontological evidence prove, even within the accepted statistical certainty associated with inductive reasoning, that this must have occured!"
I just cited two examples above, and there are many others.
Possibly the most notable examples are our distant cousins, the Neanderthals, which fossils suggested were not our ancestors, but now DNA is saying maybe there was some hanky-panky going on in back of the old cave.
So, were Neanderthals a separate species or not?
Answer: the word "species" is an arbitrary classification -- a scientific construct -- which can be less than helpful in some circumstances.
ARFAR: "You talk down to me as if I were largely unacquainted with science and carried bagload of unquestionable religious dogma.
I assure you that I am neither a scientific novice nor a religious dogmatist.
In fact, I was a strong evolutionary dogmatist before I came to question whether life could have originated and/or evolved without intelligent guidance."
I doubt all that.
Most Christian denominations teach (and I believe) something called "theistic evolutionism", which simply means that God designed, created and manages the Evolution process in order to produce what we see today, especially mankind.
And that is in no way a challenge to the theory of Evolution, it simply says that what science calls "random chance" is in fact intended by the Creator, from the beginning.
But "Intelligent Design" is something entirely different.
ID suggests -- or hints, or allows people to believe -- without in any way demonstrating, that some being is out there (where?) routinely manipulating DNA to produce new kinds of creatures.
And the problem, of course, is that nothing the IDers claim can be demonstrated scientifically.
That's why the notion of Intelligent Design is just somebody's idea of religion dressed up in scientific drag.
Look at what you wrote!
You began by saying: "The default answer for most defenders of Darwinian evolution is..."
But just three sentences later, "default answer" has magically transubstantiated into "your reply is just a reiteration of Darwinian dogma".
My dear colleague, a default answer IS a piece of dogma. Darwin asserted the basics of evolution -- adaption to a changing environment through incremental mutations, with 'survival of the fittest' being the result. This has become dogma for most biologists, even when there is overall evidence that all of Nature and each creature within it is far too complex to be the result of meadnering molecules (if you will excuse the phrase). Saying that all living things are as they are because of natural selection without reference to a guiding intelligence is just as dogmatic as saying life is as it is because 'God created it, just like the Bible states in Genesis'. What makes it dogma is nothing inherent in the theory, but rather in the way it is used over and over to reject any alternate hypothesis. IOW, it's only dogma when it cannot be questioned without suffering unending derision by other scientists, which is the case right now in the field of evolution. Granted there are some theories that are risible, but merely to attempt to weave God, or any higher intelligence into the process meets with categorical, and erroneous, name-calling, ie. 'fundamentalist', 'religionist', 'ID believer'. Boy, if your concept of ID is what you said --
But "Intelligent Design" is something entirely different.
ID suggests -- or hints, or allows people to believe -- without in any way demonstrating, that some being is out there (where?) routinely manipulating DNA to produce new kinds of creatures.
-- then I suggest you are the one who needs to pay more careful attention to the arguments of his opponents. God manipulating DNA from somewhere 'out there'? That's what IDers are supposed to believe? I carefully checked all my posts on this thread and nowhere did I use the phrase "Intelligent Design" to describe my beliefs. But ain't it a convenient panegyric to put a dunce cap on your 'opponent'?
What I actually believe, to make it clear to you, is more in line with what you define as Theistic Evolutionism, "which simply means that God designed, created and manages the Evolution process in order to produce what we see today, especially mankind. And that is in no way a challenge to the theory of Evolution...
Yet I am unfamiliar with the term Theistic Evolutionism. I am an independent thinker. Since you say you do believe TE, it seems we both believe much the same thing about how God and evolution may be integrated.
To be fair, you did not specifically say I believed in Intelligent Design. But you distinctly stated "I'm telling you, your problem here is a religion-based hang-up over the definition of the word "species".
Now how can we have an intelligent conversation sprinkled with clever telepathic psychoanalysis like that? I wish I were so talented myself. Actually, if you re-read my posts, you may find that we are not so far apart. For example, when I asked about why my cat has no feathers, I was not asking "why did not cats imitate birds and substitute feathers for their hair?" Rather, I was asking why, if feathers make good insulation and fur makes good insulation, how do we know why evolution took the course it did (furry mammals instead of featherd mammals)? It's a good question, since it's conceivable that feathers could work on a mammal. Or maybe not. We probably don't know at this point.
But MY point was that whatever state of nature biologists find animals in, no matter how complex or unexpected, they always assert that that creature is how it is because of the mechanistic forces of (oh, that Sacred Word!) Natural Selection. Just saying the magic words 'natural selection' shuts down all errant, heretical thinking, such as perhaps believing that God wanted it that way for purposes we are far too dim to comprehend.
And btw, although I am not precisely an IDer, do I really need anybody's permission to believe that God actually does manipulate DNA to His purposes? It's something I have thought about, but since I can't conceive how this is done, I hold it as a mere possibility. In order for any theory to be accurately labeled 'non-scientific', it must fly in the face of known facts. I am not aware of holding any beliefs that must shun observed data in order to be credible.
FYI, I have seen similar charts like the one you provide in the Time-Life series in which in immersed myself as a child, and in many Biology textbooks and Scientific American articles. What do the lines on these 'trees of life' prove? What does similarity of DNA prove? It proves similarity, lol.
I'd like to consider BrandtMichaels' assertion that "Considering the complexity of DNA proves clearly beyond a shadow of a doubt that one kind does not re-program itself into yet another kind." I actually am open to the idea that DNA is so intelligent that it could receive stimulus from the environment, analyze it, and make appropriate adaptations to itself. That would be a form of intelligent design (without CAPS). What I strongly doubt is that the changes leading to divergent evolution were caused by random mutations resulting from solar radiation or chemical reactions within cells. We know that usually leads to cancer and death, and not spectacularly adapted new species! There is also the fact of punctuated evolution, which is counter-intuitive to gradual random mutations. Intelligence must play a role, and since I believe in God as the Supreme Intelligence, I naturally look to Him/Her (I am Christian/Hindu) as the guiding force behind all life. I believe God has created the Universe, but in such a manner as to leave no fingerprints behind. I believe Life is a mystery that must be solved, and that science and spiritual thought (don't care much for conventional 'religion') must find common ground someday.
-- ARFAR