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If, as the creationists wold have us believe, all life on Earth came into existence through a process of special creation, then the God presumably in charge of the process has had ample opportunity to create evidence that would refute what the religious extremist minority naively labels the "heresy" of evolution. However, when we examine the physical and biological Earth, we encounter not only a complete lack of disproof of evolution, but also vast quantities of evidence supporting evolution, all of which indicates one of three possibilities: (1) life evolved on its own; (2) God used evolution as a means of "creating" life; or (3) God created all life through special creation, but wants to deceive man into believing that evolution is true. All three of these options run counter to the creationist's claims.
A crucial prediction made by the theory of evolution is that one should find a general progression of increasingly diverse and complex life forms when one examines the fossils in progressively higher strata if sedimentary rock. While creationists should expect the oldest strata of sedimentary rock to yield fossils of very complex life forms (like mammals), since their God presumably created all life within a short period of time, evolutionists specifically expect the fossil record not to. Thus, had God wished to supply evidence refuting evolution and proving His status as Creator, He could easily have done so by depositing, preerving, and later exposing to paleontologists numerous mammalian fossils in the oldest rock strata. In fact, a God powerful enough to create an entire universe would surely find it a trifle to invert the whole sequence of fossils, placing the simplest life forms in the most modern strata and the most complex life forms in the earliest strata, thereby disproving evolution. Yet, when we look at the fossil record, we find the one sequence of life forms that evolution predicts -- not one of the many sequences that would have demolished evolutionary science. One must wonder why the creationist's God has failed to seize such a beautiful opportunity to refute evolution.
For the full article, CLICK HERE.
Here are some links of continuing general interest to these threads:DARWIN, FULL TEXT OF HIS WRITINGS.
Massive mega-site with thousands of links on evolution, creationism, young earth, etc..
Site that debunks virtually all of creationism's fallacies.
Another amazing site full of links debunking creationism.
The site of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, with tons of resources on evolution, education, the current controversy in Kansas, the text of court opinions on teaching evolution, and a very good article titled: "Evolution and the Science and Religion Dialogue," American Association for the Advancement of Science.
An article by John F. Haught, Ph.D., Georgetown University: Does Evolution Rule Out God's Existence?.
Great 1997 article from the Washington Post on how evolution answers its critics: How Science Responds When Creationists Criticize Evolution.
Information about The 2nd law of thermodynamics, so beloved (and so poorly understood) by creationists.
For those who keep advancing the "do the math" argument, allegedly showing the improbability of the natural evolution of life itself, here's an article in Scientific American about self-organization, a recently discovered, innate property of some complex systems. CLICK HERE FOR "SELF-ORGANIZATION".
For the old "NASA Computer Proves Joshua's Long Day" story, a classic urban legend, CLICK HERE.
For information about Ayn Rand and Objectivism, CLICK HERE FOR AYN RAND'S PAGE.
The truth about the anti-evolution $250K offer from Dr. Kent Hovind of Pensacola, Florida (the prize is yours, provided you prove to Hovind's satisfaction that there are no miracles): HERE'S HOVIND'S OFFER. For information from two people who "debated" against the learned Dr. Hovind (who is allegedly a government school teacher), DEBATE ONE, and for the other Hovind encounter DEBATE TWO. Hovind was often touted by creationists in these threads until the absurd nature of his offer became known.
Regarding the inerrancy of scripture, here are the documents about the charges against Galileo and Galileo's confession (involving his heresy that the earth orbits the sun, contrary to scripture): Heresy charges against Galileo and Galileo's confession.
The Pope's official 1996 position on evolution (about 330 years after Galileo died under house arrest).
For a wonderful concept introduced to these threads by jennyp, click on eudaimonia.
For "Conway's Game of Life," a computer simulation, an addictive program which shows how complex self-sustaining arrangements can emerge from relatively simple rules acting on random starting configurations. It's another link from jennyp: Conway's Game of Life.
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New thread. Y'all come.
Hot new thread.
The fossil record does a rather shabby job of supporting evolutionary assumptions.Ie:if evolution is how it really happened,then wouldn't fossils be dominated by "half this/half that"?There are only arguable examples of transitional forms with archeopterix about the best shot.
Darwin sent folks out to search for them over a century ago.Where are they?
I'm just makin' sure that my latest posts didn't get abandoned back on the OLD thread.
#61................Thanks for not getting on my case about the Colts output yesterday. I'm not much of a fan of 'professional' sports anyway. "Don't go nuts, kids! It's just a business."
I don't know what the Irsays wanted from Baltimore 16 years ago, but NOW the is talk of 'needing' a NEW stadium! (Yeah, 16 years old and 'obsolete' already)
And what REALLY Pi$$e$ me off:
These IDIOTS we have for elected officials NEVER retired the SURTAX on prepared food here in Indy after the 10 years ran out. I STILL have to pay an added 1% 'To help pay off the Dome'.
(Hey Jim, "You ain't gonna get it. We just busted our budget for a new basketballcathedral, mosque, churchstadium for the Pacers. (After all, the old Market Square Arena was 25 years old!)
#63.............
Creationism is not only a cult belief it is a DANGEROUS cult belief..
I may have missed it in all of the posts, but could YOU show me just HOW it is 'dangerous'? Even FLAT EARTHERs couldn't limit discovery: they'd just warn you about falling off the edge!
continue NOT! I am just now posting MY stuff! (And you KNOW you want everyone to see it!)
;^)
But the jungle is lousy for fossilization.
You have GOT to be kidding here!!! Yank out ALL of your books and you'll SEE that them there ol' dinos is STANDING up to their belly buttons in Steamy, Swampy, Leafy, Mossy, Soggy JUNGLE!!!!!!!
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Oh, that OLD thread is here.
Oh, that OLD thread is here.
Thanks, but if you scroll up, you'll see that I had already linked to it in my initial setup posting. All part of the service, my dear.
The fossil record does a rather shabby job of supporting evolutionary assumptions. This is the most common fallacy promoted by creationists: "The fossil record MUST show every intermediate form (half-and-half) with smoooth transitions if evolution is valid. To the contrary, of the literally hundreds of billions of individual organisms that have lived in the 4.5 billion year existence of the earth, only one in every hundred milllion or so actually gets fossilized. It's like looking at a tile here and a tile there on a huge mosiaic tile floor and expecting to see the "smooth transistions" of the overall design. Evolution is a fact. It happens the same way that natural selection is imitated by humans who select dogs for certain characteristics. Where is the half chihuahua, half St. Bernard? It is arrogant of humans to limit God to one specific way of doing anything. God did what God did and the truth is ALWAYS God's work. Evolution just happens to be the truth. Creationism is the same as any other ancient myth that simply must "EVOLVE".
David M. Raup, Conflicts Between Darwin and Paleontology:
"Well, we are now about 120 years after Darwin, and...ironically, we have even fewer examples of Evolutionary transition than we had in Darwin's time. By this I mean that some of the classic cases of Darwinian change in the fossil record, such as the Evolution of the horse in North America, have had to be discarded or modified as the result of more detailed information".
This is true of all of the disciplines of science touched by Evolution.
David B. Kitts(School of Geology and Geophysics, University of Oklahoma), "Paleontology and Evolutionary Theory," Evolution, Vol. 28, September 1974, p. 467:
"Despite the bright promise that paleontology provides a means of 'seeing' Evolution, it has presented some nasty difficulties for Evolutionists, the most notorious of which is the presence of 'gaps' in the fossil record. Evolution requires intermediate forms between species and paleontology does not provide them."
His,
Bob Zuvich
rzuvich@access1.com
I suppose it won't have any effect, and it's probably outrageous of me to attempt this, but I would like to make some suggestions for those who post here:
1. Please link to lengthy articles, rather than posting them here in their entirety. A brief description of the article is helpful, but dumping it here in full is overkill. It gets out of hand if a post is longer than a screen or two. (In my humble opinion.)2. In the words of Rodney King: "Can't everybody get along?"
Darwin sent folks out to search for them over a century ago.Where are they?
Every fossil is a transitional form.
>One must wonder why the creationist's God has failed to seize such a beautiful opportunity to refute evolution.
Or to create a world that isn't better explained by assuming he does not exist.
#11..........
Every one, huh?
Bats
GAP: One of the least understood groups of modern mammals -- there are no known bat fossils from the entire Paleocene.
The first known fossil bat, Icaronycteris, is from the (later) Eocene, and it was already a fully flying animal very similar to modern bats. It did still have a few "primitive" features, though (unfused & unkeeled sternum, several teeth that modern bats have lost, etc.) Fruit bats and horseshoe bats first appear in the Oligocene. Modern little vespertiliontids (like the little brown bat) first appear in the Miocene.
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I'm going to go out on a limb and make a general comment to nobody in particular.
The most compelling evidence for evolution has nothing to do with the fossil record or with genetic trees or anything like that, but from simple observation of how people and animals inherit characteristics from their parents. People look like their parents. If they have black skin, their parents have black skin. If they have epicanthic eyes, their parents have epicanthic eyes. Any illiterate fool can see this. Even if I believed in Adam and Eve, it is instantly clear that two randomly selected orientals share more common ancestors more recently than I do with either of them.
That being said, it is equally obvious that all finches share common ancestors. Given that, it is inevitable that all birds share common ancestors, at some point before the ancestors shared by all finches. From there it gets a little more complicated, but not too much: ultimately, all vertebrates must have shared a common ancestor. Are these really such great leaps of intuition?
If Darwin had never lived and no theory of evolution had never been published, I can't imagine that I really would have failed to conclude that all life (at least each kingdom) descended from common ancestors. Throw away all fossils and all knowledge of genetics; it's still obvious by mere inspection.
This is the classic "God in the Gaps" argument. When there is a big gap, the anti-evolutionist says, find a transitional form. Then a scientist, rancher, miner or other person finds a form that is in the gap. The anti-evolutionist says, "aha, but where is the transitional form between this fossil and the one on one side or other of the gap. There will always be gaps, and all fossils are to some extent transitional forms. It is up to the person disputing the evolutionary evidence to show that fossils don't fit the evolutionary record. Mammals in early sedimentary rock would be good.
Evidence of extinction and death doesn't support the evolution hypothesis.
It did still have a few "primitive" features, though (unfused & unkeeled sternum, several teeth that modern bats have lost, etc.)
Like I said: every one.
OK, I'll grant you this: the very last trilobite was not a transitional form. Find its fossil and I'll stand refuted. Meanwhile, do you (or will you) have children? Guess who's a transitional form!
Swamp perfect, jungle bad. Tarzan know!
"Evolution is an observed fact."
Depends on how one defines "evolution." I give you another "best-hits" compilation of evolution's "morphing definitions." See if you can follow the "changing" chameleon!
Here we see one definition of evolution.
It may be said that natural selection is daily and hourly scrutinising, throughout the world, every variation, even the slightest; rejecting that which is bad, preserving and adding up all that is good; silently and insensibly working, whenever and wherever opportunity offers, at the improvement of each organic being in relation to its organic and inorganic conditions of life. We see nothing of these slow changes in progress, until the hand of time has marked the long lapses of ages, and then so imperfect is our view into long past geological ages, that we only see that the forms of life are now different from what they formerly were.
Although natural selection can act only through and for the good of each being, yet characters and structures, which we are apt to consider as of very trifling importance, may thus be acted on.
Charles Darwin, "On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life," Chapter 4
"Evolution in the extended sense can be defined as a directional and essentially irreversible process occurring in time, which in its course gives rise to an increase of variety and an increasingly high level of organization in its products. Our present knowledge indeed forces us to tile view that the whole of reality is evolution—a single process of self-transformation."2
2. Julian Huxley: "Evolution and Genetics" in What is Man? (Ed. by J. R. Newman, New York, Simon and Schuster, 1955), p.278.
And here we see another:
"Evolution does NOT proceed towards greater complexity. If anything, it meanders towards fitness within the species' environment. (And of course there's a big question of just how well it does that!)"
130 Posted on 10/30/1999 15:14:23 PDT by jennyp
"Maybe Darwin thought it was neat & linear. But it turns out it's actually quite a chaotic (unpredictable in advance) process. Wild & bushy, more like. Kinda like the dynamic free-market economy vs. the intelligently designed Soviet economy."
98 Posted on 10/03/1999 22:23:54 PDT by jennyp
"evolution is usually defined as any shift of allele frequencies in a population. Scientists don't usually make value judgments on whether or not a particular shift in frequency is "upward" or "downward". In fact in a book by Gould that I read, he gives an example of a plankton species that got smaller over time. While it's a common misstatement among even many of those who accept evolution as fact that evolution is "progress" it's not really a part of evolutionary theory."
49 Posted on 10/21/1999 07:40:16 PDT by garbanzo (garbanzo@worldnet.att.net)
Although 90 percent of Americans believe in God, "no divine intervention" is what their kids have been learning in public schools. As late as 1995, before yielding to anti-Darwinian pressure, the National Association of Biology Teachers made this clear when it described evolution as "impersonal, unsupervised, unpredictable."
Published: 08.22.99 Author: JACK CASHILL
If, as you imply, evolution is ongoing, where, exactly is it headed?
"We'll never know until we get there. Evolution doesn't have a predetermined goal, in the sense that we could predict beforehand. I guess you could say that it's headed in the direction of optimal fitness of each species to its local ecology. Of course, ecologies change all the time."
71 Posted on 10/03/1999 00:12:01 PDT by jennyp
The sheer dishonesty with which evolutionists approach the whole subject is quite clear.
When they want to prove evolution, they simply call it "change." When they want to attack creationists for distorting evolution, they trot out "improvement." And yet, "improvement" must have been part of the "change," or we wouldn't be discussing this right now.
And note the following:
"Evolution does NOT proceed towards greater complexity. If anything, it meanders towards fitness within the species' environment. (And of course there's a big question of just how well it does that!)"
130 Posted on 10/30/1999 15:14:23 PDT by jennyp
Now I ask you all to consider the quote, above, in the light of this oft-repeated evidence on these threads:
"...RNA strands of as little as six units is enough to provide a template for the creation of new copies of itself. Six units!"
166 Posted on 01/15/2000 21:42:28 PST by jennyp
I wonder how one gets from "RNA strands
of as little as six units"
to HUMANS, CELLS, DNA,
a protein with a process that "does NOT proceed
towards greater complexity."
All life from as little as "Six units!" by a process that "does NOT proceed towards greater complexity."
Is any of this getting through?
The amazing thing to me is that so much evidence of evolution has been accumulated from fossil records inthe relatively short period of time since Darwin. Most important has been the discovery of an almost complete record of the evolution of homo sapiens (that us, for you creationist guys).
The only people in the world who can read and write and still believe in creationism are the relatively few but very noisy Christian Fundementalists that have not yet figured out that evolution is not a threat to religion.
How many evolutionists does it take to change a light bulb?
Only one, but it takes eight million years.
Or to create a world that isn't better explained by assuming he does not exist.
Literal biblical creationism would predict that the universe as a whole would exhibit anthropocentric qualities. However the universe doesn't exhibit those qualities. Why do there exist poisonous plants if the universe was created for man's benefit? Most parents take the trouble to childproof their homes even without the benefit of omnipotentence. Why do there exist galaxies and stars that are invisible to the naked eye if the universe was created solely for man's benefit - for that matter why is the universe that big? Or why is there nothing particularly special about the sun?
All life from as little as "Six units!" By a process that "does NOT proceed towards greater complexity."
(It's a miracle!)
What gets through is that you're making quite a bit of hay about (what I consider to be) a misstatement by jennyp, who is not the spokesman for evolution.
In her zeal to counter the myth that evolution implies some sort of progress towards "higher" beings, she stated that evolution does not tend towards greater complexity. In this, I think she is wrong. Evolution CAN tend towards greater complexity. The mere fact that the genomes of many of today's organisms are far larger than that of any bacterium shows that evolution can and does generate complexity.
It doesn't have to produce complexity, although complexity IS one valid path to survival. The bacteria of today are probably not too much more complex than the bacteria of a billion years ago, and yet they are the product of an evolutionary chain every bit as long and eventful as that which produced human beings.
[Previous thread] You have read Zacharia Sitchen! His books account for the primal eve and Elohiem given as the name of God in Genesis. Eloheim is plural of El.
What I seem to remember:
El was the chief Canaanite god, head of the pantheon that included the notorious Baal. "El Elyon," god of gods. Some Bible verses were written in the "elohist" tradition, as opposed to "yahwist" (from Yahweh, the God of the monotheist tradition). I've seen arguments over whether the "elohim" usage stole in when the persecution of the Canaanite religion had ended and things relaxed a bit. But I haven't read Sitchen. The one book I read on Biblical times history was from a library far away and not available to me now.
Before wasting any time responding to garbanzo, you should carefully read the following quotes, culled from many long, tedious months of discussing the subject with him. I'll start with one of his most recent. See what you think...
I was not specifically referring to human evolution but rather to more generally to the evolution of wide variety of modern species in which in many cases you do see a radial pattern of evolution in space and in time. Not necessarily humans but other lineages do show that pattern.
Presumably garbanzo's reference includes horse evolution:
To: garbanzo
garbanzo: we can tell that horses have changed over time - that part seems quite clear - but what isn't known is exactly who ancestors of horses were. The fact that we don't know exactly what the ancestry was doesn't change the fact that horses developed from somewhat horselike progenitors.
watchin:
1) We know horses have changed.
2) We don't know what they looked like before
3) It is a fact that horses developed from somewhat horselike progenitors.Okay. How can #1 and #2 be true at the same time? That's like meeting someone for the first time and telling him he looks like he's lost weight. And the basis for #3 is that you know horses evolved because evolution is true?
160 Posted on 11/03/1999 13:14:15 PST by watchin
Or how 'bout these gems:
"It's clear humans evolved from something, just what is isn't yet clear."
"The law of biogenesis probably breaks down at the molecular level. Exactly how it breaks down isn't yet known though."
94 Posted on 08/22/1999 20:59:27 PDT by garbanzo"Trees evolved from earlier green plants. The evolution of chlorophyll is not particularly difficult to imagine and in fact was one of the first major systems to evolve in living things. It's only a problem if you set up the "piece-by-piece" strawman in which chlorophyll supposedly evolved an atom at a time..."
131 Posted on 08/22/1999 22:23:02 PDT by garbanzo
Note, especially, this line:
"It's clear humans evolved from something, just what is isn't yet clear."
It's the same logical fallacy watchin' nailed him on in another post, on another thread! All this store of "scientific" knowledge coming from someone who once wrote:
"I'm not biologist or a paleontogist - I don't collect evidence of this sort for a living. I'm not the avatar of the entire biological science community."
55 Posted on 09/19/1999 00:55:47 PDT by garbanzo
He has, however, alleged the following:
"I have a degree in physics."
138 Posted on 10/16/1999 06:05:28 PDT by garbanzo"Well I'm trained as a scientist, but work as an engineer - I kind of know how these things work."
194 Posted on 01/15/2000 23:37:02 PST by garbanzo
"Kind of know?" Seems a little knowledge goes a long way with regards to evolution. (It also seems that garbanzo is schooling with the wrong fish when he tries to argue in your pond, isn't he? Hehehe...)
Of course, where his knowledge is lacking, he simply fills in with something else:
"The evolution of chlorophyll is not particularly difficult to imagine..."
131 Posted on 08/22/1999 22:23:02 PDT by garbanzo
A fitting "science" for Disney, perhaps, but hardly "scientific," wouldn't you agree?
And finally, there's this gem:
"Here's a hint if you want to be a real scientist type - you have to answer criticism, often from hostile sources."
264 Posted on 09/20/1999 20:46:00 PDT by garbanzo
But, of course, I guess it's OK to duck out on the hard questions when it comes to evolution.
Just thought you might like to know who and what you're dealing with here.
All life from as little as "Six units!" By a process that "does NOT proceed towards greater complexity."
Let's not forget that science isn't about what's TRUE. Science is about what is SCIENTIFIC. That is, science is the result what one achieves when when applies the scientific method.
There have been plenty of scientific "truths" that were later abandoned in the face of new observations, which required that new theories be developed to accommodate those observations.
But I gotta tell you, I don't see that creationism makes a whole lot of sense from a scientific point of view. And I don't understand why it is so important for people to believe the creation story as fact.
Even to a layman like me, it is clear from advances in 20th century theoretical physics that God's greatness is far, far beyond human comprehension. Ask any physicist what happens inside a black hole, or what existed before the big bang, and they will tell you that we cannot know through science, because in those environments all the known laws of physics break down.
I believe that the whole universe is the manifestation of God's divine consciousness. The Bible, for all its value, is like a giant game of telephone. Even if the original words were actually spoken by God, after centuries of being re-told, written down over and over from memory and translated into so many languages, who can say which words are God's and which are man's?
If you ask me, the whole science vs. creationism debates is silly, and the creationists ultimately succeed only in making religion unbelievable and inaccessible.
God is great beyond imagining, and evolution -- a mechanism which is observable everywhere even today -- is just more proof of his divine wisdom.
I would venture that evolution is a principle which would explain virtually any life form on any planet in the universe. Creationism can't do that, unless one assumes that a) there is no life anywhere in the Universe (a really unwarranted assumption), or b) God created every world in the Universe, one at a time, in seven day increments. Since there are only 1428 weeks in 10,000 years (which I understand is the timeframe most creationists accept since the creation of the earth), the number of planets in the universe would have to be a lot, lot less than can reasonably be expected, given the known number of stars.
Why creationism is a problem is that Christianity has played a fundamental role in the political evolution of Western thought, which finally cumliminated in the founding documents of this once great nation. (I am not a Christian, but I know where respect must be paid).
To say that belief in creationism is a necessary part of Christianity, in my opinion, denigrates the importance of that great religion.
Still, I am open to the idea that evolution, which is just a scientific theory, may one day run into a series of observations that call its validity into question, and require its replacement with a new theory.
Personally though, I can't imagine that new theory being both scientific and creationist.
But that's just me.
Do you think that people will take you more seriously for the length of your posts? To summarize, you miss the main point. Evolution doesn't of necessity proceed towards greater complexity. As can be shown mathematically, a random process can cover an entire range of values. If there is a selective process which selects for certain values, then a random process can generate highly complex systems. Simply put, we don't know the number of times the six-unit sequence produced something simpler than itself. It's only the success stories (i.e. greater than six-units) which stuck. Put into industrial terms - most projects don't form fully formed from the start - they start off simple and you never see the R&D phase in the final product.
Also I think this qualifies as both personal attack and change of subject.
It's just the old "out of context quote" trick. Here's jennyp's perfectly defensible statement:
"Evolution does NOT proceed towards greater complexity. If anything, it meanders towards fitness within the species' environment. (And of course there's a big question of just how well it does that!)"In other words, evolution is a trend to adaptation, fitness in the immediate environment. That may or may not introduce complexity. Complexity can and does happen, but so does simplification--atrophy, disappearance, or reassignment of no-longer-necessary organs and functions. It's not about complexity, it's about fitness.
New thread, new filibuster. Amazing how quickly the creationists get them too big to load. Did you catch RaceBannon's performance on the previous thread?
"It seems to follow that there is no general reason to expect evolution to be progressive-- even in the weak, value-neutral sense. There will be times when increased size of some organ is favoured and other times when decreased size is favoured. Most of the time, average-sized individuals will be favoured in the population and both extremes will be penalised. During these times the population exhibits evolutionary stasis (ie, no change) with respect to the factor being measured. If we had a complete fossil record and looked for trends in some particular dimension, such as leg length, we would expect to see periods of no change alternating with fitful continuations or reversals in direction--like a weathervane in changeable, gusty weather."
Richard Dawkins,
"The evolutionary future of man - a biological view of progress"
Is Richard Dawkins a spokesman for evolution???
Sorry. Not gonna' let you off easy on this one at all.
All life from as little as "Six units!" By a process that "does NOT proceed towards greater complexity."
(To paraphrase, "Seemingly successful evolutionary 'proofs' have many fathers, but illogic is an orphan.")
Yell louder, people can still read the posts rebutting you.
Yeah, that was a world record I think. But Stingray has to get an honorable mention for the huge bold fonts. One thing I've noted when surfing the net and reading various forms of crankery - that length is inversely proportional to intelligible content and that the rationality is inversely proportional to the number of large fonts and exclamation points.
"It's just the old "out of context quote" trick."
This isn't out of context. You simply resent the fact that the collective stupidity from your side is being quoted and challenged at all!
Like garbanzo says:
"...if you want to be a real scientist type - you have to answer criticism, often from hostile sources."
264 Posted on 09/20/1999 20:46:00 PDT by garbanzo
All life from as little as "Six units!" By a process that "does NOT proceed towards greater complexity."
(Amazing!)
If, as the creationists wold have us believe
There is no creationists. They are Christians. We don't worship a science (creationism). There is no such thing as a creationist.
Evolution the biggest fraud by atheist and antiChrist forces of all time!
If monkeys evolved into people why are there still monkeys ?
If monkeys evolved into people why are there still monkeys? Evolution: the theory that works pretty good as long as you don't need any proof at all ; and as long as the bible means nothing to you !
If monkeys evolved into people why are there still monkeys ?
I pity whoever tries to bring you up to speed here.
If there is no G-d then there is no right or wrong, and ALL mores (not just sexual ones) are private hangups. This means that all life becomes a struggle to crawl to the pinnacle of power so one can impose his personal hangups on his fellow man for no reason whatsoever. Negative feelings about murder, theft, envy, rape, etc., would no more reflect an objective moral standard than the Shakers' belief that one should always put the right foot forward when walking and make ninety degree turns.
Also, if there is no G-d, why should anyone have to acknowledge this truth? In a meaningless, random universe no obligation to accept "the Truth" exists. Which means that every time you seek to convert people to evolutionism you are contradicting your own ideology of meaninglessness.
You do form one very important function, Mr. Henry. You witness to the true "enlightened" character of so many of our Founding Fathers.
Thomas Paine is still boiling in the excrement.
I pity whoever tries to bring you up to speed here.
I'm beginning to think that some intellectual triage might be necessary here...
1. It may be said that natural selection is daily and hourly scrutinising, throughout the world, every variation, even the slightest; rejecting that which is bad, preserving and adding up all that is good; silently and insensibly working, whenever and wherever opportunity offers, at the improvement of each organic being in relation to its organic and inorganic conditions of life.
Charles Darwin,
Origin of Species2. While it's a common misstatement among even many of those who accept evolution as fact that evolution is "progress" it's not really a part of evolutionary theory."
49 Posted on 10/21/1999 07:40:16 PDT by garbanzo (garbanzo@worldnet.att.net)3. Evolution doesn't of necessity proceed towards greater complexity.
28 Posted on 01/17/2000 06:41:16 PST by garbanzo
A third definition now? Get back to us when you've all decided on what it is you're trying to prove.
Also I think this qualifies as both personal attack and change of subject
Hmmm...Simply posting someone's expressed views on a given subject now constitutes a "personal attack?" Hey, dude...If you can't stand the heat, get out of the lab! Hehehe...
"Amazing how quickly the creationists get them too big to load."
Get something faster than 2400 baud, and you'll be able to run with the big dogs, too.
"I'm beginning to think that some intellectual triage might be necessary here..."
"Physician, heal thyself."
Would you -- please -- stop your spam postings. It's quite juvenile and it looks very bad for your side of the argument. If that's all you have to say, you've said it plenty of times. It's quite enough.
Actually they're all the same. Evolution can (as Physicist pointed out) proceed towards greater complexity - but it's not a necessity - and as jennyp has pointed out tends to fluctuate around a mean. Progess doesn't equal complexity -increases in complexity are allowed by evolution but not required. From a statistical point of view increases are just as likely as decreases.
Let's see more personal attacks and I forgot the misquotes from the last time.
Sitchin is a fascinating read but probably falls into the "Panspermia" school so far as humanity is concerned.
Another very very interesting book is Everything You Know Is Wrong, Book One: Human Origins by Lloyd Pye.
These to authors ought to offend everyone here.
"The fossil record does a rather shabby job of supporting evolutionary assumptions."
This is the most common fallacy promoted by creationists: "The fossil record MUST show every intermediate form (half-and-half) with smoooth transitions if evolution is valid."
That's the second most common fallacy.
To the contrary, of the literally hundreds of billions of individual organisms that have lived in the 4.5 billion year existence of the earth, only one in every hundred milllion or so actually gets fossilized. It's like looking at a tile here and a tile there on a huge mosiaic tile floor and expecting to see the "smooth transistions" of the overall design. Evolution is a fact. It happens the same way that natural selection is imitated by humans who select dogs for certain characteristics. Where is the half chihuahua, half St. Bernard? It is arrogant of humans to limit God to one specific way of doing anything. God did what God did and the truth is ALWAYS God's work. Evolution just happens to be the truth. Creationism is the same as any other ancient myth that simply must "EVOLVE".
"Would you -- please -- stop your spam postings. It's quite juvenile..."
Spam? Juvenile??? How 'bout I put up a few of your posts and we'll see who has engaged in "juvenile spamming?" (Besides, I thought you would have appreciated all the "bumps" for such an important lead article!)
"...and it looks very bad for your side of the argument."
Since when have you ever cared about what made our side of the argument look bad?
"Methinks thou dost protest too much." (Which is simply to say, it makes your side look far worse than ours.)
she stated that evolution does not tend towards greater complexity. In this, I think she is wrong...
When talking about complexity, the inorganic world forms a wall against which it is impossible to move toward less complexity. Therefore the only direction possible for variation is toward greater complexity. "Average" or typical life forms are not more complex than they were billions of years ago. Most life is still single cell or viral.
If there is no G-d then there is no right or wrong, and ALL mores (not just sexual ones) are private hangups.
I think you may be wrong on all counts. Evolution does not mean there's no god, any more than Galileo's solar system (which is blatantly contrary to scripture) meant there's no god. That's point one.
Point two: Even if there were no god, there is still right and wrong. Hell, it's even scriptural that we can figure out right and wrong for ourselves. Remember when God came to Abraham and said he was going to wipe out Sodom and Gomorrah? And Abraham said: "Hold on, that's wrong!" (or words to that effect). "Will not the judge of the world do justice?" Think about that. Think hard.
Most life is still single cell or viral.
Quite right. It is only the descendants of mutants which can exhibit any increasing complexity. Most ancestral forms just stay the way they've always been, unless some catastrophe wipes them out.
It's not about complexity, it's about fitness.
So the endless search for transitional forms is meaningless because there are no "higher forms" but we still don't have solid evidence what came from what. The gaps remain.
And God knows, I don't, what "fitness" really means. It all seems very circular to me, and I would wager that Darwin and most of his followers would say that evolution does move toward complexity and the "higher forms".
Stingray is pointing out that if the evidence misses the target, then the target gets moved by some. This redefinition process toward "change over time", however, is moving or has moved Evolutionist theory toward or to irrelevancy.
The gaps remain.
Some gaps remain, but we do keep finding new fossil species all the time. There's no point at all in closing up shop.
"Evolution can (as Physicist pointed out) proceed towards greater complexity - but it's not a necessity - and as jennyp has pointed out tends to fluctuate around a mean. Progess doesn't equal complexity -increases in complexity are allowed by evolution but not required. From a statistical point of view increases are just as likely as decreases."
So then tell me, what is the "mean" between "6 units of RNA" and a human being, statistically speaking?
You've just gotta' love what passes for "science" from your side. Hehehe...
Think of it this way - green is a "transitional color" between yellow and blue. Yellow is not a "higher" color than blue - but green lies between them. As as pointed out numerous times there are plenty of sequences in which transitional forms are found. But you never seem to actually respond to the evidence presented.
As for fitness - it simply means the ability to survive in a particular enviroment. Organisms which have traits which give them a survival advantage live longer and have more offspring passing their traits on to the next generation. Those that don't survive don't pass on their traits. It's as simple as that and I can't figure out why this is so controversial.