Evolution is BULLSHIT

[alrai]

BECAUSE:

1. The fact that almost all known animal phyla suddenly emerged in the Cambrian period (about 500 million years ago) is strong evidence against evolutionist claims in this regard. Furthermore, those creatures which suddenly emerged possessed complex bodily structures, not simple ones-the exact opposite of the evolutionist assumption (i.e . Trilobites' very advanced eyes possessed a multi-lens system. That system is exactly the same as that found in many creatures today, such as spiders, bees, and flies).

2. SOME creatures undergo physical changes to allow them to survive and adapt to different natural conditions at different times. This process is known as metamorphosis. People with insufficient knowledge of biology and evolutionist claims also sometimes try to portray the process as evidence for the theory of evolution.It is not chance that brings metamorphosis about, but genetic data which are built-in in the creature from the moment it is born.

3. To claim that DNA and all the information within it came about by chance events and natural causes reflects either total ignorance of the subject or materialist dogmatism. The idea that a molecule such as DNA, with all the magnificent information and complex structure it contains, could be the product of chance is not even worth taking seriously.

4. A 3.6-million-year-old human footprints found in Laetoli, Tanzania. A 2.3 million-year-old modern human jaw found in the Hadar region of Ethiopia. The 1.6 million-year-old and most perfect human fossils is KNM-WT 1500, also known as the "Turkana Child" skeleton. For instance, by saying, "We appear suddenly in the fossil record" the evolutionist paleontologists C. A. Villie, E. P. Solomon and P. W. Davis admit that man emerged all of a sudden. No found missing link.

5. Darwin was well aware that his theory faced lots of problems. He confessed these in his book in the chapter "Difficulties on Theory". Research this chapter and you will find that almost all difficulties still remain today. Darwin, who wrote: "If it could be demonstrated that any complex organ existed, which could not possibly have been formed by numerous, successive, slight modifications, my theory would absolutely break down. The human eye does not function unless it exists with all its components intact.


Evolution is kept alive not because it has a scientific worth but because it is an ideological obligation.

Please feel free to add ANYTHING (relevant of-course)

- - - - -​

Spoiler

Admin Note:
This user has since modified their position on this issue, please read the following post before responding.

This is the TRUTH that I have come to realize.

-I admit that some of my argument failed, and often were poorly researched.

-I agree that evolution explains changes in DNA and adaption to environments.

-I know that I don't have the answers to many opposed questions.

-I learnt that evolution deserves all the respect its given.

-I will dedicate more time and effort to understanding this topic. I've been reading over this thread and checking references; I found that people like ApostateAbe, Vrecknidj, Agent intellect, Spaceyeti are very convincing.

 

[dark]

What I am seeing is that, evolution is bullshit because everything just MAGICALLY appeared without traces leading up to it. What is your alternative?

 

[Joz_helloworld]

Evolution is the best theory we have to explain the earth's history. It makes pretty good sense. There is excellent evidence supporting it, although there are still particular areas which evidence has not been found.

The alternative is interesting. I think alien life is pretty likely, so the idea that alien life came here on meteors or whatever is not far fetched, but evolution can certainly explain more recent history, where evidence is easier to find, and overall i think earths life formed on earth, as there is no strong evidence for the alien theory.

 

[thoumyvision]

Spoiler

BECAUSE:

1. The fact that almost all known animal phyla suddenly emerged in the Cambrian period (about 500 million years ago) is strong evidence against evolutionist claims in this regard. Furthermore, those creatures which suddenly emerged possessed complex bodily structures, not simple ones-the exact opposite of the evolutionist assumption (i.e . Trilobites' very advanced eyes possessed a multi-lens system. That system is exactly the same as that found in many creatures today, such as spiders, bees, and flies).

2. SOME creatures undergo physical changes to allow them to survive and adapt to different natural conditions at different times. This process is known as metamorphosis. People with insufficient knowledge of biology and evolutionist claims also sometimes try to portray the process as evidence for the theory of evolution.It is not chance that brings metamorphosis about, but genetic data which are built-in in the creature from the moment it is born.

3. To claim that DNA and all the information within it came about by chance events and natural causes reflects either total ignorance of the subject or materialist dogmatism. The idea that a molecule such as DNA, with all the magnificent information and complex structure it contains, could be the product of chance is not even worth taking seriously.

4. A 3.6-million-year-old human footprints found in Laetoli, Tanzania. A 2.3 million-year-old modern human jaw found in the Hadar region of Ethiopia. The 1.6 million-year-old and most perfect human fossils is KNM-WT 1500, also known as the "Turkana Child" skeleton. For instance, by saying, "We appear suddenly in the fossil record" the evolutionist paleontologists C. A. Villie, E. P. Solomon and P. W. Davis admit that man emerged all of a sudden. No found missing link.

5. Darwin was well aware that his theory faced lots of problems. He confessed these in his book in the chapter "Difficulties on Theory". Research this chapter and you will find that almost all difficulties still remain today. Darwin, who wrote: "If it could be demonstrated that any complex organ existed, which could not possibly have been formed by numerous, successive, slight modifications, my theory would absolutely break down. The human eye does not function unless it exists with all its components intact.


Evolution is kept alive not because it has a scientific worth but because it is an ideological obligation.

Please feel free to add ANYTHING (relevant of-course)

1. References?

2. Just because we only have part of the picture doesn't mean there isn't a whole one. "But the theory of evolution does not predict nor should it be reasonably expected that all gaps will be filled. History is imperfectly preserved. It does predict that gaps will be filled over time – that as we gather new information, like pieces to a puzzle, they will fit into an evolutionary pattern. So far all the evidence fits exquisitely into an evolutionary pattern."

3. Any ideas about evolution being an unguided and random process springs from a materialistic worldview and is added to the theory of evolution by those whose worldview allows no other option. The fact that some people do so is not an argument against the possiblity that humans and other creatures evolved; in fact there is very good evidence to say that they did.

 

[Causeless]

Smells like INTP trap.

 

[Agent Intellect]

1. The fact that almost all known animal phyla suddenly emerged in the Cambrian period (about 500 million years ago) is strong evidence against evolutionist claims in this regard. Furthermore, those creatures which suddenly emerged possessed complex bodily structures, not simple ones-the exact opposite of the evolutionist assumption (i.e . Trilobites' very advanced eyes possessed a multi-lens system. That system is exactly the same as that found in many creatures today, such as spiders, bees, and flies).

The Cambrian radiation likely occurred because of the emergence of HOX genes (amongst other environmental influences).

2. SOME creatures undergo physical changes to allow them to survive and adapt to different natural conditions at different times. This process is known as metamorphosis. People with insufficient knowledge of biology and evolutionist claims also sometimes try to portray the process as evidence for the theory of evolution.It is not chance that brings metamorphosis about, but genetic data which are built-in in the creature from the moment it is born.

I'm not sure how this is evidence against evolution.

3. To claim that DNA and all the information within it came about by chance events and natural causes reflects either total ignorance of the subject or materialist dogmatism. The idea that a molecule such as DNA, with all the magnificent information and complex structure it contains, could be the product of chance is not even worth taking seriously.

This is a judgement call based on your own sensibilities about the magnificence of DNA and whether it seems sensible that it could arise naturally. It's been shown that RNA isomers (precursors to RNA) can abiotically assemble and evolve into current genetic polymers. And this is supposing that RNA (and RNA ribozymes) were the precursors to life - there are other hypotheses that don't require this. The point being, the chemicals used in life on earth can be synthesized by naturally occurring chemical reactions (1) (2) (3)

4. A 3.6-million-year-old human footprints found in Laetoli, Tanzania. A 2.3 million-year-old modern human jaw found in the Hadar region of Ethiopia. The 1.6 million-year-old and most perfect human fossils is KNM-WT 1500, also known as the "Turkana Child" skeleton. For instance, by saying, "We appear suddenly in the fossil record" the evolutionist paleontologists C. A. Villie, E. P. Solomon and P. W. Davis admit that man emerged all of a sudden. No found missing link.

It looks like you copy-pasted a lot of this directly from Darwinism Refuted. What's interesting is that what you've put up here is, in the scientific literature, used as support for human evolution (1) (2) (3). It's interesting how Darwinism Refuted has twisted it to fit it's own agenda - did you even check the sources on that site?

5. Darwin was well aware that his theory faced lots of problems. He confessed these in his book in the chapter "Difficulties on Theory". Research this chapter and you will find that almost all difficulties still remain today.

I'll go through Darwin's problems, as presented in "The Origin of Species," one at a time:

"Firstly, why, if species have descended from other species by insensibly fine gradations, do we not everywhere see innumerable transitional forms? Why is not all nature in confusion instead of the species being, as we see them, well defined?"

Answer: we do see transitional fossils all over the place (1) (2) (3) (4) (5).

"Secondly, is it possible that an animal having, for instance, the structure and habits of a bat, could have been formed by the modification of some animal with wholly different habits? Can we believe that natural selection could produce, on the one hand, organs of trifling importance, such as the tail of a giraffe, which serves as a fly-flapper, and, on the other hand, organs of such wonderful structure, as the eye, of which we hardly as yet fully understand the inimitable perfection?"

Answer: they're called vestigial organs (1) (2). It's actually good evidence that evolution does occur.

"Thirdly, can instincts be acquired and modified through natural selection? What shall we say to so marvellous an instinct as that which leads the bee to make cells, which have practically anticipated the discoveries of profound mathematicians?"

Answer: evolutionary psychology helps to explain this, and evolutionary algorithms depend on this sort of behavior emerging - it's a natural phenomena that modern scientists have begun to utilize for our own engineering purposes.

"Fourthly, how can we account for species, when crossed, being sterile and producing sterile offspring, whereas, when varieties are crossed, their fertility is unimpaired?"

This has to do with structural differences in chromosomes, meiotic discrepancies (in number of chromosomes, or during crossing over and random alignment etc), major histocompatibility complexes on the gametes not allowing fertilization to occur, embryonic development being unable to differentiate properly and so on all of which were unknown in Darwin's time. This is a problem that has been successfully answered in our own time.

Darwin, who wrote: "If it could be demonstrated that any complex organ existed, which could not possibly have been formed by numerous, successive, slight modifications, my theory would absolutely break down. The human eye does not function unless it exists with all its components intact.

Irreducible complexity is an argument against evolution that has been thoroughly debunked. I recommend this video:

Spoiler

Ken Miller on Intelligent Design - YouTube

Evolution is kept alive not because it has a scientific worth but because it is an ideological obligation.

You have not provided any evidence for an alternative theory, much less evidence with as much support as the evidence for evolution has. Your claims are baseless, hackneyed arguments that were not well researched, just copied and regurgitated onto this forum with a self-satisfied air of authority.

 

[SpaceYeti]

I haven't begun reading your post yet, but I don't suspect it's anything I haven't heard before. However, I'm also curious if you put this here just to stir the pot, or if you actually think it's the case. If you think it's the case, I'd suggest getting a basic education in biology, because almost every argument against the theory of evolution is based on ignorance and lies. Let's see if you've brought anything new to the table...

1. The fact that almost all known animal phyla suddenly emerged in the Cambrian period (about 500 million years ago) is strong evidence against evolutionist claims in this regard. Furthermore, those creatures which suddenly emerged possessed complex bodily structures, not simple ones-the exact opposite of the evolutionist assumption (i.e . Trilobites' very advanced eyes possessed a multi-lens system. That system is exactly the same as that found in many creatures today, such as spiders, bees, and flies).

A big paragraph of false. Firstly, the Cambrian Explosion took place over two hundred million years. That's hardly "sudden". It's simply when multicellular life became dominant and diverse. And what else would you expect multicellular life to do after it first develops? Bide it's time? This is hardly evidence "against" evolution. How would it be?

And complete body structures... dur. If it's body were incomplete, it would fail to remain alive at all. I can already tell you don't know jack shit about evolution if this is your argument. Do you really suspect evolution claims life was at some composed of only pieces of creatures floating around the sea? No, only full fledged creatures with all of their parts could possibly reproduce and have further generations, thereby evolving.

And, no, the eyes of trilobites, are not exactly like the eyes of today. They operate with the same principals, and they were good at what they did, but modern eyes are more advanced. But even if this claim were true... so? A good mutation would naturally go away, or something? That's not how evolution works. That's contrary to how evolution works.

2. SOME creatures undergo physical changes to allow them to survive and adapt to different natural conditions at different times. This process is known as metamorphosis. People with insufficient knowledge of biology and evolutionist claims also sometimes try to portray the process as evidence for the theory of evolution.It is not chance that brings metamorphosis about, but genetic data which are built-in in the creature from the moment it is born.

... Which is the result of evolving that way.

3. To claim that DNA and all the information within it came about by chance events and natural causes reflects either total ignorance of the subject or materialist dogmatism. The idea that a molecule such as DNA, with all the magnificent information and complex structure it contains, could be the product of chance is not even worth taking seriously.

Perhaps if you have preconceived notions you'd rather not lose to reason, sure. However, I would like to point out that the theory of evolution specifically, does not apply to any situation wherein there is not already life (and thereby DNA or RNA). Evolution has nothing to do with the theory of abiogenesis or cosmology or thermodynamics or any other theory which e3xplains a specific set of things, just like I don't read mystery novels when I want to read some fantasy. They're different subjects.

4. A 3.6-million-year-old human footprints found in Laetoli, Tanzania. A 2.3 million-year-old modern human jaw found in the Hadar region of Ethiopia. The 1.6 million-year-old and most perfect human fossils is KNM-WT 1500, also known as the "Turkana Child" skeleton. For instance, by saying, "We appear suddenly in the fossil record" the evolutionist paleontologists C. A. Villie, E. P. Solomon and P. W. Davis admit that man emerged all of a sudden. No found missing link.

You're going to have to provide links to your sources, or I'm simply going to assume you're referencing hoaxes, as many creationists love doing, years or decades after investigation has exposed them.

5. Darwin was well aware that his theory faced lots of problems. He confessed these in his book in the chapter "Difficulties on Theory". Research this chapter and you will find that almost all difficulties still remain today. Darwin, who wrote: "If it could be demonstrated that any complex organ existed, which could not possibly have been formed by numerous, successive, slight modifications, my theory would absolutely break down. The human eye does not function unless it exists with all its components intact.

I suggest you read his book, as he goes on to explain how the eye might have fortmed in the very next paragraph! Incidentally, he was correct.

You have proven to be ignorant on this subject, your arguments being sophomoric at best, and re-hashed versions of already debunked Creationist arguments/propaganda at worst. In fact, your attempt is so bad, I don't really believe that you're making an argument for Creationism so much as you are stirring the ant hill out of boredom. You're either not real, or you're amung the most ignorant people I've ever encountered (within context).

Evolution is kept alive not because it has a scientific worth but because it is an ideological obligation.

Yeah, just the other day I was having a discussion with a few scientists about how their overlord, Richard Dawkins, would send assassins after them if they let their tongues slip on the subject of the over-arching Evolution Conspiracy being funded by the Illuminati. I haven't seen them since, and I now fear for my life for their having shared their knowledge of The Conspiracy with me. The conspiracy that almost every scientist in the world is in on.

Please feel free to add ANYTHING (relevant of-course)

Feel free to become educated. Go to school, perhaps.

 

[SkyWalker]

missing gaps in human evolution could be due to entire cultures being burned down to the last trace ON PURPOSE. didn't we kill off most of the native americans and burn down most of their artifacts? We even crushed the bones of their skeletons, so nothing would remain, get it?

human nature? or just nature? maybe nature itself has tendencies like this as well, to completely eradicate certain branches of its diversity including every proof of it. so afterwards these are missing gaps.

 

[Artsu Tharaz]

missing gaps in human evolution could be due to entire cultures being burned down to the last trace ON PURPOSE. didn't we kill off most of the native americans and burn down most of their artifacts? We even crushed the bones of their skeletons, so nothing would remain, get it?

human nature? or just nature? maybe nature itself has tendencies like this as well, to completely eradicate certain branches of its diversity including every proof of it. so afterwards these are missing gaps.

Why would this be the case?

Because the mutation of an organism which destroys similar organisms which do not have this mutation are those which end up dominating.

This is why the dominant culture hates any different thought - a culture only comes to dominate in the first place when it has this tendency to destroy anything which does not fit it.

The new example is science. Anything which does not fit a strict set of rules is rejected. It is a very effective meme, which affects not only culture, but our world as a whole.

(whoa, just de ja vu'ed)

 

[SpaceYeti]

missing gaps in human evolution

Are fewer than the gaps in the evolution of whales. Any time you find a species that meets the criteria of being intermediate between humans and their ancestors, now we need to find something to go in between that new one and humans. They move the goal-posts. Just ignore these claims, there's more than enough fossilized protohumans to narrate our evolution, they simply ignore it.

 

[EditorOne]

I hope the original post was a mere polemic. Enthusiastic ignorance like that is discouraging if sincere.

 

[alrai]

To be honest I expected that many of use will defend the idea aggressively for the sole purpose of supporting an ideology. And I couldn't give a shit about an 'air of authority' (@ Agent intellect). And my argument isn't based on Darwinism refuted, although that may possibly overlap with some articles I've read.

Firstly, My problem with Darwin's concept is; that the evolution theory claims that living things came into being spontaneously as the result of CHANCE (or Dark would say 'MAGICALLY').

so the idea that alien life came here on meteors or whatever is not far fetched

It is not possible for meteors to carry a living organism to Earth because of the intense heat generated when they enter the atmosphere.


1.Your Article on HOX Genes is lengthy and provides no real evidence to defeat my argument. My argument is clear; the categories below the phyla possess basically similar body plans, but the phyla are very different from one another.

So how did these differences come about?

2. Its not. But I thought it was interesting as its logical and based on common sense, and i have heard it put forward as evidence for evolution on some occasions.

3. What chemical reactions??? There is enough information in the DNA of a SINGLE human cell to fill an encyclopedia of one million pages, and individual consist of some 100 trillion cells. The foundation of your claim is "chance," but chance cannot create information.

4. That is evidence because the fossil is calculated at 2.3 million years, which is much earlier than the age accepted. Basically, the fossils discovered show that the first human beings suddenly appeared on the Earth, with no "apelike ancestor."

5. Archaeopteryx is assumed to be a transitional form that branched off from its dinosaur ancestors and started to fly for the first time (that you have linked).
This is absolutely not a transitional form, but an extinct species of bird, having some insignificant differences from modern birds.The thesis that Archaeopteryx was a "half-bird" that could not fly perfectly was popular among evolutionist circles until not long ago( reason for collapse was the breastbone found in 1992).

You can Google all my claims.

WHEN forced into a corner, some people who support the theory of evolution resort to the claim "Even if scientific discoveries do not confirm the theory of evolution today, such developments will take place in the future."
To me, that is Cheap Nonsense.

 

[ApostateAbe]

For speed and efficiency, I will provide links to "An Index to Creationist Claims" for many points rather than writing responses to each point. I am not trying to be a dick or anything. I love talking about this subject, and I would love to get into this stuff more if there is any specific thing you would like to focus on.

BECAUSE:

1. The fact that almost all known animal phyla suddenly emerged in the Cambrian period (about 500 million years ago) is strong evidence against evolutionist claims in this regard. Furthermore, those creatures which suddenly emerged possessed complex bodily structures, not simple ones-the exact opposite of the evolutionist assumption (i.e . Trilobites' very advanced eyes possessed a multi-lens system. That system is exactly the same as that found in many creatures today, such as spiders, bees, and flies).

http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CC/CC300.html

2. SOME creatures undergo physical changes to allow them to survive and adapt to different natural conditions at different times. This process is known as metamorphosis. People with insufficient knowledge of biology and evolutionist claims also sometimes try to portray the process as evidence for the theory of evolution.It is not chance that brings metamorphosis about, but genetic data which are built-in in the creature from the moment it is born.

No disagreement.

3. To claim that DNA and all the information within it came about by chance events and natural causes reflects either total ignorance of the subject or materialist dogmatism. The idea that a molecule such as DNA, with all the magnificent information and complex structure it contains, could be the product of chance is not even worth taking seriously.

http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CB/CB010_2.html

4. A 3.6-million-year-old human footprints found in Laetoli, Tanzania.

http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CC/CC052.html

A 2.3 million-year-old modern human jaw found in the Hadar region of Ethiopia.

Don't know about this one, sorry.

The 1.6 million-year-old and most perfect human fossils is KNM-WT 1500, also known as the "Turkana Child" skeleton.

KNM-WT 15000:

Modern human:

Notice the differences in eyebrow ridge protrusion and snout protrusion.

For instance, by saying, "We appear suddenly in the fossil record" the evolutionist paleontologists C. A. Villie, E. P. Solomon and P. W. Davis admit that man emerged all of a sudden.

• (A) Pan troglodytes, chimpanzee, modern
• (B) Australopithecus africanus, STS 5, 2.6 My
• (C) Australopithecus africanus, STS 71, 2.5 My
• (D) Homo habilis, KNM-ER 1813, 1.9 My
• (E) Homo habilis, OH 24, 1.8 My
• (F) Homo rudolfensis, KNM-ER 1470, 1.8 My
• (G) Homo erectus, Dmanisi cranium D2700, 1.75 My
• (H) Homo ergaster (early H. erectus), KNM-ER 3733, 1.75 My
• (I) Homo heidelbergensis, "Kabwe 1," 300,000 - 125,000 y
• (J) Homo sapiens neanderthalensis, La Ferrassie 1, 70,000 y
• (K) Homo sapiens neanderthalensis, La Chappelle-aux-Saints, 60,000 y
• (L) Homo sapiens neanderthalensis, Le Moustier, 45,000 y
• (M) Homo sapiens sapiens, Cro-Magnon I, 30,000 y
• (N) Homo sapiens sapiens, modern

No found missing link.

lulz

5. Darwin was well aware that his theory faced lots of problems. He confessed these in his book in the chapter "Difficulties on Theory". Research this chapter and you will find that almost all difficulties still remain today. Darwin, who wrote: "If it could be demonstrated that any complex organ existed, which could not possibly have been formed by numerous, successive, slight modifications, my theory would absolutely break down. The human eye does not function unless it exists with all its components intact.

http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CA/CA113_1.html

Evolution is kept alive not because it has a scientific worth but because it is an ideological obligation.

Maybe so, but I think we need to take the best explanations for the evidence seriously, regardless of ideological obligations.

Please feel free to add ANYTHING (relevant of-course)

OK. So, how do you explain how all of life on Earth seems to be roughly organized in a single family-tree-like pattern?

 

[Agent Intellect]

To be honest I expected that many of use will defend the idea aggressively for the sole purpose of supporting an ideology.

Just because you don't accept the evidence doesn't mean it both doesn't exist and is well known to plenty of other people.

And I couldn't give a shit about an 'air of authority' (@ Agent intellect). And my argument isn't based on Darwinism refuted, although that may possibly overlap with some articles I've read.

Maybe you didn't get it from that particular site, but the point is, all you are doing is regurgitating the usual anti-evolution talking points, which have been shown to be, as SpaceYeti said, based on nothing but ignorance and lies time and again. The only "evidence" you have provided for your claims is that they agree with your own sensibilities about how the world should work.

Firstly, My problem with Darwin's concept is; that the evolution theory claims that living things came into being spontaneously as the result of CHANCE (or Dark would say 'MAGICALLY').

Once again, aside from how it doesn't fit in with your own sensibilities about how the world should work, how is this evidence for some alternative theory to evolution?

It is not possible for meteors to carry a living organism to Earth because of the intense heat generated when they enter the atmosphere.

Not that I agree with panspermia, but your claim is simply not true. First, the hypothesis of panspermia doesn't state that life came down on meteors, but that the ingredients of life did. Second, organisms can survive those types of extreme conditions.

1.Your Article on HOX Genes is lengthy and provides no real evidence to defeat my argument. My argument is clear; the categories below the phyla possess basically similar body plans, but the phyla are very different from one another.

So how did these differences come about?

You either didn't read the article, or you didn't understand it. I suggest reading up on HOX genes.

2. Its not. But I thought it was interesting as its logical based on common sense, and i have heard it put forward as evidence for evolution on some occasions.

I agree, it is not evidence of evolution, but it is not incongruent with the theory of evolution.

3. What chemical reactions??? There is enough information in the DNA of a SINGLE human cell to fill an encyclopedia of one million pages., and individual consist of some 100 trillion cells. The foundation of your claim is "chance," but chance cannot create information.

Chance did not create the information, evolution brought about genetic complexity from simple origins (1) (2) (3) (4). Nowhere did I claim that human genomes self organized from chemical reactions - the proto-genome that evolved into our modern genomes could relatively easily have come about by such chemical reactions (see links in my previous post).

4. That is evidence because the fossil is calculated at 2.3 million years, which is much earlier than the age accepted. Basically, the fossils discovered show that the first human beings suddenly appeared on the Earth, with no "apelike ancestor."

That is absolutely not what the fossils you referred to show. See the links in my previous post.

5. Archaeopteryx is assumed to be a transitional form that branched off from its dinosaur ancestors and started to fly for the first time (that you have linked).
This is absolutely not a transitional form, but an extinct species of bird, having some insignificant differences from modern birds.The thesis that Archaeopteryx was a "half-bird" that could not fly perfectly was popular among evolutionist circles until not long ago( reason for collapse was the breastbone found in 1992).

This is either because their are two distinct species (Aarchaeopteryx bavarica and Archaeopteryx lithographica) or because the sternum was not preserved on some specimens of Archaeopteryx lithographica. Either way, your assessment that they were birds with "some insignificant differences from modern birds" either comes from more regurgitated creationist propaganda or from a gross misunderstanding of comparative anatomy (1).

But, even if your arguments were valid (which they are not), there are mountains of other transitional fossils other than Archaeopteryx (see links in my previous post).

You can Google all my claims.

I did. And Darwinism Refuted came up for almost every one of them (along with other sites regurgitating the same tired ignorant claims and baseless assertions).

WHEN forced into a corner, some people who support the theory of evolution resort to the claim "Even if scientific discoveries do not confirm the theory of evolution today, such developments will take place in the future."
To me, that is Cheap Nonsense.

It is cheap, I agree. But even cheaper is to fill the gaps with even more untestable and baseless claims about intelligent design. Of course, I'm not accusing you of this, since you have yet to propose a better theory that takes all known fossil phylogeny and homology and geological dating evidence, comparative physiological and anatomical evidence, genetic phylogeny and homology evidence, the universality of the genetic code, molecular homology and parsimony corroborating fossil evidence, evidence from atavisms and vestigiality, biogeographical dispersion and continental drift agreeing with known phylogeny, symbiotic co-evolutionary dependence, known mutation rates in the genome, and abiotic organic chemistry evidence into account, while also explaining numerous laboratory observations and genetic experiments while also logically demonstrating why Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium is necessarily maintained despite all evidence and statistical analysis to the contrary.

 

[dark]

I keep seeing "Nothing this complex can happen by CHANCE!"

To refute that, in physics we know everything has a natural state of entropy. All things will become chaos, there is no order in the nature of things at its base. So with all this chaos, when some force, lets say as weak as gravity can gather these particles all in entropy and they start to form together. Depending on the conditions many possibilities can happen from this random assortment of "things," out of chance, something was made, mostly because very easily, if one particle had been absent or maybe doubled, it could have very well became another possibility.

When everything is in entropy, all you have is chance, you wait, and eventually things will occur from all of this. So we know that all the things that make life exist within chemicals that are readily available, so imagine a mass amount of things just randomly being tossed around, eventually after billions of years it is going to happen, the right chemicals will bond, given enough time, any random chance will happen. So from there, all things will just continue to create an ordered structure, entropy will be lessened as things are created as such, but that is how things happen. Entropy happens when left alone, and since all kinds of forces will be happening, things will be created.

 

[SpaceYeti]

Firstly, My problem with Darwin's concept is; that the evolution theory claims that living things came into being spontaneously as the result of CHANCE (or Dark would say 'MAGICALLY').

If that's your problem, then have no fear! That's not what the theory of evolution states at all! It doesn't state anything about the origins of life! That's not part of the theory, just like the kitchen is not part of the bathroom! You may dislike abiogenesis a bit, though. It doesn't say anything about "spontaneously generated life", nor does it say anything about magic, so I doubt we'll have any trouble there, either.

I'm glad we could solve this issue for you!

 

[alrai]

Just because you don't accept the evidence doesn't mean it both doesn't exist and is well known to plenty of other people.

You are stating the obvious. And I do not follow other people.

Maybe you didn't get it from that particular site, but the point is, all you are doing is regurgitating the usual anti-evolution talking points, which have been shown to be, as SpaceYeti said, based on nothing but ignorance and lies time and again. The only "evidence" you have provided for your claims is that they agree with your own sensibilities about how the world should work.

Once again, aside from how it doesn't fit in with your own sensibilities about how the world should work, how is this evidence for some alternative theory to evolution?

You are also regurgitating. I never claimed a discovery, but rather a perspective.
I don't have an alternative theory. But to me, evolution is as big a leap of faith as creation. I don't believe in anything. I simply seek the TRUTH.
Also, space-yeti comes across as a bit narrow minded for an INTP, and has contributed more Insults than Information. AND @spaceyeti, I'm aware that when Darwin put forward his theory, he never mentioned HOW the origin of life.

Not that I agree with panspermia, but your claim is simply not true. First, the hypothesis of panspermia doesn't state that life came down on meteors, but that the ingredients of life did. Second, organisms can survive those types of extreme conditions

If you maintain such an idea, you need to be able to explain why such a process is not happening now?Also, they will not survive the violence of impact when they land, neither life..or seeds of life. The subject just consists of the speculation that "it could have happened.

Chance did not create the information, evolution brought about genetic complexity from simple origins (1) (2) (3) (4). Nowhere did I claim that human genomes self organized from chemical reactions - the proto-genome that evolved into our modern genomes could relatively easily have come about by such chemical reactions (see links in my previous post).

This claim is backed up by no known physical or chemical law. On the contrary, the laws of physics and chemistry show that time has a disorganizing and destructive effect, not an "organising" one (i.e the Second Law of Thermodynamics).

This is either because their are two distinct species (Aarchaeopteryx bavarica and Archaeopteryx lithographica) or because the sternum was not preserved on some specimens of Archaeopteryx lithographica. Either way, your assessment that they were birds with "some insignificant differences from modern birds" either comes from more regurgitated creationist propaganda or from a gross misunderstanding of comparative anatomy (1).

But, even if your arguments were valid (which they are not), there are mountains of other transitional fossils other than Archaeopteryx (see links in my previous post).

The idea that 'dinosaurs grew wings while trying to catch flies' is no joke, yet isn't it funny?! I used that example because birds possess that magnificent organ, the wing, and their structural wonders, their function also inspires amazement.

The theory of evolution maintains that the ancestors of birds were dinosaurs. This is justified by the arboreal theory(turned into birds by taking to the air from the ground) and the cursorial theory(dinosaurs that lived in the branches of trees turned into birds by trying to jump from one branch to another), both i cant take seriously.

Regarding the Archaeopteryx, I chose that "transitional fossil" specifically because its the so-called ancestor of modern birds according to evolutionist. The missing sternum was the supporting evidence for the bird not been able to fly properly, but the seventh Archaeopteryx fossil, which was found in 1992, disproved this argument.[http://antidarwinistteam.wordpress.com/2007/07/21/arc/]

Finally, I'm not an enemy of evolutionary biology. I just don't think that the evidence supports the view that all biological complexity arose by the process of random variation (and natural selection). And, I'm not an expert. My questions shouldn't present much of a challenge to you.

 

[Roran]

You see, this is why you don't argue with someone who is unwilling to change their position.

 

[ApostateAbe]

You see, this is why you don't argue with someone who is unwilling to change their position.

What reason is that?

 

[Roran]

You make a point, he makes a counterpoint. You counter that, and boom, another point. There is no end to this short of someone giving up, which I do not see happening.

 

[ApostateAbe]

You make a point, he makes a counterpoint. You counter that, and boom, another point. There is no end to this short of someone giving up, which I do not see happening.

Yeah, it is very common to think that there is no point in arguing if nobody changes their respective positions. But, I think that arguing about this stuff is the best way to learn the topics--more educational than reading books or watching documentaries or taking classes--because it causes the knowledge to stick. Any argument is mutually beneficial, regardless of who does or does not forfeit. Even if it is all about the goal of changing someone else's position, it is not something that you would expect to see drastically and immediately. Such changes almost always happen gradually--someone gets wailed in a debate, doesn't change his or her explicit position, but with each successive debate has more doubt about it than before, and becomes less likely to evangelize it. I think that explains why evolutionists are far more likely than creationists to win political fights, even when evolutionists are in the minority. When members of a local school board threaten to remove evolution from the curriculum, the voters tend to kick them to the curb, even in strongly conservative districts with creationist majorities. Evolutionists win the debates far more often, and they have far more zealous passion about the issues because of that. Creationists, despite what you may expect, have considerably less confidence in their own ability to defend their own positions.

 

[Roran]

*nods* Makes sense.

 

[Don't mind me]

This claim is backed up by no known physical or chemical law. On the contrary, the laws of physics and chemistry show that time has a disorganizing and destructive effect, not an "organising" one (i.e the Second Law of Thermodynamics).

1. Things that are stable continue to exist over time
2. A is stable
Conclusion: A continues to exist over time

You know, "survival of the fittest" is just a special case of this.



1a. Traits are passed on through reproduction (If and only if R, then P)
2a. Some traits suffice for reproduction (t -> R)
Conclusion: Some traits are passed on (t -> P)

1b. Traits are passed on through reproduction (If and only if R, then P)
2b. Some traits do not suffice for reproduction (t' -/> R)
Conclusion: Some traits are not passed on (t' -/> P)

The general foundation of evolution consists only of these syllogisms, doesn't it? I guess the "sufficient for reproduction" stuff needs to be changed to probabilistic conditions, though.

 

[alrai]

Yeah, it is very common to think that there is no point in arguing if nobody changes their respective positions. But, I think that arguing about this stuff is the best way to learn the topics--more educational than reading books or watching documentaries or taking classes--because it causes the knowledge to stick.

Very true. @Roran; I'm I just as interested in LEARNING and appreciating other opinions, but it's important to me that I'm fully satisfied with the answers.

 

[Oblivious]

Very true. @Roran; I'm I just as interested in LEARNING and appreciating other opinions, but it's important to me that I'm fully satisfied with the answers.

This is really obvious from the thread title.

 

[alrai]

Lol I jus thought it would be a bolder title

 

[dala]

Although the origins of life are not a part of the theory of evolution, I would like to address your points about chance. I agree with you that life, and advanced life in particular, is an extremely unlikely thing. The chances of just the right chemical reactions happening on a planet that is friendly to life are certainly slim to none. However, the probability of this happening on any given planet are immaterial, as long as it is physically possible.

This is because there are about 300 billion stars and 500 billion planets in the Milky Way galaxy, and about 100 billion galaxies altogether (that we are aware of). That adds up to about 500 trillion planets altogether. Even if the chances of life emerging on any given planet are one in a million, you will still end up with hundreds of thousands of life-supporting planets. You might say yes, but what are the chances that that would happen here, but the question is immaterial because you would be unable to ask the question if life wasn't here (attrition bias).

Never discount the distant outliers given a large enough sample size.

 

[Oblivious]

Lol I jus thought it would be a bolder title

Unfortunately, many of us here do not find this a laughing matter.

The fact that you come in here complaining about evolution instead of dark matter, multiverse theory, string theory, all of which have very valid arguments against them as opposed to evolution, flags you as a religious zealot.

Over here, when we find a religious zealot, we hang them up by the feet and tickle them.

I do not care that you have not brought up any alternative theory to evolution. The fact that you single out evolution out of every other theory out there, many of which are more deserving of scrutiny practically screams to us that you are simply another brainwashed creationist.

If you have trouble believing in God and your own morality if Evolution is true, please recognise that you are dealing with a false dichotomy. Evolution in no way encourages lawlessness and Bad Things. God and Evolution CAN coexist. Anyone who says otherwise is lying to you for their own benefit or has been lied to.

The way you view the world has to become more comprehensive. You cannot rely on just anyone's interpretation of a single book to dictate to you how you should live your life.

The reason why evolution is so heavily defended here is because the defence of evolution represents the defence of Free Thought. Any encroachment on Free Thought will be met with swift and fierce punishment. Why? Because it's all we have.

We do not hate religion. We hate the propensity religion has to destroy Free thought and reasonable discourse by the tendency its practitioners have to take its teachings literally and misinterpret them without question. It creates this destructive whirlwind of ignorance that has destroyed much of value in the histories.

I am not even telling you that you should believe the Theory of Evolution. You should be questioning of it, but you should also be questioning of everything else in your life.

I will not force my beliefs onto you. The only thing I expect from you is the same in kind. The next time you post a topic, make sure you keep this in mind.

 

[ApostateAbe]

I love this image. Awhile ago, I used it to produce an animated gif:

The Internet is like the easiest place to dispel the myth about the so-called missing links, which reflects the reason why evolutionists rule the Internet.

 

[Vrecknidj]

1) In most species, the individual members are not identical to one another.
2) In most species, the individual members tend to produce more offspring than the environment can support.
3) In most species, some individuals survive long enough to reproduce (and succeed in reproducing) because of some trait that they have that other members of their species lack.

Draw your own conclusions.

 

[Vrecknidj]

And, yes, in bull's shit, there is evidence of evolution.

 

[alrai]

@oblivion or oblivious; Nowhere have I stated any of your claims, your simply making an intuitive judgement that has no reality.

1. I never claimed evolution and God cannot coexist.
2. I have not based this on a particular book
3. I am not complaining. But you obviously are.
4. How does evolution represent free thought? Are you suggesting that before Charles Darwin people never had no freedom of thought. There are many great minds that never accepted evolution; including Albert Einstein, Cuvier Grover, Edwin Hubble,Max Planck etc.
5. I do question everything else
6. I am also not forcing my beliefs onto you, I simply hold a contrary opinion(for the time been)

Secondly, I couldn't give a shit about how anyone is treated in this forum.

I will say it again, I seek the TRUTH. Simple. If that offends anyone. I apologize.

 

[ApostateAbe]

@oblivion or oblivious; Nowhere have I stated any of your claims, your simply making an intuitive judgement that has no reality.

1. I never claimed evolution and God cannot coexist.
2. I have not based this on a particular book
3. I am not complaining. But you obviously are.
4. How does evolution represent free thought? Are you suggesting that before Charles Darwin people never had no freedom of thought. There are many great minds that never accepted evolution; including Albert Einstein, Cuvier Grover, Edwin Hubble,Max Planck etc.
5. I do question everything else
6. I am also not forcing my beliefs onto you, I simply hold a contrary opinion(for the time been)

Secondly, I couldn't give a shit about how anyone is treated in this forum. "I never lie because I don't fear anyone. You only lie when you're afraid".

I will say it again, I seek the TRUTH. Simple. If that offends anyone. I apologize.

I think you have a great attitude. We are all truth seekers, or at least we all know that we should try to be. Truth seekers know that they should leave emotions out of the discussion, but valuing the truth has the reverse effect and can inflame emotions in topics like this. The theory of evolution is probably the most emotionally-provocative topic of science, because, one way or the other, there are a helluva lot of lies all around and about it. If there was an ideological movement to discredit Einstein's theory of relativity, then it would be the same social dynamic--a helluva lot of lies that become myths, and the defenders of the theory are emotionally provoked into an us-vs.-them mentality.

On that note, you should be careful with your claims about who accepted the theory of evolution and who did not accept it. As far as I know, Albert Einstein did not say anything about the theory of evolution, but it would be highly-unlikely that he rejected it, given his known animosity toward theism.

 

[Oblivious]

You are offensive not because you are searching for the truth. Stop lying to us.

You are offensive because you are a liar and a hypocrite. Also because you are a moron.

You have just lied to us about Einstein, who never commented about Evolution: http://www.vuletic.com/hume/cefec/7-13.html

You are a hypocrite because you claim to want to learn, yet your combative tone suggests otherwise.

You are a moron just because.

Get out of this forum zealot. You will not find any converts here.

 

[scorpiomover]

I am not quite so sure that I would go so far as to say that evolution is BS. I might be inclined to say that it's not exactly as exacting a theory as I would prefer.

Perhaps if you have preconceived notions you'd rather not lose to reason, sure. However, I would like to point out that the theory of evolution specifically, does not apply to any situation wherein there is not already life (and thereby DNA or RNA). Evolution has nothing to do with the theory of abiogenesis or cosmology or thermodynamics or any other theory which e3xplains a specific set of things, just like I don't read mystery novels when I want to read some fantasy. They're different subjects.

If we are going to start explaining the past, by looking at what evidence that exists today, then what happened in the past, that might have an effect on that past, is going to be very relevant to how we understand that evidence. For instance, if the laws of thermodynamics do not allow the recombination of DNA sequences in such an order as to transform a fish into a mammal, then it would poke a very big hole in the theories of evolution. Just saying.

Yeah, just the other day I was having a discussion with a few scientists about how their overlord, Richard Dawkins, would send assassins after them if they let their tongues slip on the subject of the over-arching Evolution Conspiracy being funded by the Illuminati. I haven't seen them since, and I now fear for my life for their having shared their knowledge of The Conspiracy with me. The conspiracy that almost every scientist in the world is in on.

I would not be so quick to say such a thing.

A few examples:

I watched a biography on Edward Jenner a while back. At the time, a LOT of scientists were extremely opposed to his work. There was a serious possibility that his work would have been discredited, which would have been a shame, seeing that he managed to develop a vaccine against smallpox, and probably saved millions of lives, if not billions, over the last few hundred years. As a result, the British government banned the other types of research into smallpox vaccines other than Jenner. Today, it would be like banning any form of treatment for cervical cancer other than the HPV vaccine.

Then there was Nicholas Culpepper. He wrote the second-most widely-read book in Britain, after the Bible, and the most widely-read text on science, for the something like 300 years. He wasn't a scientist. He was an apothecary, a pharmacist. He wanted to write a book, detailing all the herbs that were used to treat ailments, like willow for a headache. However, at the time, the Royal College of Surgeons banned anyone from practising medicine, and had their own police force, to enforce it. Even to put on a basic dressing for a wound, that we would consider definitely doesn't need a doctor, would have gotten you fined, or even put into prison. There was a huge opposition from the medical community over his book's potential publication. The power that doctors had then, along with the clout they had with the king, meant that there was almost no way it would get published. Then the Plague of London hit. You'd think that the apothecaries would clear out, and the noble self-sacrificing doctors would stay to treat the sick. Other way round. The doctors left, to let everyone else die of plague. Apothecaries like Culpepper stayed, and treated the sick as best they could. As a result, Culpepper ended up with a lot more respect from people, that rich doctors simply couldn't fight, not even with their own private police force. Funny thing was, that after that, I didn't hear anything printed saying not to read it. It only fell out of favour when the NHS took off, because then everyone got free medical treatment, even if you couldn't afford to pay a doctor Harley Street charges.

Now, I do not claim to say that British doctors are all part of a single organisation, say like the BMA, or are answerable to a single council, say like the GMC, that might align them together, and keep them all playing the same game. However, evolutionary forces do encourage one meme-set to dominate, and that dominance can allow those in a particular profession to be so pressurised by that meme-set, that going against those memes would find them discredited, and hounded out of their profession.

missing gaps in human evolution could be due to entire cultures being burned down to the last trace ON PURPOSE. didn't we kill off most of the native americans and burn down most of their artifacts? We even crushed the bones of their skeletons, so nothing would remain, get it?

human nature? or just nature? maybe nature itself has tendencies like this as well, to completely eradicate certain branches of its diversity including every proof of it. so afterwards these are missing gaps.

Why would this be the case?

Because the mutation of an organism which destroys similar organisms which do not have this mutation are those which end up dominating.

This is why the dominant culture hates any different thought - a culture only comes to dominate in the first place when it has this tendency to destroy anything which does not fit it.

The new example is science. Anything which does not fit a strict set of rules is rejected. It is a very effective meme, which affects not only culture, but our world as a whole.

(whoa, just de ja vu'ed)

Before I'd read your post, Skywalker's post reminded me of a really revealing report I saw in the last 2 years. In Timbuktu, in the last several years, thousands of scientific, medical, and mathematical manuscripts have been appearing, almost every single day. It turns out that there was a big Muslim university there, during the Dark Ages, that did an incredible amount of science. The university eventually shrunk and disappeared. Its manuscripts were kept by the families who lived there, as valuable treasures, passed down from generation to generation. When the French came, they started burning every such manuscript they saw. So these families hid these manuscripts inside the walls. They remained hidden in these walls, until the last few years, when the people there were somehow persuaded to share a few of these manuscripts with the rest of the world, to be copied, and slowly, more and more have been persuaded to allow their manuscripts to be copied.

I found it very interesting, because the French had replaced their intellectual authority from Catholic priests, to atheist scientists. The idea that religious Muslims were coming out with advanced science, medicine and mathematics, when the French were still in the Dark Ages, must have been a bitter blow to atheist post-revolutionary France. So, they wiped out any records they could find.

Were it not for the efforts of the people of Timbuktu to hide their manuscripts inside these walls, we probably would not even know what atheist France did to crush the scientific achievements of Islamic Mali.

 

[Oblivious]

We need more of those priests. They sound really awesome.

In fact, they sound like just what this world needs.

Edit: You should start a thread on that.

 

[alrai]

@oblivious Loool who is US? or WE? you can only represent yourself you little birdy.

Your source is written by Mark I. Vuletic. Whos he? I can post a blog on that site right now. Writing ANYTHING I WANT.

I am not concerned by the nonsense you wrote.

 

[ApostateAbe]

You are offensive not because you are searching for the truth. Stop lying to us.

You are offensive because you are a liar and a hypocrite. Also because you are a moron.

You have just lied to us about Einstein, who never commented about Evolution: http://www.vuletic.com/hume/cefec/7-13.html

You are a hypocrite because you claim to want to learn, yet your combative tone suggests otherwise.

You are a moron just because.

Get out of this forum zealot. You will not find any converts here.

Chillax. When someone speaks a falsehood, then it was not intended, for every 9 in 10. I see myself in this guy.

 

[alrai]

I appreciate your open minded contribution little professor.

 

[Oblivious]

Chillax. When someone speaks a falsehood, then it was not intended, for every 9 in 10. I see myself in this guy.

I suppose it is demeaning to argue with children. Try to not spoil them will you?

 

[alrai]

@ApostateAbe; I do leave emotions out of discussions. You are right about being careful with claims. I spoke of my general knowledge and possibly subjective interpretation of some quotes made by Einstein (that I quickly looked up).

 

[ApostateAbe]

@ApostateAbe; I do leave emotions out of discussions. You are right about being careful with claims. I spoke of my general knowledge and possibly subjective interpretation of some quotes made by Einstein (that I quickly looked up).

Cool. The theory of evolution is a very big debate, and it is a huge dark labyrinth of myths and false claims. The lesson is that pretty much anything that we think we know about the theory of evolution needs to be looked up and confirmed, or else we will be accused of being *ahem* liars. Luckily, Internet search engines make it easy.

 

[SpaceYeti]

Also, space-yeti comes across as a bit narrow minded for an INTP, and has contributed more Insults than Information. AND @spaceyeti, I'm aware that when Darwin put forward his theory, he never mentioned HOW the origin of life.

Hahaha, narrow-minded! Says the person who's arguing against evolution. Alright, fine, I'll play your game. I'll not assume you're playing devil's advocate and treat you like you already know the things I do. I do have a tendency to insult people who are willfully ignorant as well, though, so we'll see how far that goes. After all, I once flirted up a girl who worked at the coffee place next to where I was working and got her email address... just to discover she was a Creationist. Yeah, right there in the same city and same educational resources I myself went through, an actual Creationist. They aren't just an online phenomenon! They're real people. Granted, her beliefs were still based on ignorance and lies, but that's not my point.

Oh, and what Darwin said isn't even particularly relevant, as we're discussing the modern theory of evolution, not the infant theory he proposed. We have genetic evidence that he couldn't even have foreseen, so it can't really be claimed to be his theory, anymore. Either way, it has nothing to do with the origin of life... which is what you said your problem with it was, and now you're claiming you were already aware of this fact. So are you a liar, or what? This glaring contradiction screams poser to me, but as I said, I'm going to pretend you actually do think the theory of evolution is BS.

If you maintain such an idea, you need to be able to explain why such a process is not happening now?Also, they will not survive the violence of impact when they land, neither life..or seeds of life. The subject just consists of the speculation that "it could have happened.

Firstly, I do not advocate Panspermia. It's an unnecessary idea. If the early solar system had meteors that would crash into our planet with the building blocks for life, then those same chemicals could have condensed alongside the other elements of our planet when it first formed. Meteors are simply redundant. However, on that first point, why it's not happening now, should be obvious. Life already exists. Current life uses organic compounds as food and building materials for their own bodily structures. Those chemicals would never have the chance to foam around for a few billion years for a brand new iteration of life to arise.

This claim is backed up by no known physical or chemical law. On the contrary, the laws of physics and chemistry show that time has a disorganizing and destructive effect, not an "organising" one (i.e the Second Law of Thermodynamics).

The second law of thermodynamics states that entropy tends to increase in closed systems. Earth is not a closed system. Earth is constantly bombarded by new energy by the sun. Life itself takes in new energy by eating in whatever manner any particular form of life eats, so life is not a closed system either. The second law of Thermodynamics doesn't apply to either Earth's ecosystem or any particular organism.

The idea that 'dinosaurs grew wings while trying to catch flies' is no joke, yet isn't it funny?! I used that example because birds possess that magnificent organ, the wing, and their structural wonders, their function also inspires amazement.

The theory of evolution maintains that the ancestors of birds were dinosaurs. This is justified by the arboreal theory(turned into birds by taking to the air from the ground) and the cursorial theory(dinosaurs that lived in the branches of trees turned into birds by trying to jump from one branch to another), both i cant take seriously.

These concepts are simply not advocated by biologists nor expected by the theory of evolution. Evolution is the change in a population of organisms over time, as they adapt to their environment based on chance mutation and attrition. While it's true that birds are the descendants of dinosaurs, your overly simplified explanation for the family are less than justified. A small animal which lives in trees and must escape from predators or which must move quickly in order to catch prey will occasionally have to jump from one branch to another. The farther they can jump, the more successful they will be, which means those capable for longer jumps, especially when aided by, perhaps, flaps of skin of some sort, will be more likely to survive to the point that they mate and produce offspring. The same thing applies to that next generation. Give that particular population of animals something around a hundred million years, mating every year after maturation and giving us about 33 million generations, that flap of skin (or whatever), could easily have developed into a wing of some sort. In fact, three different kinds of wings have developed; Birds, insects, and bats, all different, but they all do the same thing.

Regarding the Archaeopteryx, I chose that "transitional fossil" specifically because its the so-called ancestor of modern birds according to evolutionist. The missing sternum was the supporting evidence for the bird not been able to fly properly, but the seventh Archaeopteryx fossil, which was found in 1992, disproved this argument.[http://antidarwinistteam.wordpress.com/2007/07/21/arc/]

Assuming that article is telling the truth, so what? Archaeopteryx could possibly fly. How does that make it not a transitional fossil?

Finally, I'm not an enemy of evolutionary biology. I just don't think that the evidence supports the view that all biological complexity arose by the process of random variation (and natural selection). And, I'm not an expert. My questions shouldn't present much of a challenge to you.

They don't. I could understand wanting people to answer your specific questions, but you could also do a simple google search for them, as well. Thenh, you haven't really posed many questions, so much as actually argued against evolution. I would suggest finding the answers to your questions before arguing against the subject, as then you're less likely to seem like you've been brainwashed by Creationist propaganda. Here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archaeopteryx

 

[Oblivious]

Cool. The theory of evolution is a very big debate, and it is a huge dark labyrinth of myths and false claims. The lesson is that pretty much anything that we think we know about the theory of evolution needs to be looked up and confirmed, or else we will be accused of being *ahem* liars. Luckily, Internet search engines make it easy.

It just occurred to me that you remind me of that Father who stood by you during one of your protests. I think I understand you better now.

 

[ApostateAbe]

It just occurred to me that you remind me of that Father who stood by you during one of your protests. I think I understand you better now.

Were you a fan of the old Atheventures?

 

[Oblivious]

I was not there when you were active, I only read the whole thing when you posted the links on this forum. I usually frown on acts like that, but what you did was too fun for me to care much.

Let's hope he grows as much as you have.

 

[ApostateAbe]

I was not there when you were active, I only read the whole thing when you posted the links on this forum. I usually frown on acts like that, but what you did was too fun for me to care much.

Let's hope he grows as much as you have.

The Atheventures were something to do for fun, and it was a vain outlet for my anti-religious opinions for people who have not been reached, but I also learned a lot--a hell of a lot--from the experiences. We all have plenty of room for growth, and we always will.

 

[alrai]

@spaceyeti I have read some of your other posts. Talk is cheap. Brag.Claim.Brag.More claims. You strike me as insecure. You maybe bright. You are far from funny (Now we're even. Please don't make this personal. I would upset you). On the contrary, some of your arguments seem valid and have made me think, I will respond tomorrow where I will have the time to write a more detailed response.

A father?? lol Adventures!! lol.
Little birdy sure loves being emotional. Your analogy was poor. You need to learn to accept your position instead of always throwing a tantrum.

 

[SpaceYeti]

If we are going to start explaining the past, by looking at what evidence that exists today, then what happened in the past, that might have an effect on that past, is going to be very relevant to how we understand that evidence. For instance, if the laws of thermodynamics do not allow the recombination of DNA sequences in such an order as to transform a fish into a mammal, then it would poke a very big hole in the theories of evolution. Just saying.

Okay, well, thermodynamics is actually a law, but the point stands. All theories must conform to laws, and I find it baffling how people read a few articles online and then presume they've figured out that thermodynamics disallows evolution, yet practicing biologists have missed the fact for over a century. Sure, they might have, but then we come to find out that these internexperts are operating on a false idea of thermodynamics, applied in the wrong circumstances. And the fact is evolution is not other theories. Even if it's related to another theory (as it is in all of biology and medicine), it's still not those other theories, and stands or falls on it's merits or lack thereof, not the merit or lack thereof for the other theories. If someone has something against evolution because it doesn't account for the appearance of life in the first place, they're simply not addressing the appropriate theory. They should, instead, argue against abiogenesis, which is it's own theory and is based on a different set of facts than those which support evolution, even though some of those facts may overlap or be somehow interdependent.

I would not be so quick to say such a thing.

A few examples:

I watched a biography on Edward Jenner a while back. At the time, a LOT of scientists were extremely opposed to his work. There was a serious possibility that his work would have been discredited, which would have been a shame, seeing that he managed to develop a vaccine against smallpox, and probably saved millions of lives, if not billions, over the last few hundred years. As a result, the British government banned the other types of research into smallpox vaccines other than Jenner. Today, it would be like banning any form of treatment for cervical cancer other than the HPV vaccine.

Then there was Nicholas Culpepper. He wrote the second-most widely-read book in Britain, after the Bible, and the most widely-read text on science, for the something like 300 years. He wasn't a scientist. He was an apothecary, a pharmacist. He wanted to write a book, detailing all the herbs that were used to treat ailments, like willow for a headache. However, at the time, the Royal College of Surgeons banned anyone from practising medicine, and had their own police force, to enforce it. Even to put on a basic dressing for a wound, that we would consider definitely doesn't need a doctor, would have gotten you fined, or even put into prison. There was a huge opposition from the medical community over his book's potential publication. The power that doctors had then, along with the clout they had with the king, meant that there was almost no way it would get published. Then the Plague of London hit. You'd think that the apothecaries would clear out, and the noble self-sacrificing doctors would stay to treat the sick. Other way round. The doctors left, to let everyone else die of plague. Apothecaries like Culpepper stayed, and treated the sick as best they could. As a result, Culpepper ended up with a lot more respect from people, that rich doctors simply couldn't fight, not even with their own private police force. Funny thing was, that after that, I didn't hear anything printed saying not to read it. It only fell out of favour when the NHS took off, because then everyone got free medical treatment, even if you couldn't afford to pay a doctor Harley Street charges.

Certainly poor decisions and unjust, but that doesn't really apply to the subject. That was always the law interfering in science, not the scientific community cencoring itself or it's opposition. Accomplishing such a thing in modern times would be extremely difficult if possible in the first place, due to the freedom of information gained through the internet and other forms of global communication.

Now, I do not claim to say that British doctors are all part of a single organisation, say like the BMA, or are answerable to a single council, say like the GMC, that might align them together, and keep them all playing the same game. However, evolutionary forces do encourage one meme-set to dominate, and that dominance can allow those in a particular profession to be so pressurised by that meme-set, that going against those memes would find them discredited, and hounded out of their profession.

Kinda like how medical doctors who denies Germ Theory would get discredited? I mean, sure, you do have to follow certain memes to retain your credibility in the scientific community. For starters, you have to actually use science. Theories that oppose evolution are simply not scientific, ans so cannot really be called theories except colloquially. All opposition to evolution so far has been nothing except religion, hidden as such to differing degrees.

Before I'd read your post, Skywalker's post reminded me of a really revealing report I saw in the last 2 years. In Timbuktu, in the last several years, thousands of scientific, medical, and mathematical manuscripts have been appearing, almost every single day. It turns out that there was a big Muslim university there, during the Dark Ages, that did an incredible amount of science. The university eventually shrunk and disappeared. Its manuscripts were kept by the families who lived there, as valuable treasures, passed down from generation to generation. When the French came, they started burning every such manuscript they saw. So these families hid these manuscripts inside the walls. They remained hidden in these walls, until the last few years, when the people there were somehow persuaded to share a few of these manuscripts with the rest of the world, to be copied, and slowly, more and more have been persuaded to allow their manuscripts to be copied.

I found it very interesting, because the French had replaced their intellectual authority from Catholic priests, to atheist scientists. The idea that religious Muslims were coming out with advanced science, medicine and mathematics, when the French were still in the Dark Ages, must have been a bitter blow to atheist post-revolutionary France. So, they wiped out any records they could find.

Were it not for the efforts of the people of Timbuktu to hide their manuscripts inside these walls, we probably would not even know what atheist France did to crush the scientific achievements of Islamic Mali.

I haven't heard anything about this, but I'd be interested to read more (as well as slower to point at atheists for getting butt-hurt to the point they'd destroy knowledge. Religious source or no, I know of few to no atheists who would deny truth due to the source it came from.

 

[SpaceYeti]

@spaceyeti I have read some of your other posts. Talk is cheap. Brag.Claim.Brag.More claims. You strike me as insecure. You maybe bright. You are far from funny (Now we're even. Please don't make this personal. I would upset you). On the contrary, some of your arguments seem valid and have made me think, I will respond tomorrow where I will have the time to write a more detailed response.

I brag? What do I brag about? And if this gets personal, then okay. I'm trying not to make it personal, but, as I said, I find it difficult to not accidentally insult people. I usually accomplish it through not talking or with silly jokes, but we're talking.

Oh, and I'm the most hilarious person alive.

Seriously, though, I'm glad that the things I said made you think, even if you have a distaste for me personally.