Originally posted by xsWell put!
There are a lot of interesting independent examples that when taken together as a whole suggests strongly that Darwinian evolution is the likely cause of them all. Like that of a criminal case, each piece of evidence individually might have a number of different explanations, and not one of them capable of substantiating a conviction, but if all of them together ...[text shortened]... nd more likely that that is the reason for their existence.
How do you explain new viruses?
The assemblage of facts can and will change, especially as techologies for observation of nature improves. Evolution as a theory has endured several generations of scientific observation; in fact, its explanatory capacities have improved as observational capabilities have improved. Hence it is a theory, not a hypothesis, not a mere fact.
Science never proves anything beyond further testing; theory is as close to truth as it gets. The theory of evolution has become a central basis for several branches of science: it is one of the foundational theories of modern research. Abandon it, and the likelihood of fighting viruses drops dramatically.
What are the stakes in the assault upon science from the religious right? In part, the creationists would have all of us die of AIDS, the scourge of g-d.
Originally posted by ColettiDo you agree with the aspect of TOE or not, because that is the issue.
The definition of the Theory of Evolution is always debatable - but if you are going to argue against someones position - you should know what it is.
I object to the TOE that says all life is a result natural evolutionary processes from the simplest self-replicating life forms all the way up to Homo sapiens. Do you agree with the aspect of TOE or not, ...[text shortened]... 's no point in you taking a side because you don't understand the issue that is being debated.
I agree with it, except that I feel we should either rigorously define "simplest" or not use that word.
Do you believe TOE is about the origins and development of lifeforms - speciation?
I think I agree with that. Well, 'development' is an awkward term to use, as it is generally used to talk about how babies form in the womb and how organisms change over their individual lives...I think.
Originally posted by AThousandYoungDefinitions are critical - the devil is in the details, and so is God.
[b]Do you agree with the aspect of TOE or not, because that is the issue.
I agree with it, except that I feel we should either rigorously define "simplest" or not use that word.
Do you believe TOE is about the origins and development of lifeforms - speciation?
I think I agree with that. Well, 'development' is an awkward term t ...[text shortened]... bout how babies form in the womb and how organisms change over their individual lives...I think.[/b]
That being said - the question of evolution - fact or myth - is flawed. It is neither. It is one answer to explain the data. I would no sooner use the term myth than law.
Originally posted by ColettiOf course I do. There is no " "up" to Homo sapiens, and we are not the pinnacle of evoluion.
The definition of the Theory of Evolution is always debatable - but if you are going to argue against someones position - you should know what it is.
I object to the TOE that says all life is a result natural evolutionary processes from the simplest self-replicating life forms all the way up to Homo sapiens. Do you agree with the aspect of TOE or not, ...[text shortened]... 's no point in you taking a side because you don't understand the issue that is being debated.
Originally posted by Wulebgr"Creations would have us all die of AIDS", get past the hate speech
Well put!
The assemblage of facts can and will change, especially as techologies for observation of nature improves. Evolution as a theory has endured several generations of scientific observation; in fact, its explanatory capacities have improved as observational capabilities have improved. Hence it is a theory, not a hypothesis, not a mere fact.
Scie ...[text shortened]... eligious right? In part, the creationists would have all of us die of AIDS, the scourge of g-d.
and strike up a conversation why don't you?
Evolution is a theory, people believe it to be true, that does not mean
that it is true, only that it is believed to be true by many.
Kelly
Originally posted by KellyJayIt is not hate speech: I'm making the observation that if we discard the theory of evolution in favor of Creationists' notions, we lose a key element in the successes of medical research over the past century, as well as anticipated future successes. If we abandon the theory of evolution in favor of an idea (one that hardly merits status as a hypothesis, let alone a theory) that does not even make the effort to explain more than a fraction of the scientific facts that have developed in the modern era, we destroy the most important developments in medicine, among many other scientific fields.
"Creations would have us all die of AIDS", get past the hate speech
and strike up a conversation why don't you?
The theory of evolution is not just an idea that some believe, while others do not. The theory of evolution is the best general explanation of most of what we know about the biology of life; indeed, it is the only explanation that accounts for the data.
Make no mistake. AIDS is a serious global health risk. Evolution offers understanding of how it emerged, how it changes, and why it is successfully resists current treatments. Creationism offers none of this. Some creationists, however, have been clear in their teaching that AIDS is punishishment for reprehensible behaviors. Such teaching is hate speech; noting that the consequences of their ideology, were it to take root in the sciences, would be terribly dire is not hate speech.
Originally posted by WulebgrCould you explain how the TOE is critical to biology? What can we do now we could not had it not been for TOE? Is this merely your assertion?
It is not hate speech: I'm making the observation that if we discard the theory of evolution in favor of Creationists' notions, we lose a key element in the successes of medical research over the past century, as well as anticipated future successes. If we abandon the theory of evolution in favor of an idea (one that hardly merits status as a hypothesis, l ...[text shortened]... eir ideology, were it to take root in the sciences, would be terribly dire is not hate speech.
Originally posted by ColettiAs a general rule for everyone, please don't refer to the TOE when you mean only that part of it called macroevolution, as this is misleading. I'm not saying anyone is necessarily doing this, but sometimes people do.
Could you explain how the TOE is critical to biology? What can we do now we could not had it not been for TOE? Is this merely your assertion?
The TOE explains drug resistance in insects, bacteria and viruses. It is the framework with which we study these things.
Also it allows us to find organisms which make good models for drug testing in humans; if an organism is closely related to us, it's biochemistry will be similar. The TOE predicts this.
You know what would be fantastic evidence against the TOE? If ID proponents were able to use their hypothesis that microevolution is always a "horizontal" or "downward" change in "information" to defeat drug resistance, or to make some other scientific breakthrough that the TOE is holding us all back from.
For example - what if we sequentially hit a virulent organism or virus with a variety of treatments, intentionally building resistance in it? As time went on, the bacterium or whatever would lose more and more "information" until it was no longer a viable organism and died from sheer loss of "information". This might be an experiment that would show the ID people are right and evolutionists wrong!
Originally posted by ColettiYour question has been answered.
Could you explain how the TOE is critical to biology? What can we do now we could not had it not been for TOE? Is this merely your assertion?
Originally posted by AThousandYoung
The TOE explains drug resistance in insects, bacteria and viruses. It is the framework with which we study these things.
Also it allows us to find organisms which make good models for drug testing in humans; if an organism is closely related to us, it's biochemistry will be similar. The TOE predicts this.
Now if you wish to argue science, present some. Otherwise locate your religious rants in the proper forum.
I posted this on another "Creation vs Evolution" thread, but I'm glad to repeat it...
Let's take the eye.
I've found that most Evolutionists are hard-pressed to explain the step-by-step development of the eye, which is characterized by a staggering complexity. Furnished with automatic aiming, automatic focusing, and automatic aperature adjustment, the human eye can function from almost complete darkness to bright sunlight, see an object the diameter of a fine hair, and make about 100,000 separate motions in an average day, faithfully affording us a continuous series of color stereo-scopic pictures. All of this is performed usually without complaint, and then, while we sleep, it carries on its own maintenance work.
The human eye is so complex and sophisticated that scientists STILL do not fully understand how it functions. Considering the absolutely amazing, highly sophisticated synchronization of complex structures and mechanisms which work together to produce human vision, it is difficult to understand how evolutionists can honestly believe that the eye came about through the step-by-step, trial and error evolutionary process...and this is especially true when we realize that THE EYE WOULD BE USELESS UNLESS IT WAS FULLY DEVELOPED. It either functions as an integrated whole, or not at all.
(Darwin: "To suppose that the eye, with all its inimitable contrivances for adjusting the focus to different distances, for admitting different amonts of light, and for the connection of spherical and chromatic aberation, could have been formed by natural selection, seems, I freely confess, absurd in the highest possible degree." )
I agree with Darwin.
I think that evolutionists' problems are further complicated by the fact that the evolutionary theory calls for the chance development of the eye several times, not just once...in the squid,the vertebrate, the athropods, etc...
And don't even get me started on the bombadier beetle! That's a whole 'nother post for a whole 'nother day...
I'll give you one more to chew on before I go beddie-bye...
Let's take Population Growth
Evolutionists believe that man has been on this earth for at least one million years, whereas Creationists belive that he has been around only a few thousand years. The question then becomes, "which possibility is better supported by the data from population growth statistics?"
Answer: Using an average growth rate of 1/2% per year (a little less than one-quarter of the present rate), and starting with a population of two (guess where I got THAT from), this process would yield a population of 6 billion people in 4,375 years. This allows ample room for periods of time when, as a result of war or disease, the population growth rates were far below the normal averages.
It is statistically inconceivable that only 6 billion people could have resulted from one million years of evolutionary history. Even if the population increased by 1/2 % per year for 10,000 years, the # of people in the present generation would exceed 9.15 x 10^21.
You think the earth is crowded NOW??
Seems more likely that man's history spans only thousand of years, not millions...
Originally posted by TheBloopYour maths are flawed.
I'll give you one more to chew on before I go beddie-bye...
Let's take Population Growth
Evolutionists believe that man has been on this earth for at least one million years, whereas Creationists belive that he has been around only a few thousand years. The question then becomes, "which possibility is better supported by the data from population gr ...[text shortened]... W??
Seems more likely that man's history spans only thousand of years, not millions...
The current population exposion only began with the agricultural revolution, which was about 8000 years ago. That was when supply of food was greater than the demand, and as happens in every ecosystem, when there is constantly a surplus of food, the population explodes.
D
Originally posted by RagnorakThe math is not flawed...the formula involves four variables:
Your maths are flawed.
The current population exposion only began with the agricultural revolution, which was about 8000 years ago. That was when supply of food was greater than the demand, and as happens in every ecosystem, when there is constantly a surplus of food, the population explodes.
D
1) Beginning population
2) Rate of Growth (average per year)
3) The # of years in a given time span
4) The current population (in this case, I used 6 billion, so I guess it's not really a 'variable' in this case, but you get the idea.
The formula is:
start_pop*((1+(rate/100))^years)=CurrentPop
(Rate of growth is entered as the percent we want to assume...for example, if we want to assume a 2% population growth per year, rate would be 2, not 0.02... (the formula then divides it by 100)...
Using your premise that the population explosion only began 8,000 years ago, if we plug the known variables into the above formula, and assume an annual growth of 1/100 of 1% (not much of an explosion, really), we come up with the following variables:
Starting population (i.e. the population 8,000 years ago): Unknown
Rate of growth = .01 (i.e. 1 one-hundredth of one percent per year)
# of years = 8,000
Ending population = 6 billion
Applying these #s to the formula, it appears that the population 8,000 years ago was 2,696,081,619
This exceeds the actual population of the world in 1950 (2.4 billion).
(my source for population history was: http://desip.igc.org/populationmaps.html). I'm not using this site to prove any point, I just googled world population growth and came up with that site...
And again, this assumes a population growth rate of 1/100th of 1% per year...hardly my idea of an explosion...
btw,the same source lists the following world populations:
1 AD 150 million
1350 300 million
1700 600 million
1800 900 million
1900 1,600 million (i.e. 1.6 billion)
1950 2,400 million (2.4 billion)
1985 5,000 million (5 billion)
(also projects 8 billion by 2020).
Is evolution fact or myth? I will say that Darwin's evolution has been strongly engrained in Biology and has even appeared in many other branches of science. It has its conflicts as do many other scientific theories, but it has withstood the brunt of everything thrown at it so far. In this sense evolutions is "scientific fact." If you want to call it truth as undeniable even outside of the realm of science (perhaps in religion and philosophy), then problems arise. The deeper question is if science is "truth" in the purest sense of the word.
I have found that science consists of functional models which are extremely useful (hence this computer I type on). But, science does not constitute "truth." A glaring confirmation of this is the fact that the sciences undergo revolutions or "shifts of paradigms." Examples are the discovery of quantum physics overthrowing Newtonian physics and the revolution of geology with the theory of plate techtonics. The previous reigning theories were "scientific fact" and indisputable until they could no longer hold up under the contrary evidence. So, they were never "true" but they were "scientific fact."
My point is, the same pattern appears to be occuring with evolution. It is well accepted in science now, but contrary evidence is building toward a paradigm shift. Perhaps it will no longer be at the status of "scientific fact" if such a thing occurs....