Hmmm, thoughts on evolution?(no, not vs religion)

[thinking of you]

I love all of god's creatures

uni-shark?

 

[Brendan]

I'll leave it with one absolute truth that seems to totally escape ID's promoters.........."proving" evolution to be false in no way provides proof that intelligent design is true. If you want to prove the truth of intelligent design, start doing it, instead of wasting your time disproving other theories.

True.

Seems to me that whole "It's either evolution, or ID," thing is a logical fallicy. False dillema, as it were. It's not like evolution or ID are set in stone. There's a Q factor out there: the very real possibility we've all got our heads up our asses.

I mean, look at how very, very little of the light spectrum we can see. If that's any idicator of how limited our processes are, then I think it's entirely probable we're all too farkin' stupid to get our headspace around things. "We were created this way." "We sorta adapted this was." Of all things big and small, these two things are the best we can manage?

Riiiiight.

Funny/inflamatory anecdote- All around campus, there were flyers for "Evolution is a lie!" and "Darwin was wrong! See the proof!" or "Evoltion is the great myth of the 20th century!" and so on. I thought to myself, "Why aren't there any posters for evoltion meetings and rallies?" After a moment, my brain said to me "It's because we call that Biology 101."

 

[Wrong Robot]

uni-shark?

Goblin Shark

 

[Brendan]

Goblin Shark

Can I just call it Larry?

 

[Wrong Robot]

Can I just call it Larry?

Only if you spell it Larrie

 

[Brendan]

Only if you spell it Larrie

Fine; Vern it is, then.

 

[Nick man]

From my understanding, that is an adaptation, not an evolution.

In that case, the "adaptation" is actually evolution.

See my next post for details.

EDIT: It was very poorly worded.

 

[clef360]

Adaptation is evolution.

nope. No it's not. Adaptation is an adjustment an organism does in response to the environment. For example, some flowers turn to face a certain direction based on the the position of the sun. This action is an adaptation. Evolution is the development of species or other large group over time. The fact that the flowers are capable of pointing themselves is a result of evolution. Adaptation is on the individual level, and evolution is on the population level.

Also, I'd appreciate it if people would stop ragging on creationism. It seems like most of it is totally unnecessary to the argument, and I hope that we're not here to bash creationists, because I happen to believe in creation as well as evolution. Thanks.

 

[Nick man]

I meant more specifically in the case he was refering to.

The adaptation to a resistance to certain antibiotics was actually a genetic mutation in some of the microbes which made them more resistant to the antibiotics and the resistance was genetic and passed on to the next generation which had a higher percentage of those resistance gene.

I see what you are saying though.

I agree with you that we should not bash creationism. You can believe whatever you want, but you dont have to put anyone down. Explain the theory you subscribe to.

There is plenty of room for the both of them to work together too.

 

[JMX]

But we should not confuse bashing with just disproving it...
Thank God creationism is pretty much non-existent in Germany. Saves a lot of time.

 

[Lloyd Christmas]

1) You really ought to apologize for implying in your last post that people who enjoy on-line discussions are "********". Way out of line, and rather humorous now that you've chosen to return to our "********" conversation.

2)Irreducible complexity was refuted before it was even presented as an argument against evolution. The argument of irreducible complexity completely ignores cooption. Basically, cooption refers to an existing structure or system that changes and is used in a new way, versus developing a structure or system "from the ground up".

A quick reference on cooption is available here....

3) Michael Behe in particular has been thoroughly rebuffed on numerous occasions; the motivation and opportunty to do so arises often, because he is a biochemist from The Discovery Institute. Some of you may be familiar with this place; for those who are not, it is an organization whose sole purpose is to force intelligent design to be taught as science in our schools. This is the organization behind all the efforts in various states, especially Texas and Ohio, to have biology textbooks altered.

Earlier, I was asked what I do , why I know all this stuff about evolution. Well, I've always been fascinated by life and evolution, so I've known quite a bit about it for a long time. But I really got loaded up on information about 2 years ago The state board of education was compiling rquirements for the new batch of biology textbooks. Religious fundamentalists started a full-court press to put ID in the science curriculum. Of course, they were heavily assisted by the Discovery Institute. In Montgomery county, which is where I live (just north of Houston), things got particularly, shall we say, "active".

You see, Texas (and Ohio) are big targets for this kind of thing, because they're big and they buy a lot of textbooks. If ID'ers can get these states to require ID in the science curriculum, the companies that produce textbooks will of course put it in there; and, of course, they are not going to bother to produce different versions for less populous states. So by default, if ID goes into the Texas and Ohio curriculums, it will go into a whole bunch of states.

We've been succesful in defeating them thus far, but they do not give up. The recently approved biology textbooks will not be up for replacement until 2008, and then the battle will rage again.

In the meantime, the ID movement is targeting seats on the state board of education. These are not usually very high visibilty in the elections, so it's not real hard for someone with just a little bit of organization to get elected. They have been successful in obtaining a number of seats, but we are now actively publicizing the importance of these positions, as well as tracking down and publicizing the sources of the candidates funding.

Enough said. This is not the forum for fighting ID'ers.

I'll leave it with one absolute truth that seems to totally escape ID's promoters.........."proving" evolution to be false in no way provides proof that intelligent design is true. If you want to prove the truth of intelligent design, start doing it, instead of wasting your time disproving other theories.

OK, I guess I am ******** for continuing to reply. However, I stated in my post that you should read what I posted clearly, ie ALL OF IT, if you did, you didn't understand it. Nowhere in that document did I suggest intelligent design, in fact I specifically made a note that implied it is not one or the other, just as Brendan said, both could be wrong. I don't think the phrase "intelligent design" was even used once in that document. Your biggest argument is to imply that I, and those I quoted are religious fundamentalists. Personal attacks are not arguments.

Behe or Plantinga also never claimed that they were "proving" evolution false, in fact, they explicitly state that they are not. They are simply pointing out what they perceive to be serious logical and scientific flaws in the theory. Evolution may well have happened, but if it did we have a long way to go before we can explain how or why it happened. In fact, we probably never will. The argument is not against the theory of evolution, but rather against those like Ayala, Gould, and Dawkins who claim that it is absolutely certain.

 

[Mark Reccord]

Your biggest argument is to imply that I, and those I quoted are religious fundamentalists. Personal attacks are not arguments.

There's no implication in the case of Michael Behe. He is a fundamentalist Christian, with a vested interest in trying to disprove evolution. Do a search on him. The stuff you quoted is pretty moderate compared to some of the things he's said.

I'm not going to speak for BruceWane, but I didn't think he made a personal attack on you in his post.

Personally, I think there are some problems with the current theories, but like I said before, it's a very complex problem that's not likely to be settled any time soon.

 

[Mark Reccord]

Also, I'd appreciate it if people would stop ragging on creationism. It seems like most of it is totally unnecessary to the argument, and I hope that we're not here to bash creationists, because I happen to believe in creation as well as evolution. Thanks.

I've got no problem with creationists. I do have a problem with people distorting the laws of thermodynamics (or whatever) to suit their agenda, though.

I don't even have much of a problem with people wanting creationism taught in schools but I do have a rather large problem with people wanting creationism taught as 'science.'
No matter which way you slice it, it's an inextricably religious thing and by definition cannot be called science.

I don't believe evolution and God are mutually exclusive either.

 

[Brendan]

I don't believe evolution and God are mutually exclusive either.

Nope, but many creationists feel that way, for some reason.

 

[Mark Reccord]

Nope, but many creationists feel that way, for some reason.

Lots of scientists too, apparently. Although most scientists that I know don't.

 

[danshee]

But we should not confuse bashing with just disproving it...
Thank God creationism is pretty much non-existent in Germany. Saves a lot of time.

I'm glad I can count on you for the inside skinny on what the masses think in Germany. How much of the population do you represent?

 

[john turner]

There have been no new species of plant or animal evolved since recorded history but there are plenty that are extinct. I stand by my original statement,

this is not exactly true. evidence of natural selection was collected with regards to the peppered moth in england.

 

[khay0s]

I'm glad I can count on you for the inside skinny on what the masses think in Germany. How much of the population do you represent?

Well, out of all the people I've spoken to in Aust. about Darwin vs Creationism, I've only ever had one who supported Creationism. I have a good cross-section of friends who are heavily religious, slightly religious, undecided and atheist. Only one of the heavily religious people was a Creationist and none of the others were. Thus, from not being involved in any debates on the topic previously, due to a general acceptance of evolution, I have nothing to add.

Leigh

 

[Mark Reccord]

I'm glad I can count on you for the inside skinny on what the masses think in Germany. How much of the population do you represent?

What JMX said is well supported by statistics. Think about it. Europe is consderibly more secular than the US, so it stands to reason that there are fewer creationists there.

In fact, I'd go as far as to say that literal creationism is almost entirely limited to the US. I live in Canada and it just isn't an issue here. Again, the percentage of fundamentalist Christians in Canada is much less than it is in the US. That's just the way it is.

 

[JMX]

I'm glad I can count on you for the inside skinny on what the masses think in Germany. How much of the population do you represent?

See my PM

Mark pretty much said it all.