Evolution discussion

[Gameface]

I'm not super invested in whether evolution is correct or not. I know as an atheist I'm supposed to beat the drum and claim that evolution is proof that God doesn't exist, but I really see evolution and debates on the reality of a supernatural creator being as not being connected. First reason being that evolution is reality based, whereas faith is based on a fantasy that plays off our basic hopes and desires. So it's hard to disprove one with the other.

I trust that every last scientist on the planet is not in on a giant con job because they're actually satan worshipers or something. They could be wrong. It wouldn't hurt my feelings.

 

[Darkwing Duck]

This thread has not failed to live up to my expectations.

 

[carolinajazz]

England’s peppered moth is referred to as a modern example of evolution in progress. The International Wildlife Encyclopedia stated: “This is the most striking evolutionary change ever to have been witnessed by man.” After observing that Darwin was plagued by his inability to demonstrate the evolution of even one species, Jastrow, in his book Red Giants and White Dwarfs, added: “Had he known it, an example was at hand which would have provided him with the proof he needed. The case was an exceedingly rare one.” The case was, of course, the peppered moth.

Just what happened to the peppered moth? At first, the lighter form of this moth was more common than the darker form. This lighter type blended well into the lighter-colored trunks of trees and so was more protected from birds. But then, because of years of pollution from industrial areas, tree trunks became darkened. Now the moths’ lighter color worked against them, as birds could pick them out faster and eat them. Consequently the darker variety of peppered moth, which is said to be a mutant, survived better because it was difficult for birds to see them against the soot-darkened trees. The darker variety rapidly became the dominant type.

But was the peppered moth evolving into some other type of insect? No, it was still exactly the same peppered moth, merely having a different coloration. Hence, the English medical journal On Call referred to using this example to try to prove evolution as “notorious.” It declared: “This is an excellent demonstration of the function of camouflage, but, since it begins and ends with moths and no new species is formed, it is quite irrelevant as evidence for evolution.”

The inaccurate claim that the peppered moth is evolving is similar to several other examples. For instance, since some germs have proved resistant to antibiotics, it is claimed that evolution is taking place. But the hardier germs are still the same type, not evolving into anything else. And it is even acknowledged that the change may have been due, not to mutations, but to the fact that some germs were immune to begin with. When the others were killed off by drugs, the immune ones multiplied and became dominant. As Evolution From Space says: “We doubt, however, that anything more is involved in these cases than the selection of already existing genes.”

The same process may also have been the case with some insects being immune to poisons used against them. Either the poisons killed those insects on which they were used, or they were ineffective. Those killed could not develop a resistance, since they were dead. The survival of others could mean that they had been immune at the start. Such immunity is a genetic factor that appears in some insects but not in others. In any event, the insects remained of the same kind. They were not evolving into something else.

 

[babe]

I'm not super invested in whether evolution is correct or not. I know as an atheist I'm supposed to beat the drum and claim that evolution is proof that God doesn't exist, but I really see evolution and debates on the reality of a supernatural creator being as not being connected. First reason being that evolution is reality based, whereas faith is based on a fantasy that plays off our basic hopes and desires. So it's hard to disprove one with the other.

I trust that every last scientist on the planet is not in on a giant con job because they're actually satan worshipers or something. They could be wrong. It wouldn't hurt my feelings.

This is like saying you're just too smart for this stupid argument. And probably you have evidence to substantiate the claim that would be just overwhelming to anyone who could understand it. But the problem with exemplary intelligence is just that nobody can properly appreciate it. So it's a useless claim.

"Scientists" who are just liars enough to take a "straw man" argument from a Bible written by people living in an age where there was no understanding of the chemical elements let alone DNA and the chemical damage that does occur to it actually don't merit their claims to be "scientists" when arguing that biology disproves the concept of "God" and the creation as described briefly in the Bible.

There are no actual scraps of writing that date back to either Moses or any other "authoritative" source for the books of Moses. What we have was put together by the scribes and priests who worked for Solomon when he was the King of Israel on a campaign to solidify a "State Religion". So I don't think you could really attribute the Biblical account of "creation" to the God of Abraham any more than you could attribute to Jesus the "Trinity" concept of the Godhead adopted by the Catholic Church hundreds of years later.

Any hack who hasn't considered the need to factually address the origin of biblical texts who can ignorantly run on about how current science disproves "God" is way out of bounds as a "scientist".

uhhhmmmm...... well, same thing about any "defender of the faith" who thinks his "faith" hangs on the infallibility of the priestly hacks who wrote what Solomon wanted them to write.

 

[One Brow]

Science magazine said this: “Species do indeed have a capacity to undergo minor modifications in their physical and other characteristics, but this is limited and with a longer perspective it is reflected in an oscillation about a mean [average].” So, then, what is inherited by living things is not the possibility of continued change but instead (1)*stability and (2)*limited ranges of variation.

I'm sorry, but some random quote of some random magazine just doesn't hold up compared to the ten of thousands of pages of scientific papers that say otherwise.

Thus, the book Molecules to Living Cells states: “The cells from a carrot or from the liver of a mouse consistently retain their respective tissue and organism identities after countless cycles of reproduction.” And Symbiosis in Cell Evolution says: “All life .*.*. reproduces with incredible fidelity.” Scientific American also observes: “Living things are enormously diverse in form, but form is remarkably constant within any given line of descent: pigs remain pigs and oak trees remain oak trees generation after generation.”

Again, random quotes sans context.

And a science writer commented: “Rose bushes always blossom into roses, never into camellias. And goats give birth to kids, never to lambs.” He concluded that mutations “cannot account for overall evolution—why there are fish, reptiles, birds, and mammals.”

That roses always create seeds that will becomes roses *is* evolution. Goats giving birth to lambs would be a miracle, not evolution. There are many other mechisms in evolution besides mutation.

Now those were quotes from "educated" evolutionists!

YOUr science writer needs a better education, or more honesty. The others, I have no reason to think they mean what you claim they mean based on small quote mines.

The matter of variation within a kind explains something that influenced Darwin’s original thinking about evolution.

Please define what a "kind" is in some meaningful way. Otherwise, talking about "kinds" is just gibberish.

 

[One Brow]

Not contradictory at all. You know that part "you set up a few conditions" and "You repeatedly generate" and "You keep repeating"...that's the intelligent design part.

In nature, the environment sets up the conditions, without intent or intelligence. Reproduction creates the new generations, without intent or intelligence. Selection occurs, without intent or intelligence. So, if you acknowledge evolutionary design is possible at all, denying evolution in living things is self-contradictory.

Think of specified as useful patterns. The sculpted rocks of Mt. Rushmore may not have a use besides tourism, but the faces they were copied from do.

Nice try to divert the topic. However, the Man in the Mountain also had an eye, nose, etc. Again, we know one was designed, and the other not, by the simplicity in the designed monument.

Under your random/accidental system there is no reason to expect that the first place our eyes appeared were on the front of our faces. Why don't we have ancestors with eyes at the end of each boob or knee? or on the back of their heads? The existence of clunkers like that would really lend some credibility to your crazy *** theory.

Actually, it would undermine it. Eyes developed long before long before boobs and knees.

But seriously, you seem to be implying that any existence of "flaws" in the system negates intelligent design. The only thing "flaws" negate are purity/perfection in the design/useful pattern.

Most ID advocates not not seeking to put forth the Incompetent Designer. I fully acknowledge that if you think life might have been designed by an Incompetent Designer or a Malicious Designer, than the inferior construction of living things is no bar. However, since either of those designers is consistent with any state of affiars, they can not be evidenced, either.

You need to change that "does" to "did."

I'll work on that.

That was an interesting conflation of a point you never made and a point I did.

I attempted to make that point earlier. I'll try to do better.

Formula (*) asserts that the information in both A and B jointly is the information in A plus the information in B that is not in A. ... Either way. If you have 2 seperate books with the same story or if there are two copies of the story in one book the formula accounts for both.

What the formula does not account for is the processing environment. If program A has output B in some computing environment X, it may have an entirely different output C in computing environment Y. It's not just A that contributes to B, it's both A and X. As such, B can have information derived from X that is does not exist in A, and may even have information that is not present in A or X alone, but only when the two are joined together.

The formula is just wrong in saying that laying two copies of at text, end-to-end, produces no new information. Every measure of information in use says the amount of information increases.

You notice how you had to add an intelligent force into the equation ("you") in order to produce useful information. Same thing holds true for all of our biological parts/systems.

I fully acknowledge that the division algorithm is a designed process. However, my point was that you can't claim that something is not produced by a process simply because it is not produced in any particular step. This is just as true of useful information as it is of division.

OB: Yet, the two copies laid end-to-end still has more information.​

... your conclusion hasn't been backed up with logic.

It's very basic information theory. 01100110 has more information than 0110. 0110011001100110 has still more.

I don't think it was useful...

It served, and still serves to some degree, the same purpose as Mt. Rushmore.

That is one of the most bizarre answers I've ever seen...it is like a 50 ft. wookie.
Yes human language changed over time but it originates from an intelligence source...the human mind...are you really going to deny that humans are intelligent beings?

Who directed the changes? ID is not just a claim of intelligence, but one of intelligent direction. There was no one person or group who directed the change from Old English to Middle English or Latin to Romanian. Everyone just spoke the language they learned, with small differences due to their own particulars and peculiarities (random variation). The variations that were pick up by others (reproduction) either were preserved or let go (selection). No one decided which changes to make.

The appendix was more useful hundreds of years ago when we weren't city dwellers.

How so? Not everyone today is a city dweller or has significant city-dweller ancestry. Are you saying their appendixes work differently?

So in conclusion all your "vestigial" arguments are as useless as your stories about bears falling into the ocean and becoming whales.

So, you think is an organ has any sort of use at all, no matter how poorly done, duplicated, and inefficient it is at that task, it's not vestigial? I don't think you understand the term.

I hope I made that huge *** response more readable for you, one brow.

Very much so. Thank you.

 

[green]

I'm sorry, but anyone that argues that God disproves science or science disproves God is an idiot. Hawking said it best:

"There is a probably apocryphal story, that when Laplace was asked by Napoleon, how God fitted into this system, he replied, 'Sire, I have not needed that hypothesis.' I don't think that Laplace was claiming that God didn't exist. It is just that He doesn't intervene, to break the laws of Science. That must be the position of every scientist. A scientific law, is not a scientific law, if it only holds when some supernatural being, decides to let things run, and not intervene."

When it comes to science, God is irrelevant. IF God exists, he follows the laws of science. If you believe in the Bible, Jesus didn't snap his fingers then magically walk through walls. He did it following the laws of science. Jesus didn't say abracadabra and magically walk on water. He did it manipulating the laws of science. He didn't shuffle a deck of cards, then feed thousands from a few fish, he did it following the laws of science (which, we are close to being able to replicate with 3-D printing).

This is a stupid debate, because it is irrelevant.

 

[One Brow]

Well you can call it different but to me they are advanced.

I see no reason to treat your mystical claptrap as any better than anyone else's.

Hagfish of today is basically the same as 300 mil years ago. There is a reason they are called living fossils.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23254938

If hagfish had been unchanged, there would be no need to create a pan-cyclostome pattern. Present-day hagfish would be that pattern.

There are 77 species of hagfish. Do you really think they are all identical?

They are the only known living animals that have a skull but not a vertebral column. Along with lampreys, hagfish are jawless and are living fossils; hagfish are basal to vertebrates, and living hagfish remain similar to hagfish 300 million years ago.

A 'living fossil" is an oxymoron, and thus quite popular with the media, but not with scientists. Hagfish have been evolving for 400 million years since our lineages separated. The notion that they would not experience massive change is almost magical.

 

[One Brow]

You would still have to come up with, demonstrate, show, or answer: "If this animal "evolved" how did it happen?" No theories, concepts, experiments have ever held water when you ask those questions of any kind of life in the animal kingdom!

The problem is not that evolutionists lack an answer, it's that there are so many possible answers, and no reliable way to choose between them.

As far as experiments holding water, that applies to the initial standard you set. Science never has, and never will, lay claim to the absolute truth. If that's your standard, I agree it will never be met.

 

[One Brow]

Just curious. We have already seen evolution take place (what was that like white moth species whose habitat was blackened due to coal being burnt and they slowly became black to not stand out so much to predators ((white creatures on black surfaces, hard to hide)), do you think humans have reached the pinnacle point of their evolutionary progression? What stressors would bring about a genetic change in our lax, kush lifestyles? Would it be possible, considering the vast diversity of geographic location of humans to make any biological change to be evident in all humans?

There is no pinnacle. There is just change. No one knows how humans will change in the future. To predict that would require knowing what earth will be like for the next 100,000 years.

Genetic changes happen with or without stresses.

Yes, it's possible. Consider that the ability to drink milk as an adult is a very recent change, and very wide-spread.

 

[One Brow]

These Darwiniacs glued black and white moths to blackened trees to show how black moths in a polluted England were "more fit" then light moths against being eaten by birds.

This happened for textbook pictures, not in the experiments.

The problem was that the moths only came out at night and so had no need to hide from birds while they rested on the undersides of branches,

Only a small percentage of the moths would rest under branches, and a bright white moth is still more visible at night resting on a blackened tree than a black moth.

 

[One Brow]

Yes, Darwiniac's have managed to confuse a lot of people, as to what Darwin's theory actually is, by labeling small differences in populations "micro-evolution."

There is no difference in quality between "micro-evolution" and "macro-evolution", just quantity. Accepting the former but not the ladder is like believing in rungs, but not in ladders.

https://amultiverse.com/2013/05/29/drink-like-a-fish/

 

[One Brow]

But was the peppered moth evolving into some other type of insect? No, it was still exactly the same peppered moth, merely having a different coloration. Hence, the English medical journal On Call referred to using this example to try to prove evolution as “notorious.” It declared: “This is an excellent demonstration of the function of camouflage, but, since it begins and ends with moths and no new species is formed, it is quite irrelevant as evidence for evolution.”

On Call seems to be confused about what evolution would say, which is that the new moths would still be moths. What else would they be?

As Evolution From Space says: “We doubt, however, that anything more is involved in these cases than the selection of already existing genes.”

Evolution From Space seems to be confused about what evolution would say, which is that previous existing variations are being selected. What else would it be?

In any event, the insects remained of the same kind. They were not evolving into something else.

What is a "kind"?

 

[PearlWatson]

I trust that every last scientist on the planet is not in on a giant con job because they're actually satan worshipers or something. They could be wrong. It wouldn't hurt my feelings.

That's the second time an atheist has gone beyond their usual claim of consensus to absolute and total agreement among scientists. All I have to do is name one scientist who doesn't buy it to refute your delusion that everyone agrees with Darwin's crazy *** story. At least when you stuck with consensus you were on safer although dogmatic ground.

 

[PearlWatson]

a bright white moth is still more visible at night resting on a blackened tree than a black moth.

If there ain't any predators to see them it has no baring on their "fitness" for survival.

There were black and white moths before pollution and there was black and white moths after.

If you continued to support this idea that nature knows how to deal with pollution you would also undermine the entire "climate change" movement. Ooops.

 

[PearlWatson]

There is no difference in quality between "micro-evolution" and "macro-evolution", just quantity. Accepting the former but not the ladder is like believing in rungs, but not in ladders.

Scientism is wonderful like that. They zero in on little things and extrapolate to huge proportions.

Because the desert is flat the whole earth must be.

Because there is local warming that must mean the whole damn world is warming.

Because there are different colored moths then we all must have come from a fish.

You can't see how ridiculous you all are.

The "ladder" slip was amusing.

 

[PearlWatson]

That roses always create seeds that will becomes roses *is* evolution.

That is just a bizarre statement.

You just threw your whole "change over time" out the window with just one sentence.

Things staying the same ain't change and you Darwiniacs kinda need huge *** change to get from an amoeba to a rose.

 

[MVP]

I love how evolution deniers trying to argue, that since we do not see it happening within our short period of time we can't explain how it happened within millions of years. It is the same like you would be in denial at crime scene where somebody was shot - forensic specialist will tell you from what distance, what angle, how long ago, everything to small details to know how the crime occured. Same with evolution - you have fossil records and changes throughout the million years, just need to put everything together. Not that difficult. None of you dared to answer my question about new species appearing in our time - do you trully believe it is your "intelligent designer" who is creating them?
Other thing I found interesting is looking at people survey's about evolution... USA is the most "uneducated/sceptical" when it comes to evolution. Compared to Europe and Japan for example where more then 90% population understands and accepts evolution only 40% in USA do. I am not surprised right now to see such a ridiculous arguments on this website. Would never happen in Europe ( heck even in Canada I have never met a person who would deny evolution.) While countries like UK spend millions to create spectacular educational movies like "Walking with dinosaurs", "Walking with cavemen", "Walking with prehistoric monsters" some Americans waste millions on "Creation museum". USA is trully a strange country.

 

[PearlWatson]

Edit: I must say though, your most annoying catch phrase got to be "consensus science". Which seems to disagree with a scientific model simply because of the fact that the evidence is so thorough and uncontroversial, that every human being who studies the evidence agrees with the conclusion. In short, you're mocking those who have knowledge for not sharing your ignorance based opinion. You can't see how ridiculous that FoxNews catch phrase is?

Even the most fanatic Darwiniac only invokes consensus for their crazy *** story not 100% agreement, so you had to have been at the pinnacle of your faith at the moment you typed that.

Your crazy *** story only seems unimpeachable because scientists who challenge it get sued and/or lose their jobs for daring to go up against the dogma disguised as "scientific theory." Darwiniacs treat any questioning of their supposed "scientific theory" like heresy which is a sure sign of its scientific veracity.

How could a kid possibly question a biology teacher or some claim written in a government textbook if they can't even pray or chew pop-tarts into the shape of guns without a liberal busybody butting in and punishing them for not being little Obamabots.

There is no way to know what adults believe about Darwin's theory when everyone has been manipulated into going along with it through claims of scientific consensus.

My guess is:
*most government school graduates go along with it because they were indoctrinated with it

*a lot of God-believers who don't really believe it may go along with it because it is easier to acquiesce to loud mouthed liberals who lord their stories over God-believers like apes with a club.

*some critical thinkers might question it, but most really won't care enough to understand what Darwiniacs are really claiming

*Then there is a buttload of people who got all confused about what "evolution" really is when the Darwiniac purveyors of consensus science started calling small differences in populations "micro-evolution."

*Also, Darwiniacs pick off more uncritical people by describing evolution as "change over time" in the same way they describe killing a baby as "reproductive choice."

I'm guessing with the percentage of people in America who claim to believe in God, that the real consensus on the origin of life would be intelligent design if people were allowed to hear about it.

I will conclude with my memorized fox news catch phrase (otherwise known as the description of consensus science by the late Michael Crichton):

“I want to pause here and talk about this notion of consensus, and the rise of what has been called consensus science. I regard consensus science as an extremely pernicious development that ought to be stopped cold in its tracks. Historically, the claim of consensus has been the first refuge of scoundrels; it is a way to avoid debate by claiming that the matter is already settled. Whenever you hear the consensus of scientists agrees on something or other, reach for your wallet, because you’re being had.
“Let’s be clear: the work of science has nothing whatever to do with consensus. Consensus is the business of politics. Science, on the contrary, requires only one investigator who happens to be right, which means that he or she has results that are verifiable by reference to the real world. In science consensus is irrelevant. What is relevant is reproducible results. The greatest scientists in history are great precisely because they broke with the consensus.
“There is no such thing as consensus science. If it’s consensus, it isn’t science. If it’s science, it isn’t consensus. Period.”
[Crichton gave a number of examples where the scientific consensus was completely wrong for many years.]
“… Finally, I would remind you to notice where the claim of consensus is invoked. Consensus is invoked only in situations where the science is not solid enough. Nobody says the consensus of scientists agrees that E = mc². Nobody says the consensus is that the sun is 93 million miles away. It would never occur to anyone to speak that way.”​

 

[PearlWatson]

I love how evolution deniers trying to argue, that since we do not see it happening within our short period of time we can't explain how it happened within millions of years. It is the same like you would be in denial at crime scene where somebody was shot - forensic specialist will tell you from what distance, what angle, how long ago, everything to small details to know how the crime occured. Same with evolution - you have fossil records and changes throughout the million years, just need to put everything together. Not that difficult. None of you dared to answer my question about new species appearing in our time - do you trully believe it is your "intelligent designer" who is creating them?

Okay, so you get out your fossils and you line them up from smallest to biggest how you think they might have progressed. Then you tell us that a series of lucky accidents accounts for this progress. Then we say, hey you geniuses, "that looks like a clean and well organized sequence of events," but then you keep on telling us that this was a brutal dog eat dog fight for survival among all the retarded babies, but then you can't show us the pile of dead "unfit" babies (except maybe in Kermit Gosnell's backyard).

Show us all your unfit fossil babies, and I'll bake you a 10 tier cake to celebrate Darwin's birthday.