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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: The Death of Darwinism
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Ley Druid
Ship's chemist
# 3246
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Faithful Sheepdog:
Bacteria are a highly successful species, having remained as bacteria for 3.5 billion years or thereabouts. And bacterial resistance to antibiotics is an important scientific and medical questions. However, to suggest that the adaptive mechanism behind this phenomenon (natural selection) throws light on all evolutionary mechanisms is to claim far too much, I think.
Darwin didn't do that. He suggested other evolutionary mechanisms.
So you see, your predictions and your thinking are getting more Darwinist all the time.
Very good. Long live Darwinism rah rah rah!
Posts: 1188 | Registered: Aug 2002
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Alan Cresswell
Mad Scientist 先生
# 31
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Faithful Sheepdog:
Bacteria are a highly successful species, having remained as bacteria for 3.5 billion years or thereabouts.
Though many bacteria 3.5 billion years ago evolved to be things other than bacteria. And, they were highly successful in doing that too.
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Don't cling to a mistake just because you spent a lot of time making it.
Posts: 32413 | From: East Kilbride (Scotland) or 福島 | Registered: May 2001
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Callan
Shipmate
# 525
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Posted
Originally posted by Faithful Sheepdog:
quote:
I am particularly intrigued by this comment. So, if you remove the hostile antibiotic environment, the bacteria lose the acquired resistance, and that is in accordance with Darwinian theory? How are the bacteria going to evolve complex adaptations if they cannot build on previous selective choices? Does this not undermine Darwinian theory completely?
Not really, if you have a strong selective measure for a certain trait, that trait will predominate. If the selective pressure is removed then other traits may re-emerge.
Imagine a homicidal religious dictatorship which thinks that all redheads are the result of sexual intercourse with demons and orders all redheads to be killed. Obviously there will be a strong selective pressure against redheads and the population will be blonde or brunette. If there is an insurrection against the dictatorship then the selective pressure will be removed and redheads will be found again as part of the population. Now if the dictatorship establishes itself for several thousand years then the gene for redheadedness will be eliminated from the population and if the insurrection takes place after this time it will be impossible for redheads to establish themselves as a part of the population, unless a mutation occurs which restores redheadedness.
Something similar is, presumably, happening with anti-biotic bacteria. Given the existence of anti-biotics those bacteria who have resistance will be inordinately favoured. Remove the selective pressure of anti-biotics and other bacteria may compete just as effectively.
Mutations are, generally, less helpful than not. In one of Richard Dawkins' books, for example, there is a photograph of a frog with its eyes inside its mouth. Clearly such a mutation has little chance of becoming established within the frog population. But a mutation may be neutral or beneficial. In an anti-biotic enviroment losing the resistance to anti-biotics will be fatal. If that pressure is taken away then losing such resistance will be of no great moment. A neutral mutation may establish itself within a population because natural selection does not allow for foresight. There is no gene which says, in effect: "Maintain anti-biotic resistance because the anti-biotics may come back" or for that matter "don't be redheaded because the dictatorship may be re-established".
So if anti-biotics are removed from the environment the selective pressure for resistance goes away and non-resistant bacteria compete on otherwise equal terms. Which is what a Darwinian would expect.
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How easy it would be to live in England, if only one did not love her. - G.K. Chesterton
Posts: 9757 | From: Citizen of the World | Registered: Jun 2001
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Ley Druid
Ship's chemist
# 3246
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Alan Cresswell:
quote:
Originally posted by Faithful Sheepdog:
Bacteria are a highly successful species, having remained as bacteria for 3.5 billion years or thereabouts.
Though many bacteria 3.5 billion years ago evolved to be things other than bacteria. And, they were highly successful in doing that too.
Actually, I think this is Faithful Sheepdog once again expressing his interest in tautologies.
Bacteria remained bacteria.
Bacteria remain bacteria.
Bacteria will remain bacteria.
It seems perfectly acceptable when he does it; he protests when he suggests that it's those evil Darwinists making tautologies.
[ 29. July 2004, 15:28: Message edited by: Ley Druid ]
Posts: 1188 | Registered: Aug 2002
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ken
Ship's Roundhead
# 2460
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Posted
It's just cladism gone mad, that's what it is...
if birds are dinosaurs then we're all of us bacteria and we remain so ![[Smile]](smile.gif)
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Ken
L’amor che move il sole e l’altre stelle.
Posts: 39579 | From: London | Registered: Mar 2002
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Faithful Sheepdog
Shipmate
# 2305
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Callan:
<snip>
Imagine a homicidal religious dictatorship which thinks that all redheads are the result of sexual intercourse with demons and orders all redheads to be killed. Obviously there will be a strong selective pressure against redheads and the population will be blonde or brunette. If there is an insurrection against the dictatorship then the selective pressure will be removed and redheads will be found again as part of the population. Now if the dictatorship establishes itself for several thousand years then the gene for redheadedness will be eliminated from the population and if the insurrection takes place after this time it will be impossible for redheads to establish themselves as a part of the population, unless a mutation occurs which restores redheadedness.
Something similar is, presumably, happening with anti-biotic bacteria. Given the existence of anti-biotics those bacteria who have resistance will be inordinately favoured. Remove the selective pressure of anti-biotics and other bacteria may compete just as effectively.
Mutations are, generally, less helpful than not.
<snip>
Callan, I enjoyed your illustration. I wish I could tell you an amusing story about a redhead. Sadly, the woman who broke my heart was a brunette. ![[Waterworks]](graemlins/bawling.gif)
Although this is probably not what you intended, it is possible to interpret your illustration to say that natural selection is far from being a creative force, and is actually a destructive force. It weeds out those who can’t cope in the new environment (the homicidal dictator) and destroys that particular genetic trait (the redheads).
When the environment eventually changes again (i.e. the insurrection finally occurs), we have now lost the redhead gene, and have to wait for a lucky mutation to get our redheads back. In general there is no guarantee that this will happen at the time it is needed, especially if being redheaded suddenly becomes essential to survival.
Of course, if you breed at the rate of bacteria, an occasional beneficial mutation is not an unreasonable expectation – the Nature article I quoted earlier gives an average of 100 mutations in a pool of 100 billion bacteria. It doesn’t say how many of these will be beneficial, but in rapid asexual reproduction only one is theoretically enough to restore our redheads.
This whole scenario becomes very substantially less reasonable when we start talking about slow-breeding sexual creatures such as humans and other mammals. The time waiting for a beneficial mutation increases markedly, and with sexual reproduction there is in any case only a 50% chance that it will be propagated through the population.
Your point that “mutations are, generally, less helpful than not” should be made into a banner and suspended over the bed of every Darwinist.
Neil
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"Random mutation/natural selection works great in folks’ imaginations, but it’s a bust in the real world." ~ Michael J. Behe
Posts: 1097 | From: Scotland | Registered: Feb 2002
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ken
Ship's Roundhead
# 2460
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Faithful Sheepdog:
if you breed at the rate of bacteria, an occasional beneficial mutation is not an unreasonable expectation ? the Nature article I quoted earlier gives an average of 100 mutations in a pool of 100 billion bacteria. It doesn?t say how many of these will be beneficial, but in rapid asexual reproduction only one is theoretically enough to restore our redheads.
This whole scenario becomes very substantially less reasonable when we start talking about slow-breeding sexual creatures such as humans and other mammals. The time waiting for a beneficial mutation increases markedly, and with sexual reproduction there is in any case only a 50% chance that it will be propagated through the population.
Run the numbers. In a sufficiently large population many, many mutations will turn up every generation.
Sex maes it more likely that the beneficial mutation will prosper, not less.
Yes, about half of them will disappear in the first generation - so what? Mutations are amazingly common. There are millions and millions around. Sexual reproduction allows different mutations to be combined in one individual - so evolution happens much faster. Recombination ius a machine for producing overwhelmingly more genetic layouts - do the sums - combinatorial explosion.
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Ken
L’amor che move il sole e l’altre stelle.
Posts: 39579 | From: London | Registered: Mar 2002
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Faithful Sheepdog
Shipmate
# 2305
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by ken:
Sex makes it more likely that the beneficial mutation will prosper, not less.
Please could you expand on this remark. It would appear to be contrary to everything I've read on reproduction, mutation and the spread of beneficial traits through a population.
Neil
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"Random mutation/natural selection works great in folks’ imaginations, but it’s a bust in the real world." ~ Michael J. Behe
Posts: 1097 | From: Scotland | Registered: Feb 2002
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Glenn Oldham
Shipmate
# 47
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Faithful Sheepdog:
with sexual reproduction there is in any case only a 50% chance that it will be propagated through the population.
How do you work that out? You appear to be assuming that the individual with the beneficial mutation has one offspring.
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This entire doctrine is worthless except as a subject of dispute. (G. C. Lichtenberg 1742-1799 Aphorism 60 in notebook J of The Waste Books)
Posts: 910 | From: London, England | Registered: May 2001
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Faithful Sheepdog
Shipmate
# 2305
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Glenn Oldham:
quote:
Originally posted by Faithful Sheepdog:
with sexual reproduction there is in any case only a 50% chance that it will be propagated through the population.
How do you work that out? You appear to be assuming that the individual with the beneficial mutation has one offspring.
I think you have a fair point here. My dubious logic went something like this: I was thinking particularly of slowly reproducing sexual species who have relatively few offspring, and I was assuming that only one partner had the beneficial mutation – the chances of both having it are minimal.
What I should have said is that for every offspring born, there is only a 50% percent chance that this benefit will be passed on to the offspring. So for species that have only a few offspring, spreading this beneficial trait is less than certain, allowing for factors such as normal infant mortality and sheer bad luck.
With a much larger number of offspring, then on average maybe 50% of them will have the beneficial mutation. In this case there may be numerous offspring possessing the beneficial trait, and the chances of the beneficial gene propagating through the population are now much better.
Right at the back of my comments are the mathematical studies on population genetics done by JBS Haldane (which I would like to get my hands on) and the whole issue of how Darwinism explains the origin of sexual reproduction. With asexual reproduction the heredity of a beneficial mutation is not subject to such uncertainty.
Neil
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"Random mutation/natural selection works great in folks’ imaginations, but it’s a bust in the real world." ~ Michael J. Behe
Posts: 1097 | From: Scotland | Registered: Feb 2002
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Glenn Oldham
Shipmate
# 47
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Posted
Most textbooks on Evolution (such as Mark Ridley's Evolution (Blackwell 1996 (2nd ed)) have the maths of evoutionary genetics in them and will cover the maths of the increase of beneficial mutations in populations.
The subject of what advantage sexual reproduction has that offsets the considerable disadvantages to it is much discussed. Mark Ridley has a book on it called Mendel's Demon and he inclines to the view that, given certain other factors, sex allows bad versions of genes to be more easily got rid of, thus permitting genomes to be more complex in the face of the fact that the more complex the genome the more copying errors will occur. A helpful review of that book is given here http://homepage.ntlworld.com/anthony.campbell1/bookreviews/r/ridley-mark.html.
I still owe you two posts: one on Dembski and one on Natural Selection ,Fitness and Teleology. Unfortunately life intervenes in these threads!
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This entire doctrine is worthless except as a subject of dispute. (G. C. Lichtenberg 1742-1799 Aphorism 60 in notebook J of The Waste Books)
Posts: 910 | From: London, England | Registered: May 2001
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Mad Geo
Ship's navel gazer
# 2939
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by ken:
....if birds are dinosaurs then we're all of us bacteria and we remain so
Actually we're viruses, according to some.....
![[Big Grin]](biggrin.gif)
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Diax's Rake - "Never believe a thing simply because you want it to be true"
Posts: 11730 | From: People's Republic of SoCal | Registered: Jun 2002
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ken
Ship's Roundhead
# 2460
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Mad Geo:
quote:
Originally posted by ken:
....if birds are dinosaurs then we're all of us bacteria and we remain so
Actually we're viruses, according to some.....
Some people will believe anything.
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Ken
L’amor che move il sole e l’altre stelle.
Posts: 39579 | From: London | Registered: Mar 2002
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ken
Ship's Roundhead
# 2460
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Faithful Sheepdog:
quote:
Originally posted by ken:
Sex makes it more likely that the beneficial mutation will prosper, not less.
Please could you expand on this remark. It would appear to be contrary to everything I've read on reproduction, mutation and the spread of beneficial traits through a population.
I just posted a 3-page discussion on this, and now it has vanished into the Net!
So I will assume that God doesn't want me to post it. Seeing as I don;t have time to repeat it now.
Neil, what I was saying is exactly the mainstream description of population genetics.
But I will summarise:
Basically sex makes no difference to the survival chances of a rare variant or new mutation in a common species - that's obvious. If you think sex does make a difference then you need to get out a pencil and paper and write down what you think the chances are. Do the sums.
NB except for highly deleterious or lethal mutations (which are obviously selected against) the main influence on the chances of survival of a mutation is variation in family size. The variance in number of offspring is the important figure.
But once a mutation has spread through the population - just at random - sex makes it much more likely that advantageous alleles will increase because they can be joined together in one individual. In asexual populations this is terribly unlikely.
Without sex they all have to compete with one another - my beneficial mutation A against your one B.
With sex, individuals will turn up who have A and B (and C and D and E...)
There is a complex pattern of variation, the "raw material" of selection, new genomes being thrown up with every generation. Every individual is unique.
In fact (& no time to go into this now) one would expect evolution by natural selection to progress fastest in groups with rather low variance in family size, and that experience occasional large fluctuations in population.
Two quick questions to check your understanding of population genetics (because you do seem to be missing something)
- what do you think the random chance of a new neutral mutation eventually being fixed in a population is?
- how many mutations do you think there are in the human species? (less variable than most common species)
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Ken
L’amor che move il sole e l’altre stelle.
Posts: 39579 | From: London | Registered: Mar 2002
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Faithful Sheepdog
Shipmate
# 2305
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by ken:
Two quick questions to check your understanding of population genetics (because you do seem to be missing something)
- what do you think the random chance of a new neutral mutation eventually being fixed in a population is?
- how many mutations do you think there are in the human species? (less variable than most common species)
Sorry to hear that you lost 3 pages into cyberspace. That’s a bummer.
Good questions, though. The maths of population genetics is definitely not something I presently have at my fingertips, but I’ll have a go nonetheless.
On your first question, I already knew vaguely that the chances of a beneficial mutation fixing are related to s, the selection coefficient. This paper using Kimura’s ideas suggests that the chances of a new neutral mutation fixing are the same as q, its initial frequency within the population. In other words, the chances are tiny if only one member has the new mutation.
As for your second question, I recently picked up some information from the ARN website, which suggests that the human genome mutation rate is 1.8E-8 per base pair for a genome of 3E+9 base pairs. Doing the arithmetic gives 54 mutations on average per genome – that’s 54 in each of us. I presume that the vast majority of these will be either neutral or deleterious, but a few may be beneficial.
This webpage from the textbook that Glenn Oldham recommended suggests that there are at least three theories on the relationship between the rate of mutation and the selection coefficient.
Neil
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"Random mutation/natural selection works great in folks’ imaginations, but it’s a bust in the real world." ~ Michael J. Behe
Posts: 1097 | From: Scotland | Registered: Feb 2002
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Alan Cresswell
Mad Scientist 先生
# 31
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Posted
Tangential discussion from a thread on the Fall in Purgatory
quote:
Originally posted by Anij:
evolution is not real, If it were would we not be seeing half man half ape coming out of the forests, and don't say oh it takes a million years for change to happen, nah I know change to happen in an instant. and the mathematical probability of two creatures, male and female having the same genetic "defect" from the norm, in the same area and place, and the ability to also mate and produce off spring is slim to none. Most genetic "defects" (i really don't like that word) are infact infertile, and can not produce offspring. I am not forgetting biology, i studied it, but guess what, the Seed of Woman, their heel shall crush the serpents head. that is not biologically correct, and yet it is the bible and it happened.
quote:
Originally posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider:
And since I'm back as of now (and come out of creationist bash^h^h^h^h correcting retirement) I'd be even more inclined to correct one of the most misguided misdescriptions of evolution that I've seen in a long time.
quote:
Originally posted by Anij:
I admit I was rambeling a bit there before, But Im sorry my God new me before I was born and he knitted me together in my mothers womb, I am a CREATION of my God, and nothing will take that away, I am NOT some cosmic accident and neither is anyone else out there reading this or not. (reading this i mean). I see my God in all of creation, Paul says man has no excuse for not worshipping God, simply because He is evident in the world that he created. I feel the presence of God in creation, do I worship creation no. I worship the God who created it.
So for those who believe you came from an ape, God Bless you and we'll just have to agree to disagree. I can see your problem with the whole perfect couple, lack of a specific time of receiving a sinful nature if you take that stance. But the bible (in case you can't tell im protestant and take most in fact pretty much all of the bible to be literal) says that God created us in His image. This is so we can communicate with him to have a relationship with him, so if you believe in Evolution then you have to accept a point where God changed us from animal to his image.
quote:
Originally posted by GreyFace:
quote:
Originally posted by Anij:
so if you believe in Evolution then you have to accept a point where God changed us from animal to his image.
Of course. There's a point in any evolutionary change when the offspring become something the parents are not.
quote:
Originally posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider:
Well, there is and there isn't. Was there a point at which Middle English speaking parents found their children were speaking Modern English? It's an arbitrary line.
Did God have to "change" us from an animal into His image? No. The evolutionary process was God's way of creating a species that was in His image. No magic intervention required.
quote:
Originally posted by Anij:
quote:
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Well, there is and there isn't. Was there a point at which Middle English speaking parents found their children were speaking Modern English? It's an arbitrary line.
Did God have to "change" us from an animal into His image? No. The evolutionary process was God's way of creating a species that was in His image. No magic intervention required.
But this doesn't make me special, okay I know it sounds selfish, but its true, And do you seriousely believe the earth to be millions of years old, If we worship a God that can impregenate a woman, why can he not create a universe mid life, It's the age old question which came first the chicken or the egg. the egg needs to be heated by the chicken, The egg is created with in the chicken, before another chicken is created in the egg. It actually makes sense to me anyway that the chicken came first, as an adult chicken, with full knowledge on how to breed and produce more chickens. I mean God could have created the chicken sitting on its egg at the same time, but i digress.
I had a friend come over and we were going through my interlinear bible (ie hebrew with lit english trans.) it was the mesoritic text and i don't know hebrew, but she is Jewish and so knows it. Istead of In the beginning God created the Heavens and the Earth, she read In the beginning God created heavens WITH the earth, yeh i know it may sound the same and I have always believed it, but it made it so much more understandable, for evolution surely the universe came before the earth, and yet the bible states that the heavens were made WITH the earth.
and yet we digress from my original op, partially, if you have evolution, were we ever perfect and as such i suppose you are saying that we never received a sinful nature but it was a left over bit from our animal days, slight problem shouldn't we have improved, I have a feeling we are getting worse, or worse still we haven't changed, I am often surprised by things mentioned in the bible, and heres me thinking it only happened in the last 100 years, how wrong I am. We have not changed nor improved, our moral standing as a species, and this is why i believe that we have received a sinful nature when adam and eve ate the fruit.
quote:
Originally posted by GreyFace:
quote:
Originally posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider:
Well, there is and there isn't. Was there a point at which Middle English speaking parents found their children were speaking Modern English?
No, but each miniscule change in the language is discrete, surely? It might be arbitrary but it should be possible to draw a line between prehuman and human. Obviously it would be a contentious issue
quote:
Did God have to "change" us from an animal into His image? No.
That's a difficult question to answer from the viewpoint of a theistic evolutionist. I wouldn't want to answer as you have because it would look like I was saying God had nothing to do with the process at all. But of course what you meant was...
quote:
The evolutionary process was God's way of creating a species that was in His image. No magic intervention required.
Who said there was magic intervention? Not that I have any problem with the concept of discrete miraculous events but I don't think the creation of the first true human is one of them.
quote:
Originally posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider:
quote:
And do you seriousely believe the earth to be millions of years old,
Is this a serious question? Are you seriously suggesting it isn't, given all the evidence that it is? Are you next going to ask whether I seriously believe the earth goes round the sun?
quote:
If we worship a God that can impregenate a woman, why can he not create a universe mid life,
Because if He did, He also created a history for the world which never occurred. You may be happy with such a fraudulent God, but I'm not. Can't trust Him.
quote:
It's the age old question which came first the chicken or the egg.
The egg. Eggs have been around for hundreds of millions of years; chickens only a million or so.
And the ghostly mineralised mesohippus went clop clop clop...
quote:
Originally posted by ken:
quote:
Originally posted by Anij:
And do you seriousely believe the earth to be millions of years old
It certainly looks as if it is.
quote:
If we worship a God that can impregenate a woman,
Well, so can I, given half a chance. God can do much more difficult things than that.
quote:
why can he not create a universe mid life,
Of course he can, but I believe and hope that he is not a liar and that the world he created is real, not some stage set or virtual reality.
Your idea that God lied in creating the world, that he cheated, that the world is some sort of fake, distressed and done up to look old like the furniture in a dodgy antique dealer's, is not really a Christian idea at all. It belongs to the ancient Gnostic heresy.
Posts: 32413 | From: East Kilbride (Scotland) or 福島 | Registered: May 2001
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GreyFace
Shipmate
# 4682
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Posted
It's so disappointing when posts get merged into one. This will never overtake That Other Thread at this rate.
Posts: 5748 | From: North East England | Registered: Jul 2003
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Alan Cresswell
Mad Scientist 先生
# 31
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Posted
I thought it was the Biblical Inerrancy thread that was posted on to get it past that other thread.
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Don't cling to a mistake just because you spent a lot of time making it.
Posts: 32413 | From: East Kilbride (Scotland) or 福島 | Registered: May 2001
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k-mann
Shipmate
# 8490
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by ChristinaMarie («The Fall»-topic):
Can we believe in the Fall today? If evolution is true, how can we believe in a first human pair who were perfect or innocent?
Well, some Christians believe that God used evolution, and than - at a given time in history (we don't now when) - gave them a soul. They would not be alive befor they got their soul, but their matter would be «old» - evolved.
quote:
Originally posted by ChristinaMarie («The Fall»-topic):
Do we have our heads in one compartment when considering biology, but in another when considering theology about the Fall? Do we conveniently 'forget' biology and evolution then?
No, I can't see that they contridict. But there is interpretations that rule evolution out. But it's all about that - interpretations.
quote:
Originally posted by ChristinaMarie («The Fall»-topic):
What if the story of the Fall, is actually meant to tell us that there is something better for us? Perhaps it is a myth to make us long for a Golden Age in the future, not one in the past? Perhaps, in the words of Jack Spong, Jesus did not come to atone for our sins, but to empower us to become the new humanity?
Christina
This sounds like new age crap. Sorry for the expression, but that's what it is.
GOD BLESS!
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"Being religious means asking passionately the question of the meaning of our existence and being willing to receive answers, even if the answers hurt."
— Paul Tillich
Katolikken
Posts: 1314 | From: Norway | Registered: Sep 2004
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ChristinaMarie
Shipmate
# 1013
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Posted
Well it sounds more realistic than the crap you posted. Sorry for the language though.
Christina
Posts: 2333 | From: Oldham | Registered: Jul 2001
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FatMac
Ship's Macintosh
# 2914
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Posted
It doesn't often happen, but I agree with ChritinaMarie entirely. Calling something New Age crap is not a terribly cogent argument. Is it all you have in the locker then?
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Do not beware the slippery slope - it is where faith resides.
Do not avoid the grey areas - they are where God works.
Posts: 1706 | From: Sydney | Registered: Jun 2002
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Orb
Eye eye Cap'n!
# 3256
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Posted
I'm posting here to say that I am an evolutionary theist and so I can say I've posted on this thread. That's my politik, I stick by it.
It did sound quite New Age-y. But that's what Spong is. New and kind of Age-y.
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“You cannot buy the revolution. You cannot make the revolution. You can only be the revolution. It is in your spirit, or it is nowhere.” Ursula K. Le Guin, The Dispossessed
Posts: 5032 | From: Easton, Bristol | Registered: Aug 2002
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GreyFace
Shipmate
# 4682
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Alan Cresswell:
I thought it was the Biblical Inerrancy thread that was posted on to get it past that other thread.
It was, but we couldn't find anyone else to play. If we work this one long enough, you can merge the threads - isn't Young Earth Creationism a result of applying Inerrant Literalism to Genesis anyway?
Just don't put the whole thread on a single post when you move it ![[Biased]](wink.gif)
Posts: 5748 | From: North East England | Registered: Jul 2003
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Alan Cresswell
Mad Scientist 先生
# 31
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Anij on the Fall thread in Purgatory:
Count your bones, Men and women do have a different number of bones.
To quote an online encyclopedia quote:
There are small differences between the male and female human skeletons. Men tend to have slightly thicker and longer limb bones while women tend to have larger pelvic bones in relation to body size.
There is a legend that male humans have one rib fewer than female humans. This is false
quote:
As I said before I do take the bible litterally, there is too much info in it that is true that man did not know until the last 500 years or so,
Well, even if true I don't see how that proves the Bible to be literally true ... but that probably belongs on a seperate thread. Anyway, your examples simply don't hold up anyway
quote:
orions belt is held together by gravity. No other stars are infact held together in there constelations by gravity relating to each other. and yet in job, the oldest book written, it says so.
First, the stars in Orions belt are too far apart to be directly held together by gravity (though they do, like all stars, contribute to the general gravitational field of the galaxy and so do indirectly held each other together). I've never come across anyone claim they're held together by gravity. Also, I don't recognise the Job reference ... the closest I can think of is Job 38:31 "Can you loose the cords of Orion?"
quote:
All the prophecys are exact in timing, from Christ entering jerusalem, to Isreal becoming a country in 1945.
Bollocks. I don't see anything, in any prophecies, that relate to the timing of events. Even if there are prophecies predicting the establishment of the modern state of Israel then they don't specify the time that would be (and, wasn't it 1948 anyway?). Though Christ rode into Jerusalem on a donkey, in fulfilment of prophecy, it can be argued he did it deliberately - and again, the prophecy doesn't mention a date.
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In regards to mutations, if you can give me one concrete example of either animal or human mutating, that is both good, and can reproduce with each other or even with the previous type or animal I would like to know.
What, you're genetically identical to me??? Of course not. No two humans or animals (except a small number of clones) are genetically identical, we all carry large numbers of small varients in genes - doesn't stop us reproducing though.
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The world itself is so delecately balanced and intricate, you can change an entire eco system and destroy by taking out one species of animal. or introducing a new one. To think that God didn't make this at once exactly the way it was supposed to be, is not logical. Evolution is not logical.
The world, as it is, can be very easily changed is without doubt. But, that's the thing, it changes as circumstances change (eg: by the introduction of an alien species to an environment) but it isn't destroyed. It may become less habitable for some species (including man), but it will adapt. We've seen it countless times before - the development of disease resistance is well documented, and is the response of an environment (eg: a species) to the introduction of a new pathogen. It is all an example of evolution in practice. It is entirely logical.
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We as humans have not changed over at least the length of the bible, so guessing about 7000 years or so, If evolution existed we should have changed into something better then what we were which is the same as what we are.
I disagree. Though it's impossible to actually quantify how much humanity has changed, there have been small evolutionary changes. There are diseases that are now less severe than once they were due to evolution (eg: sickle-cell mutations providing immunity to malaria, I don't know how recent that mutation is, but it's only present in a portion of the human species).
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Don't cling to a mistake just because you spent a lot of time making it.
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ken
Ship's Roundhead
# 2460
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Posted
Can someone tell Arij that I have counted my bones and I do have the same number as a woman.
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Ken
L’amor che move il sole e l’altre stelle.
Posts: 39579 | From: London | Registered: Mar 2002
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Karl: Liberal Backslider
Shipmate
# 76
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Posted
Oh dear, oh dear.
I know Alan's already disembowelled Anij's little collection of misinformation, but there's still bits that need putting out of their misery.
quote:
Count your bones, Men and women do have a different number of bones.
That's as maybe. But they have the same number of ribs. Do you know how archaeologists identify whether skeletons are male or female? Hint - it's a lot harder than just counting the ribs.
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As I said before I do take the bible litterally, there is too much info in it that is true that man did not know until the last 500 years or so
If that were so (which it isn't as we shall see) why do you assume that the Bible being true means that it is literal? Methinks you have two concepts confused here.
quote:
that orions belt is held together by gravity. No other stars are infact held together in there constelations by gravity relating to each other. and yet in job, the oldest book written, it says so.
As Alan said, they aren't. The Pleiades are, but so is every other star cluster. Nothing unique. I think you half-learnt this from a questionable creationist or literalist source. They told you wrong. I wonder what other lies they fed you? Have you also heard that the Earth's magnetic field is weakening and would have been impossibly strong millions of years ago? Did they also tell you that the sun is shrinking five feet every hour? Or that the year gets half a second longer every year? What about geologists not being able to explain why sea creatures' fossils are found on top of Mt Everest? Or there being not enough salt in the sea if the earth is millions of years old? None of the above are true, but they're lies generally spouted by the same organisations and sources that tell you men have fewer ribs than women and the speed of light is slowing down. Open your eyes. Creationist sources are shameless liars.
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(I will have to look it up, its in one of Gods speeches to Job). All the prophecys are exact in timing, from Christ entering jerusalem, to Isreal becoming a country in 1945. How can I not take it litterally.
Bollocks, as Alan said. There are no dates given. It's a matter of interpretation. And were it not, why does "correct" mean "literal"?
quote:
In regards to mutations, if you can give me one concrete example of either animal or human mutating, that is both good, and can reproduce with each other or even with the previous type or animal I would like to know.
As Alan said, we all carry de novo mutations, but we can still interbreed with other humans. Sickle cell anaemia is a case in point - a significant number of black people especially carry the sickle cell mutation, but can still produce viable children with non carriers. There's your concrete example. You don't actually know much about biology save what your creationist liemongers have told you, do you?
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It is very very very rare that a mutation occurs, (realistically) and its even rarer for that mutation to be good. A friend of mine's wife has a genetic mutation, nothing physical is apparant from it, she is fine, but there son died at 3 months because her mutation combined with his "normal" genes, meant their son came out with a hole in his heart and one of the veins in the wrong posistion, he fought, and so did the many talented doctors and nurses but it all didn't help.
Some mutations are deleterious. The vast majority are neutral. A small proportion convey some advantage.
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I don't know what would have happened if she had married some one with the same mutation. but clearly it doesn't help to stay with "normal".
I think you're confused here. Usually these genetic abnormalities are expressed when two people carrying the abnormality produce a child who inherits the faulty gene from both parents. I do not know what condition you refer to, but I know of no genetic abnormality where the heterozygous condition is the dangerous one. Besides, in order to have a heterozygous child, the mother would also have to be heterozygous. Why was the condition harmless for her but fatal for her child?
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Beside why would God waste so much time developing something that was going to change and the previous become extinct. It doesn't make sense.
If that's the way God wants to do it, why not? Individuals die and their progeny live on; why is it so weird for God to introduce modification into this descent?
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And when I say that God created the earth and the universe midlife. what I am saying, is that it is no point in him saying on the 3rd day?? let there be stars in the heavens, but the light won't reach earth for a few million years.
Problem is we don't just see the starlight. We see events - events happening in stars millions of light years away. If the universe is young, these events never really happened. God has created a false history. Can you trust this God?
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Well its amazing that man kind some how was able to navigate the seas for millenia before the stars shone. Adam can't have been created as single celled fetus, he wouldn't have survived, nor even as a baby, he wouldn't have survived. He would have to be at least early teenage hood so he could gather food for himself from the garden. When I say mid life I mean that everything is at least in adult form able to sexually reproduce.
God creating an adult Adam is one thing. God creating an adult Adam with an old fracture that has partially rehealed, a scar on his arm and a faded tattoo on the other hand is creating a fraudulent history. And that is how the universe looks, not just old, but with a history.
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Mutations generally can not.
Yes they can. I used to breed guppies (well, the bloody things breed themselves if you don't put other fish in to eat the fry, but I digress). Ever so often a mutation would occur - deformed spine, or a different colour eye. These fish were freely able to breed; in the case of deformities is was necessary to forceably prevent the individual from breeding and passing on the deleterious mutation. Your claim is simply wrong.
quote:
Also in animal society mutations would be seen as a threat and they would be killed by other animals, (unless of course that mutation was a huge horn that could slice through stone. Even humans did this, when a child was born with two different coloured eyes they would be left to die.
The vast majority of mutations have effects that are too small to be obvious. A huge horn would be the sort of saltational jump that is not thought to be involved in evolutionary change.
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The world itself is so delecately balanced and intricate, you can change an entire eco system and destroy by taking out one species of animal. or introducing a new one.
No, they change when that happens. Ecosystems evolve along with the organisms within them.
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To think that God didn't make this at once exactly the way it was supposed to be, is not logical. Evolution is not logical.
Stop working with your own logic only, and start including irritating side issues like "evidence".
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If you think God but the fossil record there on purpose as to add history, this I disagree with. I believe every one of those animals did exist, and for various reasons, the main one being the flood, they have become extint over time.
The flood, for which there is absolutely zero evidence. Please don't tell me you're going to try to suggest that the fossiliferous strata were laid down by the flood - even the desert palaeosols....
quote:
We as humans with our grand ol knowledge of right and wrong have contributed to this ourselves, Is it so hard to believe that the humans of pre flood even post flood days did not contribute to the extinction of flora and fauna.
I'm sure we've been doing it for tens of thousands of years.
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We as humans have not changed over at least the length of the bible, so guessing about 7000 years or so, If evolution existed we should have changed into something better then what we were which is the same as what we are.
This is a bit like watching a swimming pool with a pinhole in it for ten minutes, and declaring that because you can't see any change in the water level, it won't go down at all even given a couple of months. Do you have any conception of how tiny a period 7000 years is in evolutionary terms?
But you're wrong anyway. Evolution is a change in relative gene frequencies over time, and I'll bet the incidence of genes that give rise to - for example - myopia - is higher now than 2,000 years ago, owing to the invention of spectacles.
Posts: 17938 | From: Chesterfield | Registered: May 2001
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mr cheesy
Shipmate
# 3330
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Posted
wb, Karl.
I am interested in hearing more about palaeosols. Thanks
C
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arse
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Alan Cresswell
Mad Scientist 先生
# 31
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Posted
This might take away some of the fun of shooting fish in barrels debates with Creationists, but ...
Maybe you should read arguments Creationists should not use as compiled by AnswersinGenesis. This is a list of some of the arguments that are just totally fallacious that keep getting put forward. They include the extra rib thing.
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Don't cling to a mistake just because you spent a lot of time making it.
Posts: 32413 | From: East Kilbride (Scotland) or 福島 | Registered: May 2001
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Karl: Liberal Backslider
Shipmate
# 76
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Cheesy*:
wb, Karl.
I am interested in hearing more about palaeosols. Thanks
C
I'm sure you know more about them than I do. I just ask how desert ones can fossilise during a flood, that's all.
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Might as well ask the bloody cat.
Posts: 17938 | From: Chesterfield | Registered: May 2001
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mr cheesy
Shipmate
# 3330
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Alan Cresswell:
This is a list of some of the arguments that are just totally fallacious that keep getting put forward.
Hahahahaha.
Like AiG could tell a fallacious argument if it walked out of the sea on its hind flippers and cooked a full english breakfast whilst reading the Complete Works of Shakespeare.
C
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arse
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Karl: Liberal Backslider
Shipmate
# 76
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Cheesy*:
quote:
Originally posted by Alan Cresswell:
This is a list of some of the arguments that are just totally fallacious that keep getting put forward.
Hahahahaha.
Like AiG could tell a fallacious argument if it walked out of the sea on its hind flippers and cooked a full english breakfast whilst reading the Complete Works of Shakespeare.
C
They can tell an argument that's fallacious because even they can't invent a defence for it, and an argument that's just fallacious because it's wrong, which they can't tell from an argument that's correct.
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Might as well ask the bloody cat.
Posts: 17938 | From: Chesterfield | Registered: May 2001
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k-mann
Shipmate
# 8490
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by ChristinaMarie:
Well it sounds more realistic than the crap you posted. Sorry for the language though.
Christina
Sorry for the hard words. But they were written in anger. If the fall is just a myth, and Adam/Eve hasn't been around, how can Jesus then be the second/the last Adam?
GOD BLESS!
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"Being religious means asking passionately the question of the meaning of our existence and being willing to receive answers, even if the answers hurt."
— Paul Tillich
Katolikken
Posts: 1314 | From: Norway | Registered: Sep 2004
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Justinian
Shipmate
# 5357
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by k-mann:
quote:
Originally posted by ChristinaMarie:
Well it sounds more realistic than the crap you posted. Sorry for the language though.
Christina
Sorry for the hard words. But they were written in anger. If the fall is just a myth, and Adam/Eve hasn't been around, how can Jesus then be the second/the last Adam?
GOD BLESS!
Would you mind justifying that?
(And in answer, "The last Adam" is easy enough even if there wasn't a first one)
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My real name consists of just four letters, but in billions of combinations.
Eudaimonaic Laughter - my blog.
Posts: 3926 | From: The Sea Coast of Bohemia | Registered: Dec 2003
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ChristinaMarie
Shipmate
# 1013
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Posted
quote:
Sorry for the hard words. But they were written in anger. If the fall is just a myth, and Adam/Eve hasn't been around, how can Jesus then be the second/the last Adam?
GOD BLESS!
Quite simple, really. Adam means 'mankind'. The myth accounts for the imperfection in life, and points to perfection. As it was in the beginning, it shall be without end. Only, we now know about evolution, and that death did not come into the world because of a Fall.
We are all part of the Old Humanity, we are all part of the Old Adam (Humanity). By the grace of God we can become like Jesus, who role modelled what the next level of humanity is and will be.
The empowerment comes from Jesus through the Spirit. We experience a Now / Not Yet. We change as we follow Jesus (Now) but fail also as the Old Nature wins over the New Nature.
The Old Nature is wired into our flesh, our biology, that is why we die physically. Without death and resurrection we couldn't be perfect as Jesus is. The Old Nature has a survival instinct, which can lead to what is called sin. Why is Martyrdom the ultimate glory? Because it completely opposes the survival instinct through faith.
Just a few of my attempts to explain things taking evolution into account. A reframing of Christianity if you will.
Christina
[Fixed UBB code]
[ 18. September 2004, 20:17: Message edited by: TonyK ]
Posts: 2333 | From: Oldham | Registered: Jul 2001
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mr cheesy
Shipmate
# 3330
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by k-mann:
quote:
Originally posted by ChristinaMarie:
Well it sounds more realistic than the crap you posted. Sorry for the language though.
Christina
Sorry for the hard words. But they were written in anger. If the fall is just a myth, and Adam/Eve hasn't been around, how can Jesus then be the second/the last Adam?
GOD BLESS!
Because the science of the world is an entirely different issue to the nature of, and need for redemption. It makes me rather angry that people continually try to make one into the other.
The world is wonderfully put together - however that was done. Most scientists would probably agree that mankind is having a negative impact on it. Hence the story of the fall is a profound truth on a global as well as an individual level.
I would say that individuals, societies and the natural world need redeeming and that is something we cannot do on our own.
Humph. See what you made me do? ![[Frown]](frown.gif) I've just come over all evangelical. I need to go and lie down.
C
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arse
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Cod
Shipmate
# 2643
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Cheesy*:
Because the science of the world is an entirely different issue to the nature of, and need for redemption. It makes me rather angry that people continually try to make one into the other.
Only if one believes God to be unknowable. Christianity has traditionally stated that God can be known, that God has attributes similar to that of humans. The reason why science has been so devastating to Christianity is that its discoveries seem not to have found the comprehensible divine patterns that Christian theology expected to find. By this I'm not referring to literal interpretations of Genesis but rather evidences of the workings of a mind which we can understand.
So with Darwin: It's not evolution itself that causes problems for Christianity but that the reason for evolution is simply survival of the fittest. One can place God at the start of this process, but it pushes God beyond the bounds of what we can know.
[ 21. September 2004, 05:14: Message edited by: Sir George Grey. ]
Posts: 4229 | From: New Zealand | Registered: Apr 2002
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mr cheesy
Shipmate
# 3330
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Sir George Grey.:
quote:
Originally posted by Cheesy*:
Because the science of the world is an entirely different issue to the nature of, and need for redemption. It makes me rather angry that people continually try to make one into the other.
Only if one believes God to be unknowable. Christianity has traditionally stated that God can be known, that God has attributes similar to that of humans. The reason why science has been so devastating to Christianity is that its discoveries seem not to have found the comprehensible divine patterns that Christian theology expected to find. By this I'm not referring to literal interpretations of Genesis but rather evidences of the workings of a mind which we can understand.
So with Darwin: It's not evolution itself that causes problems for Christianity but that the reason for evolution is simply survival of the fittest. One can place God at the start of this process, but it pushes God beyond the bounds of what we can know.
On the contrary, I think science has shown that processes that are seemingly incomprehensible are actually able to be understood (to some degree or another). There are patterns (and yes, I appreciate that they are complicated) and we can make general statements that explain the things we see. I accept that there is a lot we still do not know.
Frankly I don't understand your point re the difference between our understanding of science and God. Surely advanced theology suggests that whilst God in theory is comprehensible/capable of being understood (otherwise there is absolutely no point in even attempting to understand) in practice our humanity means that we will never hope to get a complete handle on him. This is exactly the same as my understanding of science.
C
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arse
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ken
Ship's Roundhead
# 2460
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Sir George Grey.:
The reason why science has been so devastating to Christianity is that its discoveries seem not to have found the comprehensible divine patterns that Christian theology expected to find.
Yet this doesn't ring true to me at all.
Many Christians who are scientists find endlessly incrasing reason to worship God as they see more of the workings of the natural world.
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Ken
L’amor che move il sole e l’altre stelle.
Posts: 39579 | From: London | Registered: Mar 2002
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k-mann
Shipmate
# 8490
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by ChristinaMarie:
quote:
Sorry for the hard words. But they were written in anger. If the fall is just a myth, and Adam/Eve hasn't been around, how can Jesus then be the second/the last Adam?
GOD BLESS!
Quite simple, really. Adam means 'mankind'. The myth accounts for the imperfection in life, and points to perfection. As it was in the beginning, it shall be without end. Only, we now know about evolution, and that death did not come into the world because of a Fall.
[Fixed UBB code]
How do we «know» that death didn't come into the world because of a fall? I'm not a fundamentlist, and I believe that mankind may be old, but I still believe that Adam is a ral historical person.
quote:
Originally posted by ChristinaMarie:
We are all part of the Old Humanity, we are all part of the Old Adam (Humanity). By the grace of God we can become like Jesus, who role modelled what the next level of humanity is and will be.
The empowerment comes from Jesus through the Spirit. We experience a Now / Not Yet. We change as we follow Jesus (Now) but fail also as the Old Nature wins over the New Nature.
The Old Nature is wired into our flesh, our biology, that is why we die physically. Without death and resurrection we couldn't be perfect as Jesus is. The Old Nature has a survival instinct, which can lead to what is called sin. Why is Martyrdom the ultimate glory? Because it completely opposes the survival instinct through faith.
Just a few of my attempts to explain things taking evolution into account. A reframing of Christianity if you will.
Christina
[Fixed UBB code]
I Adam isn't an historical person, the whole meaning of these verses fall apart:
«Therefore, even as through one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin, and so death passed on all men inasmuch as all sinned: for until the Law sin was in the world, but sin is not imputed when there is no law.
But death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over those who had not sinned in the likeness of the transgression of Adam, who is the type of Him who was to come; but the free gift shall not be also like the offense. For if by the offense of the one many died, much more the grace of God, and the gift in grace; which is of the one Man, Jesus Christ, abounded to many. And the free gift shall not be as by one having sinned; (for indeed the judgment was of one to condemnation, but the free gift is of many offenses to justification. For if by one man's offense death reigned by one, much more they who receive abundance of grace and the gift of righteousness shall reign in life by One, Jesus Christ.)
Therefore as by one offense sentence came on all men to condemnation, even so by the righteousness of One the free gift came to all men to justification of life.» (Rom 5:12-18)
GOD BLESS!
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"Being religious means asking passionately the question of the meaning of our existence and being willing to receive answers, even if the answers hurt."
— Paul Tillich
Katolikken
Posts: 1314 | From: Norway | Registered: Sep 2004
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Karl: Liberal Backslider
Shipmate
# 76
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Posted
No, they don't.
Or to put it another way, just because you assert something to be so doesn't make it so.
You need to explain why these verses fall apart.
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Might as well ask the bloody cat.
Posts: 17938 | From: Chesterfield | Registered: May 2001
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mr cheesy
Shipmate
# 3330
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Posted
Explain how the soil system would work without death. I'd be facinated to hear.
C
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arse
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GreyFace
Shipmate
# 4682
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by k-mann:
How do we «know» that death didn't come into the world because of a fall? I'm not a fundamentlist, and I believe that mankind may be old, but I still believe that Adam is a ral historical person.
In the Fall thread in Purgatory I gave what I think is a useful way of thinking about the causality of sin and death. I think sin did (and does) cause it, but not in the way you mean.
If you're asking how we know that death didn't come into the world because of a fall and you mean it in the cause-and-effect within the universe sense, then to disprove this, we have to identify the fall and then show that death existed before it.
If the fall was historical then I'd have to place it in the time period in which humans have existed - we are still assuming the Fall is a result of human sin? Fossil evidence shows dead animals from an age orders of magnitude greater than the age of homo sapiens as a species. Either this evidence is falsified (by its creator?), or the entire scientific community is mistaken as to its age.
This, if I'm not mistaken, is why ken and some others think Young Earth Creationism is actually a pretty nasty heresy - it accuses God of deliberately creating a fossil record which is basically a lie. (I know you've said you're not a YECcie but I think the basic argument here is useful)
I don't see things that way. I regard it as a mistake that leads some sections of Christianity to reject science on the grounds that it is opposed to religious truth, and, far more seriously, leads many scientifically trained people, such as any who've had a decent modern education, to reject Christianity on the grounds that it is opposed to scientific truth. Which is rubbish.
Posts: 5748 | From: North East England | Registered: Jul 2003
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GreyFace
Shipmate
# 4682
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Posted
Cheesy, has anyone ever told you you have an unhealthy fascination with dirt?
Posts: 5748 | From: North East England | Registered: Jul 2003
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mr cheesy
Shipmate
# 3330
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by GreyFace:
Cheesy, has anyone ever told you you have an unhealthy fascination with dirt?
Oh yes. Unfortunately it is the only thing I have studied in any depth. Har har.
C
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arse
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ChristinaMarie
Shipmate
# 1013
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by k-mann:
[Fixed UBB code]
I Adam isn't an historical person, the whole meaning of these verses fall apart:
K-mann,
What do you want?
Do you want to defend something?
Do you want the truth, even though it may mean abandoning what you thought to be true?
You see, if Adam and Eve didn't exist, then I couldn't give a damn about what Paul wrote about them. He was simply using the story he was brought up with for his arguments. We would need to reframe what he wrote, now we know he was using myth, without realising it was myth perhaps.
If Adam and Eve didn't exist, then anyone who insists they did, because the Bible says so, is defending an untruth. Get my point?
Others have commented about sin and death and have covered what I would say.
Christina
[Edited to fix UBB code]
[ 21. September 2004, 17:23: Message edited by: TonyK ]
Posts: 2333 | From: Oldham | Registered: Jul 2001
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Alan Cresswell
Mad Scientist 先生
# 31
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Anij on the Fall thread in Purg:
Why would God only set things in motion so many billion of years ago, it is illogical, If we were created for him, why would he wait for us to evolve.
Why do you find it illogical? And, why does it concern God (for whom a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years like a day) how long the process took? Surely you're not implying He was bored and lonely until we came on the scene?
quote:
HE IS GOD if he can create a sperm to impreganate Mary why can't he create the earth and the universe with all the layers done and sorted out. why would he bother wasting his time.
I'm not disputing that God could have created everything in 6 days about 6000 years ago, or indeed in a picosecond yesterday morning, with everything as we currently see it. The question is, did He do so? And, in answer to that question I see absolutely nothing in Scripture that compels me to accept that conclusion, and everything in me says I wouldn't like the sort of God who creates something that to all rational enquiry appears to be billions of years old when it isn't.
quote:
The complexities with which our bodies are made, the complexities of how our universe all fits together in virtual perfect harmony (in regards to running the show not necessarily our personal infighting that's part of sin) to think that all this could happen by a few accidental bits a pieces of chemicals flying around the place, it is mathematically impossible.
Unlikely, maybe, but not impossible. The mechanisms inherent in the universe are very powerful when it comes to sorting things out. Natural selection is a very powerful mechanism for sorting out variations that are better suited to the local environment.
quote:
If it were possible why can't we redevelop it in the lab.
Some of it we can redevelop in the lab. We have particle accelerators that can recreate conditions (in a very small scale) found in the early universe or stars. We observe evolution in bacteria all the time. We can compress sediments under high pressure and temperature and observe rocks being made. Many things are beyond our technical capability, that doesn't mean they are beyond natural processes.
quote:
I believe dinorsaurs existed and were living and breathing and also that humans were around at the same time, look at the book of Job.
Where in Job does it mention dinosaurs? Though you are right, dinosaurs are still around, I can see several flying around outside my window at this moment. We just tend to call them birds.
quote:
why is it such a hard leap of faith to believe that God did this in six days, yet we seem to have no problem believing that he sent his son to die for us and then to be raised from the dead.
Two reasons for me.
One, there is no evidence to contradict the resurrection (except the "dead men don't rise" which is a very weak argument - it's a miracle, d'uh). Whereas there is evidence all over the place that the earth is much older than 10000 years.
Second, the death and resurrection of Christ is an integral, vital part, of the Christian faith. If I couldn't accept that I wouldn't be a Christian and would probably not be here to debate with you. The mechanism God chose to create the heavens with the earth are not important.
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Don't cling to a mistake just because you spent a lot of time making it.
Posts: 32413 | From: East Kilbride (Scotland) or 福島 | Registered: May 2001
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mr cheesy
Shipmate
# 3330
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Posted
Surely the main point is that if the world really is only 6,000 years old then God has a lot of explaining to do about why he made it to look several billion.
Sure, I believe God can do miracles. But there is a difference between miracles and deliberate deception IMO.
C
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arse
Posts: 10697 | Registered: Sep 2002
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Alan Cresswell
Mad Scientist 先生
# 31
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by sanc on the Fall thread:
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
So how old is Earth, Sanc, and how old is the universe? ... There are no discontinuities in the strata or biodiversity that allow for a global flood. And I believe in The Flood.
How old? Honestly I don't know. Who does? Big bang is just a theory. Just recently they made a discovery about galaxies being formed two billion years earlier.
When Newtonian physics was very successful in solving and predicting a lot of phenomena, scientists attempted to apply it to quantum and near light speed phenomena only to find it wanting. Isn't it fair to say that scientists might be making a wrong prescription to solve problems involving conditions near birth of the universe and cosmic expanse with our ill equipt present theories.
Physics has this doctrine that theories for them to be theories must be falsifiable, this means that they are only applicable to a certain limit. Like Newtonian mechanics being proved false when applied to quantum mechanics. So far Eintein general and special relativity hasn't been falsified yet. So shall we swallow hook and sinker that his theory is applicable to all cosmic phenomena? This would be pushing it too far.
<snip>
As to the Flood, there are evidences also pointing to its occurence, marine life fossils on high grouds and big volume of fossils of animals alienated from its habitat. I'm no specialist on this issue, but from what i read, there's a fair weight of evidence to Noah's Flood. As to the goeologic column, there is no column that is complete . Some columns have layers that are missing in others.
Now there seems to be a lot in here to respond to. Forgive me as I don't think I can do all of it (I copied all the sections of the post relevant to this thread if anyone else wants a go).
First, with reference to physical theories. I think you've misunderstood what is meant by "falsifiability" in relation to science. It doesn't mean that scientists expect theories to be false and just waiting to prove it. It means that the way to test just how good a theory is is to produce predictions that are open to experimental investigation - and that the design of those experiments should be such that if the theory is wrong then the experiment fails. So, as an example, when Einstein proposed his General Theory of Relativity this competed with the existing Newtonian theory. An experiment was needed to decide between them. Now, both theories made predictions about objects attracting each other - you can make as many measurements of apples falling out of trees as you like and you couldn't prove either theory wrong (and hence, the other more likely to be right). You could, however measure light from distant stars passing close to a massive object, such as our sun, and determine if it's path is bent - if it is bent then Newton was wrong. This was done during solar eclipses.
Second, re: the Flood. The existance of marine sediments on mountain tops is very adequately explained by plate tectonics and resulting geological processes over extended periods of time. No need for a Flood to explain them.
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Don't cling to a mistake just because you spent a lot of time making it.
Posts: 32413 | From: East Kilbride (Scotland) or 福島 | Registered: May 2001
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mr cheesy
Shipmate
# 3330
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Alan Cresswell:
quote:
Originally posted by sanc on the Fall thread:
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
So how old is Earth, Sanc, and how old is the universe? ... There are no discontinuities in the strata or biodiversity that allow for a global flood. And I believe in The Flood.
<snip>
As to the Flood, there are evidences also pointing to its occurence, marine life fossils on high grouds and big volume of fossils of animals alienated from its habitat. I'm no specialist on this issue, but from what i read, there's a fair weight of evidence to Noah's Flood. As to the goeologic column, there is no column that is complete . Some columns have layers that are missing in others.
<snip>
Second, re: the Flood. The existance of marine sediments on mountain tops is very adequately explained by plate tectonics and resulting geological processes over extended periods of time. No need for a Flood to explain them.
Hmm. Well the problem, Sanc, is that these are very sweeping statements. First, there are no complete geological columns, quite true. But geology is a hard subject and the answers are not obvious. Columns are produced from taking the wide view of very large areas. Now, there happen to be some places in the world where it is possible to piece together which rocks are oldest (ie lie near the bottom) and which are youngest (ie nearer the top). One of these places happens to be the UK where we have rock from all of the geological periods. Of course, in no one place do you find all of them, but given that things like erosion will be going on all the time, this is hardly surprising. Now, you can say that missing rock is evidence of a failure in the theory, or you can say it is evidence that the whole story is more complicated than it first appears. Personally, having skeptically and critically studied the evidence in the field, I can say that although there may be areas in geology that a ruthless person could pick holes in, this isn't one of them. And frankly, only someone who has studied little or no geology would even suggest such a thing.
I'm afraid that if there was a global flood event, we would expect quite different rock formations than the ones we have. Sea animals on the top of mountains, unfortunately, is not evidence. I have already aluded to the fact that it would require completely different conditions that we observe today to have the amount of limestone laid down.
The unfortunate thing is that people latch onto other people who appear to be supporting their own theological position without ever critically examining the evidence or the person making such assertions.
What is not appreciated is that 1) geological theory was formulated largely from empircal evidence measured in the field, against the common understanding of the time (and therefore needed very strong evidence indeed) and 2) had nothing whatsoever to do with the development of evolutionary theory. To reject the theory without studying the evidence is to spit in the eye of the men who followed where their instincts led them and wrote down what they saw.
C
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arse
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Karl: Liberal Backslider
Shipmate
# 76
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Posted
And the "geological column not found complete in situ anywhere" thing is one of the lies professional creationists tell their credulous followers, alas.
This is not unusual. The likes of ICR and AiG who say this stuff wouldn't know truth if it wore a badge marked "I am truth", and bit them on the arse whilst saying "I am truth, I am truth", and have pretty much the same relationship with integrity.
Posts: 17938 | From: Chesterfield | Registered: May 2001
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