Are we helpless without memory?

Originally posted by Jigtie
Before they found those bones in the Ethiopian desert, Lucy was the
oldest evidence of a humanoid species (I think). How come they hadn't
found anything older than that? Was the remains of a humanoid species
some two million years older than Lucy somehow virtually "invisible"?

The thing about science is that theories always change in the light of
c hat we've not found any
evidence of a humanoid species older than 6 million years.

…Before they found those bones in the Ethiopian desert, Lucy was the
oldest evidence of a humanoid species (I think). How come they hadn't
found anything older than that? Was the remains of a humanoid species
some two million years older than Lucy somehow virtually "invisible"? ..…

Obviously neither I nor, I presume, they, would assume that the oldest humanoid fossil found so far must literally be a fossil of the oldest hominid and the reason why we don’t presume that is that, obviously, the chances of us requiring the fossil of the very oldest humanoid of them all is, mathematically virtually zero. But that doesn’t mean that the oldest humanoid fossil is of a humanoid of such an age that, relatively speaking, is much younger than the oldest hominid to actually exist.

Let me give an analogy; suppose a gale blows a stormy cloud over my garden and it starts to rain and is currently still raining on my garden; I may observe the first rain drops falling in my garden at 12 o’clock at the start of the storm but definitely not an hour before then -but I didn’t see the very first rain drop fall on my garden! -I mean, I can never know for sure which was the first one and the exact moment it fell because I almost certainly didn’t see the first one. So do I conclude from that fact that it was probably raining on my garden an hour before 12 o’clock? Or can I can be almost 100% certain that it wasn’t raining on my garden then? -surely, at the very least, I can be 100% certain that it wasn’t raining yesterday if yesterday was a cloudless day?

…The fact that we've found no evidence of a humanoid species older than
6 million years, means nothing other than that we've not found any
evidence of a humanoid species older than 6 million years...…

But that doesn’t answer my question -how do you explain the absurd coincidence (if you assume that hominids existed at the time of the dinos) that ALL the humanoid fossils found so far just happen to be those that are ONLY from within the last ~6 million years and not in any of the vast periods of time afterwards?

The last tyrannosaurus rex died about 65 million years ago -isn’t it an amassing coincidence that ALL the humanoid fossil found so far just happen to be those that are ONLY from within the last one-eleventh of that period of time between 65 million years ago and the present and not a single one found within the first ten-elevenths of that period? Mathematically, what is the probability of that happening by pure chance if hominids existed throughout that period? -the answer is not much chance.
Therefore, the obvious conclusion is that hominids didn’t exist throughout that period (hence no absurd coincidence).

Originally posted by Andrew Hamilton
But that doesn’t mean that the oldest humanoid fossil is of a humanoid of such an age that, relatively speaking, is much younger than the oldest hominid to actually exist.

Huh? What's that?.. You mean?.. I have absolutely no idea what that
means. Sorry. 😕

From the rest of your post I conclude that you mean to say it's an
absurd coincidence that no fossils of humanoids has been found older
than six million years? Well, first of all, I don't think they've ever found
humanoid fossils. But that's not important I suppose. Your analogy with
the rain, I presume is meant to show that the time span between 6
million and 65 million years is so huge that even though you can
imagine humanoids falling on your garden before 8 or say 9 million
years ago, you can't possibly imagine that they would have fallen from
the sky some 20 let alone 65 million years ago, because?.. well, that's
where your analogy falls flat on the ground (so to speak). To make your
analogy work, we would have to assume that you weren't even around to
see those first rain-drops, hence you have no way of knowing that it
didn't rain yesterday (though that's definitely one possibility). In fact, it
could be considered a huge coincidence that you haven't seen any
remains after those rain drops, sorry: humanoids that fell from the sky
yesterday. In your garden. Due to a gale. Blowing a storm. Over... your
gar... den?..

?
😕~

This is all very confusing to me. Shall we keep it simple instead? Earth
bigger than us. Much, much bigger than us. Millions of species. Only a
small percentage of which was preserved for prosperity (even with the
sudden catastrophe and all) as fossils. Only a small percentage of which
we have yet discovered. Do you still think it's such a huge coincidence
that we haven't found any evidence of the other millions of species that
no doubt lived during that era?

Addition: I think it's slowly starting to sink in what you're talking
about. You're saying that there's a huge gap between the extinction of
dinosaurs and the oldest humanoid remains where nothing even
remotely like humanoids have been found, and you think that's a huge
coincidence. Is that it?

Originally posted by Jigtie
Huh? What's that?.. You mean?.. I have absolutely no idea what that
means. Sorry. 😕

From the rest of your post I conclude that you mean to say it's an
absurd coincidence that no fossils of humanoids has been found older
than six million years? Well, first of all, I don't think they've ever found
humanoid fossils. But that's not important I suppose ...[text shortened]... anoids have been found, and you think that's a huge
coincidence. Is that it?

I think we all find it a bit odd that you seem to be equating "possibility" with "likelihood". Your point about how elusive absolute certainty can be is well taken, however that doesn't mean idle speculation is on par with scientific research.

Originally posted by PBE6
I think we all find it a bit odd that you seem to be equating "possibility" with "likelihood".

Well, I don't. I'm merely not equating "lack of evidence" with "certainty of its non-existence".

Originally posted by Jigtie
Huh? What's that?.. You mean?.. I have absolutely no idea what that
means. Sorry. 😕

From the rest of your post I conclude that you mean to say it's an
absurd coincidence that no fossils of humanoids has been found older
than six million years? Well, first of all, I don't think they've ever found
humanoid fossils. But that's not important I suppose anoids have been found, and you think that's a huge
coincidence. Is that it?

…From the rest of your post I conclude that you mean to say it's an
absurd coincidence that no fossils of humanoids has been found older
than six million years? .…

ONLY IF you assume hominids existed in a period well before 6 million years old -else no "absurd coincidence"!

…Well, first of all, I don't think they've ever found
humanoid fossils....…

What do you mean by that?

http://www.trussel.com/prehist/news97.htm

http://www.redorbit.com/news/science/1290869/fossils_of_extinct_human_species_found/index.html

Do you dispute the evidence?

…To make your
analogy work, we would have to assume that you weren't even around to
see those first rain-drops, hence you have no way of knowing that it
didn't rain yesterday
..…

Not true -we can scan for fossils in the rock strata that is MORE than 6 million years ago.

…This is all very confusing to me. Shall we keep it simple instead? Earth
bigger than us. Much, much bigger than us. Millions of species. Only a
small percentage of which was preserved for prosperity (even with the
sudden catastrophe and all) as fossils. Only a small percentage of which
we have yet discovered. Do you still think it's such a huge coincidence
that we haven't found any evidence of the other millions of species that
no doubt lived during that era?....

No -because some species are obviously are going to be much harder to find in the fossil record than other species due to factors such as how often and how readily they fossilise etc.

…You're saying that there's a huge gap between the extinction of
dinosaurs and the oldest humanoid remains where nothing even
remotely like humanoids have been found, and you think that's a huge
coincidence. Is that it?.…

Yes -BUT ONLY if you assume humanoids existed all the way back to the time of the dinosaurs.

Let me put it this way:

lets suppose exactly 8 humanoid fossils have been found so far (I am sure it is a much greater number than this -can any one tell me how many have been found so far?) and lets further suppose for the sake of argument that humanoids DID exist at least as far back as the last of the dinosaurs which was about 65 million years ago;
-mathematically, what is the probability that ALL the humanoid fossils (i.e. ALL 8 of them) that have been found so far just by pure chance being from only the last 1/11th’s of that 65 million year period and not one of them being within the first 10/11th’s of that 65 million year period?
-you can do the maths yourself; the probability is actually:

(1/11)^8 ~= 4.7 * 10^9

Or about one in 5-billion -that would be a big coincidence!
The simplest way to explain this “coincidence” is to assume there is no “coincidence” because the existence of humanoids don’t go back that far but, rather, they go back about, say, no further than the last 1/10th of that period (we should assume that the oldest one found to date is not literally of the oldest humanoid to exist so we should assume the oldest humanoids to exist probably go just a "bit" further back than the last 1/11th of that period with some uncertainly of just how much that “bit“ should be but that “bit“ certainly shouldn’t be as much as the first 10/11ths of the last 65 million years!).

Originally posted by Andrew Hamilton
No -because some species are obviously are going to be much harder to find in the fossil record than other species due to factors such as how often and how readily they fossilise etc.

Exactly. So... you agree with me then? 🙄

To speak with absolute certainty about things you have no evidence for,
is to likely set yourself up for a bit of foot-munching. There's no
escaping that fact. From wikipedia (the source of all absolute and
useful knowledge - Ta-TA!):

"Further, only the parts of organisms that
were already mineralised are usually preserved, such
as the shells of molluscs. Since most animal species
are soft-bodied, they decay before they can become
fossilised. As a result, although there are 30-plus phyla
of living animals, two-thirds have never been found as
fossils"

You mean to tell me that of the two-thirds that's never been found as
fossils over a range of 65 million years it's not possible, not a chance,
not in a million years (or 65 as it were) that humanoids could have
existed further back in time than, what?.. 10 million?.. 15 million?..
where do you suppose it's all of a sudden a coincidence of huge
proportions, given the relatively small amount of facts science has
collected so far, that humanoid existence may still be fact?* I will remind
you that most of palaeontological science is based on fossil evidence.





You got me on the fossil thing though. I actually didn't realise that
fossilisation happen so soon as 10 000 years. Thought they found 5
million year old bones in the Ethiopian desert. Silly me. I'll just go stand
in that corner over there. 😳

I also didn't know about biomarkers. 🙂




* I didn't have the time or energy to read your entire post, so I missed
the part with your calculations. I apologise. Two thirds of all the species
have still not been found as fossilised evidence, so I think you would
want to include that in your calculations, though. Also, consider this:

Due to the combined effect of taphonomic
processes and simple mathematical chance, fossilization
tends to favor organisms with hard body parts, those that
were widespread, and those that lived for a long time. On
the other hand, it is very unusual to find fossils of small,
soft bodied, geographically restricted and geologically
ephemeral organisms, because of their relative rarity
and low likelihood of preservation.

Humanoids would count as relatively small and soft-bodied, and may
well have been geographically restricted back then, yes?

For clarification, I'm still not saying there was humanoids 65 million
years ago. The discussion, as far as I'm concerned, is whether or not it's
possible to say with certainty anything without hard evidence (a fossil,
say).

Originally posted by Jigtie
Exactly. So... you agree with me then? 🙄

To speak with absolute certainty about things you have no evidence for,
is to likely set yourself up for a bit of foot-munching. There's no
escaping that fact. From wikipedia (the source of all absolute and
useful knowledge - Ta-TA!):

[quote][i]"Further, only the parts of organisms that
were already mine
possible to say with certainty anything without hard evidence (a fossil,
say).

[/i]…Exactly. So... you agree with me then?
.…

About what?
Are you implying that the earlier hominids where less prone to fossilisation?

…To speak with absolute certainty about things you have NO evidence for....…
(my emphasis)

Sometimes the absence of evidence for an existential claim is good evidence that that existential claim is false.
I don’t believe Santa exists because there is no evidence for his existence.
I don’t believe hominids existed at the time of the dinosaurs because the total absence of fossil evidence for the existence for hominids at that time period when you would expect such evidence if there were hominids at that time.

…"Further, only the parts of organisms that
were already mineralised are usually preserved, such
as the shells of molluscs. Since most animal species
are soft-bodied, they decay before they can become
fossilised. As a result, although there are 30-plus phyla
of living animals, two-thirds have never been found as
fossils"
....

Correct -are any hominids just purely “soft-bodied” creatures or have they all got bones that can readily fossilise? Hominids belong to the one-third of creatures that can be found as fossils.

…Humanoids would count as relatively small and soft-bodied,.…

Err, no!

When they talk about “soft-bodied” they are referring to things like worms and jellyfish etc that have no shells or bone or exoskeleton etc or any other hard substance that can readily fossilise before it totally rots away. Hominids do NOT go into that category because they are invertebrates which means they all have bones that do not readily rot away.

….and may
well have been geographically restricted back then, yes? .…

Correct -and rock strata from these time periods in various locations in every continent has been scanned for fossils. An adaptable hominid (most are adaptable and I assume the very first one was because of the way evolution works) should be able to quickly (in just a few tens of thousands of years maybe) spread and adapt to the various niches in a continent so if there are hominids somewhere on a given continent then, at least after a few ~tens of thousands of years from when they first exist there, I assume we should expect them to be everywhere on that continent where hominids can survive.

….The discussion, as far as I'm concerned, is whether or not it's
possible to say with certainty anything without hard evidence (a fossil,
say).

..…

If you are talking about the absence of a humanoids fossil from 65 million
years ago, the answer is yes, we can be rationally certain that they didn’t exist then for we should assume the probability of them existed then to be vanishingly small.

Originally posted by Andrew Hamilton
When they talk about “soft-bodied” they are referring to things like worms and jellyfish etc

Most animal-species are jellyfish and worms?

Actually, that may be true for all I know. I don't know if I'm convinced,
but that may be due to part of my head being suitable for fossilisation.
With all the revisions made to evolutionary teaching based on new,
unexpected findings over the years, I'm not so readily convinced that
palaeontologists has really so much knowledge about between 5 and 65
million years ago that they can say with absolute certainty what was
not alive and kicking back then. I'm not convinced because they
don't seem to know all that much even about the last hundred thousand
years, so I find it extremely hard to believe that there's no more
surprises to be found regarding earlier periods in history. But you
obviously know a whole lot more about this than I do, so I will not
keep up the argument any longer, but acknowledge that I could be
wrong.

With that, I'm done here. 🙂

Originally posted by Jigtie
Most animal-species are jellyfish and worms?

Actually, that may be true for all I know. I don't know if I'm convinced,
but that may be due to part of my head being suitable for fossilisation.
With all the revisions made to evolutionary teaching based on new,
unexpected findings over the years, I'm not so readily convinced that
palaeontologists has ent any longer, but acknowledge that I could be
wrong.

With that, I'm done here. 🙂

I am just curious;

Using the same logic, given the fact that we have so far only explored a tiny fraction of the oceans, do you think we cannot be rationally certain that Liopleurodon (a huge whale-size meat-eating swimming reptile that lived from ~65 to ~150 million years ago) does not exist in the oceans in the present day?

Originally posted by Andrew Hamilton
I am just curious;

Using the same logic, given the fact that we have so far only explored a tiny fraction of the oceans, do you think we cannot be rationally certain that Liopleurodon (a huge whale-size meat-eating swimming reptile that lived from ~65 to ~150 million years ago) does not exist in the oceans in the present day?

I just gave you a chance to back off with some dignity intact, while I
began munching my left foot and even humbled myself in your
presence, and you just had to make a silly argument like that, didn't
you?

See, the thing about living species, of which each specimen would be
between 7-11 metres in length and living relatively close to the surface,
is that they also usually come in large numbers. Kinda like whales used
to do before we hunt them down like... dogs (?).




?
😕~







Anyway, my point being that we would have most likely detected them by
now (though it's not certain, of course 😉 ). Now, fossilisation being such
a rare and random occurrence will obviously not come in equally large
numbers, and we would have to know where to look for them (not to
mention the fact that they often come in parts, so the pieces has to be
puzzled together with blanks filled in). Many discoveries has been made
while actually looking for something else. Or so I've been told.

Well, if you manage to regain some credibility in this discussion, I
suggest you stop while you're on top this time and just enjoy me sucking
my feet. See, I've got an ego the size of a Liopleurodon in a fish tank,
and I just jump at any chance of looking good. See this? See me from
the side? Niiiiice profile, yeah?

😏

Originally posted by Jigtie
I just gave you a chance to back off with some dignity intact, while I
began munching my left foot and even humbled myself in your
presence, and you just had to make a silly argument like that, didn't
you?

See, the thing about living species, of which each specimen would be
between 7-11 metres in length and living relatively close to the surface, ...[text shortened]... ny chance of looking good. See this? See me from
the side? Niiiiice profile, yeah?

😏

There are two people in this thread that believes that the Flintstone Family Show is a documentory.

One is Kelly Jay, who thinks that there are cave drawings of dinosaurs made by men, and this is a proof that man and dino lived side by side in time. That Noah, actually took two speciems of each dinosaurs with him in the ark. Imagine a bunch of Tyrannosaurus Rex, Brontosaurs, Velicoraptors, Stegosaurus, and all the rest of the dinos, together with elefants, rabbits, elks, kangaroos, and lions, to mention a few. And of course his wife, his three sons with their wives. This is supposed to happen in the age of Noah, for 6 thousand of years ago. (Read the Noah story in the bible). He promised to show some evidence of his claim of the dino cave drawings, in this thread as early as december 5th (page 5). He hasen't showd anything yet, but he'e trying: "I'll give you some links for that in due time."

The other one is Jigtie, who defends KJ of his right to actually believe in man and dinos living together in time. And of course KJ has the right to believe this, it's his religion, isn't it? KJ has no scientific backup, but, hey, it doesn't matter, he goes to heaven, and everyone not beliving as he does is going to hell. It's his religion, isn't it? And science cannot back up his religion, and his religion doesn't believe in science. But Jigtie is of a scientific mind. He argues that it actually can be true that man lived 65 million of years ago.

Here his claims is different from Kelly Jays clam. Kelly Jay claims that dinos lived 6 thousand of years ago (at the time of Noah), Jigtie claims that man lived 65 million of years ago (at the time of dinosaurs). They do not agree to eachother, but still defends eachother *as* they agreed. (!)

I find Kelly Jay an unscientific person who doesn't believe in any science that does not support his Intelligent Design religion.
I find Jigtie a person who belives in anything that is not 100% proven wrong. Even that human beings actually lived at the same time as dinosaurs.

Now, Kelly Jay, where are your documentations of cave drawings of dinos?
Now, Jigtie, do you really believe that that the moon actually is made of green cheese? If not, can you prove otherwise, or find someone who can? Are you absolute certain of the fact that the moon is *not* made of green cheese? I say that it is equally hard to prove your man/dino claim as there is to prove the green cheese moon claim.

Or do you admit that you just don't like me being absolute certain that there were no human beings 65 million of years ago?

Originally posted by FabianFnas
Jigtie claims that man lived 65 million of years ago (at the time of dinosaurs).

I have said nothing of the sorts, my overly upset little friend.

Originally posted by FabianFnas
I say that it is equally hard to prove your man/dino claim as there is to prove the green cheese moon claim.

No, it's not. We need but travel to the moon and check. It's still there.
Perhaps you're suggesting that we can just step into a time travelling
device, swoop ourselves back in time and start exploring? That'd be a real
hoot, wouldn't it?

Originally posted by FabianFnas
Or do you admit that you just don't like me being absolute certain that there were no human beings 65 million of years ago?

You're the one all upset that not everyone agrees with you and
everything, not I. What I don't like, is to hear Dumb-dumb (with
lack of absolute proof) attempting to ridicule Diddeli-do (with lack of
absolute proof) for not having absolute proof. Seems so unnecessary to
me.

But you just don't get that. You really believe that your believes are the
ultimate truths, written in stone (a little fossil pun there) and anything
not specifically written must be untrue and cause for indefatigable
persecution and ridicule at the cost of simple logic, humility and forum
harmony.





🙂




GOD DAMN, I look good now. See that butt? Hu? See that butt? That's
my butt. Pretty, innit?

😀

Originally posted by Jigtie
No, it's not. We need but travel to the moon and check. It's still there.
Perhaps you're suggesting that we can just step into a time travelling
device, swoop ourselves back in time and start exploring? That'd be a real
hoot, wouldn't it?

They have been there (to the moon) and they didn't see anything. So they were obviously at the wrong spot.
I don't belive in the green cheese theory, of course, I'm just using the same methodology as you are using: "They haven't searched all over the world, so they don't know if there are any humanoid fossils somewhere from 65 million of years ago. A proof that they don't know for certain."

I know for certain, as certain as I can be, without any reasonable doubts, that there were no human beings living at the same time as the dinos. Equally certain that the moon is not made of green cheese.

I say that with equally precision, you cannot even prove to me that you exist, and therefore you don't exist. Right?

I don't think that you even dispute the fact that there were no human beings from the dino epoque, I think you are discussing this for fun, trying to find out how far you can go with this absurdities. Or that you're trying to protect Kelly Jay who actually believes that there were dinosaurs living at the same tima s Noah.

So tell me, really, what is your opinion?
(1) Do you really belive that there were human beings 65 million of years ago? (Yes/No)
(2) Do you think there werre dinosaurs at historic times, at the same time when the bible was written? (Yes/No)
(3) Do you think that the Family Flintstone Show is a documentary? (Yes/No)
(4) Are you certain that the moon is *not* made of green cheese? (Yes/No)

I'm certain that there were no human beings 65 million of years ago. Anyone claiming otherwise are just [cencored].