quote:Originally posted by Reshpeckobiggle: No, not true. The difference between salt crystals and genetic information is the difference between abcabcabcabcabc and this sentence. This sentence has information, and it came from my intelligence. Genetic sequences have information, and natural selection + randomness does not produce information.
Can you define "information" as you are using it for us? Please be as thorough and exact as possible.
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Enigmatic, A is indeed what I am calling Naturalistic Macroevolution, or just Evolution (with a capital "e") for short.
C is not what I am calling Microevolution. A Creator/Deity does not enter into the equation. Microevolution is basically just Natural Selection +randomness/chance/mutations without purpose. Its effects can be observed.
What do I think of B? I think that most open-minded people who accept Evolution would concede this to be the case, because you can't disprove a Creator. Besides, the Big Bang theory seems to imply it (but then again, so does biological design.)
I don't buy it, though. I recognize that I was naturally inclined to disbelieve Evolution after years of trusting my teachers and textbooks, because of my concurrent belief in God. But when the weaknesses of the theory were pointed out to me, they appeared insurmountable, and the defenses of the theory only appear effective if you already take it for granted that Evolution happened. This is what I recognize in all the so-called "proofs" everyone continues to throw at me. They look like proofs to you, but you aren't skeptical, like me.
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Btw, aren't you being very circular? You're saying its a transitional species because . . . it has a name? It exists? You haven't given any reason. You said that an A isn't a transitional species because it is an A.
You're not much of a skeptic. You keep making definitive statements about what is possible (not the mark of a skeptic), but then aren't willing to clarify them sufficiently that anyone could prove or refute them (also not the mark of a skeptic).
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No, I can't Mucus, or rather I won't, and for the same reasons that I refuse to define complexity. Again, I recognize a trap when I see it. Why don't you just define it for me, and then Fugu can show how it has been naturally increased. I'd like to know what he may be referencing, though I think I already know what he's going to say.
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No, fugu, I'm saying A isn't a transitional species because transitional species don't exist. All species are transitional if we evolved, except for the last of the evolutionary dead ends.
Since I deny evolution from the get go, all species are just what they are. I believe they may be the transitionals from a devolutionary standpoint, however.
[edit] Let me amend that. The initial creation process may have required an framework of increasing complexity, but then at a certain point we've all just been devolving. This is something I consider to be a possibility, but I won't back it up so don't ask me to.
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I know. But read what I've been writing these last few posts. Here's a thought experiment: Imagine we didn't evolve. What would all those transitionals be if that were the case?
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Resh. The Miller-Urey Experiment didn't fail, because it wasn't meant to demonstrate the exact conditions of ancient earth. It was meant to show that the building blocks of life could be formed from non-living substances. They can, as is shown in that experiment.
And again, evolution is the process of life once it has begun. It doesn't matter for evolution whether or not it was abiogenesis or your god or a magic unicorn created life. Evolution is what happens after life begins.
Now, you say you accept microevolution. (No such thing, there's only evolution, but for the sake of argument we'll use the silly creationist term.)
How can you keep from walking a mile if you take one step at a time?
Seriously. Do you think that once a species has changed a certain amount god picks them up and resets them?
Now, if you want to be shown everything exactly how it happened with no gaps and no mysteries or else you won't believe it...by all means, let's discuss why you believe your religion.
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How is asking you to define your terms a trap? The only way it could be considered a trap is if you are using these terms for rhetorical advantage rather than to objectively describe an aspect of reality as you see it. Is that what you are doing?
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Well put, with the last sentence there. I don't need it to be that comprehensive to believe it. But what I d o need is some sort of reason why I should that observable variations within the species, or as far out as to what is essentially the same species (fruitflies, for instance), and extrapolate that out to massive changes in orders, phylum, kingdoms, divisions, or what have you. That is the fallacy of composition: "when the conclusion of an argument depends on the erroneous transference of an attribute from the parts of something onto the whole (Patrick Hurley)" Comparitively miniscule changes within a species does not imply the amount of variation required for all the species that have existed.
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No, not true. The difference between salt crystals and genetic information is the difference between abcabcabcabcabc and this sentence.
Oh, so you can count information, can you?
Order the below sequences by information: You should have no problem figuring out which is the original sequence, which has lost information due to a mutation, and which two the result of my typing a random string, and changing one letter.
If you want more sequence info, I'd be happy to get it for you.
But you won't even try to address this question.
If you can't count information, then all your claims about how information increases, or can't increase, are completely blown away.
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quote:I don't need it to be that comprehensive to believe it.
But it needs to mean something to believe it, doesn't it? If you are not able to precisely articulate that belief, then there is no chance that any evidence could ever sway that belief, is there? You can just define everything that evolution is ever shown to do as being "not information" and "not complex" without "information" or "complexity" actually meaning anything other than "not evolved" and if that's all it means, then it would be a lot simpler to express your opinion as "I don't believe in evolution" and dispense with the nonsense about "complexity" and "information."
If you insist on using words that have meaning, expect people to challenge you when your statements, using normal definitions of those words, are demonstrably false.
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quote:Originally posted by Reshpeckobiggle: I know. But read what I've been writing these last few posts. Here's a thought experiment: Imagine we didn't evolve. What would all those transitionals be if that were the case?
It would be an extremely weird coincidence. Assuming creationism, why would God create all of these fossils to appear exactly like transitional fossils? The looks and ages of the fossils line up too well for it to be a random coincidence. Creationism is obviously possible in theory but doesn't make sense given the data.
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quote:Originally posted by Reshpeckobiggle: No, I can't Mucus, or rather I won't, and for the same reasons that I refuse to define complexity. Again, I recognize a trap when I see it. Why don't you just define it for me, and then Fugu can show how it has been naturally increased. I'd like to know what he may be referencing, though I think I already know what he's going to say.
So what you're saying is that you're using terms like "complexity" and "information" but refusing to actually explain what you mean by them, whether they are equal to commonly accepted definitions or even whether they *have* a definition in your own world.
To be honest, I'm not sure we should be having a debate about evolution. We really need to find out what you think about the *whole concept* of language and communication.
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Resh: If I stand in the middle of a pond full of frogs and throw every frog with long toes into my cook pot, eventually all the frogs in the lake will have short toes.
Randomness (toe length) + natural selection (my cook pot) has produced a group of frogs with only short toes. Clearly I'm not their creator, nor do I have any supernatural powers.
Allow me another, more straight forward example.
Let us assume that the letters E, H, and T naturally tend to group together, due to the chemical bonding forces in their composition. After they have bonded together, they make exact copies of themselves.
In a pool of 3 of each letter. We find the following groups:
EHT HTE THE
But in this pool, only English words are viable. So EHT and HTE die, while THE survives, producing more and more THE offspring. If a mutation occurs, and one of the offspring is ETH, it dies before it can reproduce.
The letter grouping is random, the survival is directed, but not by any omnipotent creator, simply by the rules of the system.
In a real example, the rules might be that the creature must be able to digest the plants in its immediate area, or it must be unappetizing to local predators.
The point is that natural selection IS selection, it isn't completely random, as you have suggested that it is. The selection process takes the randomness, and only allows the random variations which have conformed to a survivable status to continue.
Take enough random letters and watch them combine, and eventually you'll find a word, which you keep. Allow billions of years for random chemicals to combine, and eventually some will arise which are able to survive and reproduce.
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Resh said: " All species are transitional if we evolved, except for the last of the evolutionary dead ends."
DUH!
We're ARE all transitional. Furthermore, looking at the fossils, we can actually see the transitions!
So, Resh. You do realize that, without a definition a word is meaningless, right?
You are a burmagalshwarp.
I shall refuse to define this word for you, though.
And if you deign to suggest it has a meaning, I'll just disagree with that meaning. It's really easy to do, if I hadn't defined it clearly in the first place.
Resh, in science, every word has a precise definition. It has to, to describe what the heck we're talking about. To be clear. Vague words don't work in science, and only work to obfuscate the issue.
Stop obfuscating, start defining, and if you find your definition is incorrect, correct it for us to see!
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Mightycow, yes, yes, they'll all have short toes. But are they still frogs? If you stop eating the long-toed frogs, will the population return to normal? Like big-beaked finches, perhaps? Is this really what you consider proof that fish become amphibians become reptiles become birds?
The word "the" is a far cry from a hundreds of thousands of pages of a precisely written language. Sure, given enough time with your method a beautiful book may be written. But who wrote the book? Using Gould's example, if you want to spell "tobeornottobe" with a computer program that randomly assigns letters and only keeps the letters that work, you need to program the computer to only look for letters that fit the pattern "tobeornottobe." Your claim is that natural selection looks for the letters provided for it by random mutations. I don't think it could. It's never been observed to happen, and there is no indication that it ever will.
quote:Originally posted by Threads:
quote:Originally posted by Reshpeckobiggle: I know. But read what I've been writing these last few posts. Here's a thought experiment: Imagine we didn't evolve. What would all those transitionals be if that were the case?
It would be an extremely weird coincidence. Assuming creationism, why would God create all of these fossils to appear exactly like transitional fossils? The looks and ages of the fossils line up too well for it to be a random coincidence. Creationism is obviously possible in theory but doesn't make sense given the data.
They don't look like transitionary fossils to me. The look like highly ordered groupings of different body types generally arranged from smaller to larger bottom to top. Kinda like if you have a jar full of different sized pebbles and you shake it for a while. All the big ones end up on top. They appear arranged according to evolutionary theory because that is what the theory requires them to do.
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Mucus, Megabyte, why don't you just tell me what science says the definition of information or complexity is.
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There isn't a single definition of either. There are a number of definitions, especially for information. For instance, there's an information entropy measure of information (which evolution regularly increases). However, it doesn't much matter. You're the one making the assertion. You have made a specific, factually checkable assertion . . . or you will have, once you let us know what you actually meant. I guess I shouldn't expect that, since you've never been willing to make any of your vast, sweeping, absolute statements specific enough that it is even possible to talk about one coherently.
As for it never being observed that natural selection keeps the genes that are beneficial, that's absurd. There are numerous examples we've observed of a population of bacteria without resistance to a disease gaining resistance to a disease through a mutation, and that spreading throughout the population. That's just the easiest and most numerous sort of example. How is that not 'keeping the letter that helps form the word'?
Again with the absolute statements, btw. Skeptic, are we?
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quote:Originally posted by Reshpeckobiggle: I know. But read what I've been writing these last few posts. Here's a thought experiment: Imagine we didn't evolve. What would all those transitionals be if that were the case?
It would be an extremely weird coincidence. Assuming creationism, why would God create all of these fossils to appear exactly like transitional fossils? The looks and ages of the fossils line up too well for it to be a random coincidence. Creationism is obviously possible in theory but doesn't make sense given the data.
They don't look like transitionary fossils to me. The look like highly ordered groupings of different body types generally arranged from smaller to larger bottom to top. Kinda like if you have a jar full of different sized pebbles and you shake it for a while. All the big ones end up on top. They appear arranged according to evolutionary theory because that is what the theory requires them to do.
Sorry, evolutionary theory cannot change the data. You seem to be claiming that it's a matter of interpretation, however, you ignore the fact that each of those fossils has been dated. You can't change dates and the dates are what show the transitions.
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quote:Originally posted by Reshpeckobiggle: Mightycow, yes, yes, they'll all have short toes. But are they still frogs? If you stop eating the long-toed frogs, will the population return to normal? Like big-beaked finches, perhaps? Is this really what you consider proof that fish become amphibians become reptiles become birds?
Let's say instead of Mightycow eating all of the long-toed frogs, a new predator settles in the frog's habitat, and finds the long-toed frogs easier to spot and catch due to their super-long toes. Frogs with shorted toes will not get eaten.
Exchange this new predator for a new climate, or some nasty chemical that is especially damaging to the cuticles on the long-toed frogs' toes. Combine this change-in environment / change-in-populations with a never-stable-for-long environment (i.e. our planet) and you've got a species of constantly changing creatures.
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No, you've got a population of frogs with a fluctuating average toe-length. What is so hard about this? You still have a frog. You don't get a lizard, much less a shrew. A hundred-billion-billion-billion micromutations do not necessarily add up to a new species. You must show that it does, but you can't.
Threads, it is a matter of interpretation, and the vast majority of the dating is done based upon the rocks they are found in, and the rocks are dated based upon the fossils that are found in them. The exceptions, where actual radiometric and other techniques are use, come back with far more inconsistencies than many geologists, biologists, and paleontologists would like to admit. Many times they've all have to put their heads together and come up with an acceptable compromise. I've even read about instances where there was a major inconsistency and they went back and tested until they got a result they needed. Sorry Megabyte, I cant cite my source because I read it in a book and I don't remember which one. This isn't a dissertation.
Scientists are people too, and not only that, many of them take it for granted that evolution happened so when inconsistencies occur they assume the data must be wrong. I remember another case where the mathematician community was showing some evidence contradictory to Evolutionary theory and someone, it may have Ernest Mayr, said "the math must be wrong. We are comforted by the fact that evolution occurred."
[edit] I found the quote online, and it was Mayr: "Somehow or other by adjusting these [the mathematicians'] figures we will come out all right. We are comforted by the fact that evolution has occurred."
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It has become obvious that Resh is just going to retreat behind his veil of ignorance and inability to define the terms he himself has made absolute statements about whenever pushed far enough.
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Btw, Resh, what part of the following do you not understand:
A prediction was made that a certain sort of species would be found, based on the theory that it is possible for animals to change from species to species, even drastically, given enough time (which isn't hard to imagine, as the whole idea of a species is an approximation, anyways, much less the idea of a mouse).
This prediction was tested, and found to be accurate.
Therefore the accuracy of the prediction is evidence that the original theory is true.
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quote:Originally posted by Reshpeckobiggle: Mucus, Megabyte, why don't you just tell me what science says the definition of information or complexity is.
Well, for the obvious reason that you've already made a statement about "information" and "complexity" using definitions that probably do not match the scientific definitions of those words and we want to figure out what you meant? Posts: 7593 | Registered: Sep 2006
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quote:I remember another case where the mathematician community was showing some evidence contradictory to Evolutionary theory and someone, it may have Ernest Mayr, said "the math must be wrong. We are comforted by the fact that evolution occurred."
Yeah...because the scientists wouldn't be desperate for a new field of research that would give them lots of new work, new chances to become well known and, a very human motivator, grant money!
If anyone would have a reason to disprove evolution, if for no other reason than to get more money, it would be the scientists.
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It's obvious to me you have no answers. You just told me there is no single scientific definition of complexity or information. If I give you some narrowly defined version of either, I'm sure you've got a pat little answer for it. I'm not going to play your game. Guess what: I don't need to convince you of anything. You're the ones who are having such trouble making inroads into the consciousness of the people with your theory. Blame it on ignorance or religion (one and the same as far as you're concerned.) But if it's so obviously true, why do so many smart people have devastating arguments against it? As I said before, it's only obvious if when you believe it in the first place. Kinda like being a Christian.
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quote:Originally posted by Reshpeckobiggle: Your claim is that natural selection looks for the letters provided for it by random mutations. I don't think it could. It's never been observed to happen, and there is no indication that it ever will.
See, this is where your own bias shows itself.
Natural selection doesn't look for anything.
Random mutations happen and happen all the time. This has been observed.
Occasionally, a random mutation will confer a positive benefit on the mutated population that allows it to compete better in its natural environment.
It can also happen that the environment changes and that standard mutations which were always a part of the population now confer either advantage or disadvantage.
Either way, population pressure is exerted and natural selection takes care of those best able to compete in their given environment.
It doesn't require the "guided hand" that you're biased towards in the above statement - it's all quite elegant, simple and beautiful without that.
One excellent point that I think is important is also regarding time - I don't think you appreciate the vastness of time that life has had to evolve on this planet. There's been an awful lot of time on our collective hands/fins/pseudopods/tentacles/etc in which any mutation has had time to prosper or fail.
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Btw, that quotation was about work by Ulam, who said the following about it.
quote:"In my talk I will give you a whole set of such parameters with values it is important to know. The trouble is that at present realistic definitions of these parameters, not to mention numerical values, are completely unknown."
In other words, the whole point of the research being commented on was to adjust the figures. In fact, it was quickly discovered that a parameter Ulam had used in calculating the average number of descendants (called gamma, with each individual having 1 + gamma descendants) was quickly found to be far lower than we know it to be in animals.
It is hardly surprising that a calculation done with the wrong constants (which can be checked against reality) reaches a conclusion inconsistent with evolution.
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Btw, the guy you like so much, Dembski, agrees that natural selection selects for more advantageous mutations. He's put forward a highly flawed mathematical argument that this isn't enough, but he doesn't think it doesn't happen. Or are you only agreeing with him when it is convenient for you?
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Javert, I highly doubt that. History has shown that scientists are just as dogmatic as the clergy. Just like the church needs an occasion Martin Luther to shake things up, so does science. This is not to downplay the value of dogmatic paradigms: when a worldwide community is working with a common set of ground rules, a lot can get done.
Fugu, I will concede that that is compelling evidence in favor of Evolution. But its like a firefly in the void as far a I can tell. Fire enough bullets and you'll eventually kill one of those mosquitoes.
Mucus, I use those words, like most others, in their most commonly understood sense. If scientists need extremely precise definitions that change depending on the context in which they are being used, more power to them. But I'm not a scientist, and so when I say complex, I mean "not simple," and when I say information, I mean... well I mean "information." Just like everyone else.
When winning your argument requires you to tell your opponent that he can't use words like "complex" and "information" unless they are precisely defined, well, you aren't going to win many converts that way, I can tell you.
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Resh, you're the one who made an absolute statement about evolution being unable to explain something. Let us imagine you said "evolution is unable to increase ooglibooginess". That's a pretty strong statement . . . well, it would be, if we knew what ooglibooginess was. Until we know what it is (which only you can tell us, you're the one who made the statement), its so much nonsense you're making up to 'support' your own views.
Also, the argument has never been that a mouse suddenly turns into an elephant. The argument has always been that a mouse turns into something like a mouse, which turns into something like a mouse, which turns into something like a mouse, which turns into something like a mouse, et cetera, and that at each stage, the difference is very small from what has gone before.
It is the accumulation of all those tiny changes that results in the drastic differences we observe, not any drastic change.
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quote:Originally posted by Reshpeckobiggle: But if it's so obviously true, why do so many smart people have devastating arguments against it?
Er, which ones? You've yet to show us a single devastating argument that you can back up in any way shape or form.
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We have observed populations of bacteria without any resistance for a particular antibiotic.
We have later observed a mutation that gave one of the bacteria resistance, and this resistance quickly spread so that most of the population had it.
Thus, before mutation, the bacteria as a population had a certain set of features they could express.
After the mutation, they had one more set of features they could express.
This makes the bacteria more complex by the colloquial definition, and have more information, also by the colloquial definition. Or do you disagree?
And that isn't one firefly in the void, we've done similar predictions (usually about genetic features we will see, such as gene locations chromosome structure) over and over. We're right most of the time. I mean, heck, people routinely make such predictions as part of graduate, and sometimes undergraduate biology, its not even esoteric.
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I was speaking figuratively, and I would have hoped anyone would understand that.
quote:
Random mutations happen and happen all the time. This has been observed.
Occasionally, a random mutation will confer a positive benefit on the mutated population that allows it to compete better in its natural environment.
Shouldn't "occasionally" be substituted with "hypothetically"?
Fugu, I would agree that advantageous mutations would be selected by Natural Selection, but there are major issues with what constitutes an advantageous mutation. This is generally defined as something which increases the likelihood of reproduction. But that is just a reiteration of Natural Selection. This is a tautology and conveys no meaningful information.
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quote:Originally posted by Reshpeckobiggle: Threads, it is a matter of interpretation, and the vast majority of the dating is done based upon the rocks they are found in, and the rocks are dated based upon the fossils that are found in them. The exceptions, where actual radiometric and other techniques are use, come back with far more inconsistencies than many geologists, biologists, and paleontologists would like to admit. Many times they've all have to put their heads together and come up with an acceptable compromise.
That's actually incorrect. Using rocks to date fossils only works in specific circumstances because rocks are often much much older than the fossils embedded in them. You also need to be more specific about what you mean by "inconsistencies". In other words, citing a few examples where dating did not work does not count as an inconsistency. You need to show that, as a whole, radiometric dating is totally unreliable. That's going to be difficult to do because there are countless examples of different dating techniques agreeing with each other (within their respective error bars of course). This would be hugely improbable if the samples were contaminated. Read my link on the age of the earth.
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Fugu, your example is pathetic. The bacteria actually have one less feature. A mutation causes the bacteria to be unable to restrict production of a certain enzyme that protects it from the antibiotic. Under normal conditions this would be greatly detrimental to its survival, but a new environment (i.e; filled with antibiotics) and now you've got a highly resistant strain of the bacteria. Evolution in action? Hardly. You have a better adapted, less complex creature.
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Which bit do you think is hypothetical? That random mutations occur, or that it's possible for a mutation to confer a benefit on a population?
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"Restrict production"? It wasn't producing any enzyme before. It had no gene to produce the enzyme. What previously was a section of DNA doing something else now produces an enzyme. That's an additional characteristic.
And note, I talked about populations. The population of bacteria has every single gene before, and one more gene.
How is it less complex to have everything you had before, working just fine, and have one more thing? Evolution doesn't work at the level of individuals.
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Threads, from what I understand, and I may be wrong here, rocks are much less like to be dated with radiometric techniques because it is far easier to date them according to their fossils. The rocks are not older, they are the same age as when the animal was deposited there. Otherwise, how did the creature get down there?
I gotta go, but I'll be back later.
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The statement is (or is closer to, there are considerations like mixtures of genetic combinations), mutations which increase the reproductive likelihood of individuals carrying the mutation (note: this might not be the same individuals as the ones expressing the gene, which explains non-reproductive individuals) in a population are more likely to be increase in representation in the population than ones which don't.
Yes, it is obviously true. That's part of why scientists are pretty certain that its true. It is also measurable, and we have measured that it is true, which is another reason scientists are pretty certain that its true.
Remember, there is no better in evolution. Beneficial mutation is just a shorthand for one which has the property mentioned above, not something that needs to be proven to be equal to it. It is a definition, not a theory.
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Btw, the individual hasn't necessarily lost something, either. Individuals being created with increased chromosomal material is extremely common.
For instance, something like one in every few thousand human babies is born with an extra chromosome. Most of them have some condition associated with it, but a substantial percentage are otherwise perfectly normal humans.
If a beneficial mutation were to occur on that chromosome, the person would have every gene they had originally (since they still have the duplicates), plus one.
This is even more common in less complex species. Many species, particularly plants, but some animals, can have an extra copy of every single chromosome and breed with other individuals with the same duplication. We've seen it happen in nature and recreated it in the lab.
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quote:Originally posted by Enigmatic: Given the following categories, which most accurately sums up your belief or position: A: Evolution with Abiogenesis, definitely without a creator/designer/deity. B: Evolutionary Theory stands up as an explanation of species on its own without a creator/deity, but doesn't necessarily mean that there couldn't be a creator/deity guiding it as a process and/or getting it started. C: Evolutionary Theory is useful on some levels but can't stand on its own without a creator/deity to either guide it or start its process.
C, but I don't believe there is any specifically scientific evidence to support it (as distinct from B).
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quote:Fugu, I would agree that advantageous mutations would be selected by Natural Selection, but there are major issues with what constitutes an advantageous mutation. This is generally defined as something which increases the likelihood of reproduction. But that is just a reiteration of Natural Selection. This is a tautology and conveys no meaningful information.
It sounds like you've been reading some Egnor. In any case, this response to his claim about evolution being a tautology answers your complaint pretty well:
quote: The theory of gravity? If you let go of something, it will fall - therefore, if you let go of something, it will fall.
Relativity? Light bends when it passed through a gravitational field - therefore, if I shine a light through a gravitational field, it will bend.
Evolution? The things that survive to reproduce are the things that survive to reproduce.
Tautological statements of theories don't invalidate the theories; and they don't mean that the theories are useless and have no explanatory value. The only time that a tautological statement of a theory is a problem is when it's the only statement of the theory - that is, when the theory itself consists of nothing more than a tautological structure. A theory that consisted of nothing more than the fundamental statement "A=A" isn't a theory - it's gibberish dressed up to look like a theory.
quote: To return to Egnor: he asserts that the theory of evolution is irrelevant to bacterial resistance to antibiotics, because after all, all that evolution says is "If you have an antibiotic that doesn't work on a bacterium, then that antibiotic won't work on that bacterium".
Well, yeah. It does say that. But it also predicts that if you use antibiotics on some population of bacteria, and you don't kill all of them, that over time, the population of bacteria will change to become resistant to the antibiotics.
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I've read that sometimes things are tautologies simply because they are self evidently true. This may very well be the case for Natural Selection. I have never once expressed any doubt about Natural Selection. But as a mechanism for Macroevolution, I don't think so. I don't think there is a mechanism for it, because I don't think it happened. Giving me examples of Natural Selection in action is not going to change my mind.
Since large-scale Evolution cannot be recreated in a Lab ---and I'm sure you would all admit that is true--- it seems that the theory holds a place in the scientific story of creation as one that only must be conceivably possible in order to be believed. This relegates it to a position no higher on the scale of subjective truth than God.
My only request to you all is that you recognize that you are not privy to some special knowledge that those of us who do not believe the same are ignorant of. Stop insisting that it be taught as a fact, for it is not. Allow some alternate views to be presented, for they may be valid (even in the sphere of science.) And open your mind to some possibilities that a naturalistic worldview does not allow.
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Resh: What you seem to be saying is that the ONLY way you'll believe in Evolution, is if you were able to go back in time to the beginning of life on earth, and you yourself physically watch the entire process unfold.
So basically, as far as you're concerned, all history is complete garbage, because we can't actually SHOW you that it happened?
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Why do we see animals in the rocks that are morphologically similar to whales, but live on the land. And, later, animals that live in the water that are morphologically very similar to those earlier animals, but even more like whales, and so on?
Subjective truth? Show me some reasonable explanation for what I mentioned above. And if you want to see them, I can show them to you. I can back up my claims of fact, and I and the others will happily do so.
Show me a reasonable explanation. Please. What does your theory state? That is, the theory of the people you trust?
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We can't recreate the murder of a specific person in a specific place in a lab, you know.
I suppose we shouldn't allow the use of forensic evidence, you know, DNA evidence, physical remains, things like hairs, fibers, skin flakes, possessions left at a crime scene, etc, since they don't prove anything, after all. And we CERTAINLY shouldn't put anyone in jail that we never actually saw commit a crime!
Following your logic, of course.
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Resh: Have you ever seen large-scale Creation shown to be true? Just wondering if you hold ID to the same standards.
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- refute scientific proof because it's unobservable (in action, if not in the actual fossil record), while ignoring the huge body of evidence that supports evolution - refuse to provide a similar level of evidence for 'intelligent design' - yet insist they're equally credible
The reason I have a problem with this is that evolution is actual science whereas ID is just creationism, religion, trying for equal status for purely political reasons.
ID belongs in church, it belongs in Sunday School, it belongs in religion classes because it is purely and solely a matter of faith with no body of supporting evidence beyond "This is so wonderful it must be proof of God".
To come back to a previous point regarding the US abysmal rating in science schooling and the consequent widespread acceptance of the political lobbying for ID's equal status. You posited that other countries were indoctrinated in atheism, hence would be predisposed to evolutionary theory.
In Australia, everyone of my generation was taught 'RE' (religious education) from kindergarten until year 7 in all schools, public or private. This was a class taught weekly, alongside all the other regular subjects.
Unfortunately I have to admit to not being able to find data on Australian acceptance of evolution.
Anecdotally (and Ironically), it was a priest who finally convinced me of the scientific validity of evolution, something not a single highschool biology teacher managed to achieve.
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