Questions for creationists

[Adalbertus]

Ethelred:
It shows that we discover it.

It claims that we discover it. I don't disagree with that mathematics is a discovering. But what we are discovering is a structure of ourselves (not a structure we made ourselves!).

Nonsense. There is no reason at all to says its a human structure.

Nonsense. If it were not, we wouldn't be able to do maths without constant reference to something outside. This exactly is the difference between maths and natural sciences.

If we couldn't do math by thinking we wouldn't be able to do it at all.

Missed the point. My point was that we can do maths by only thinking. We cannot do physics/chemistry/biology by only thinking. Ok, you can play with physical models, but if you don't test them against experiments, it's just nice physical models.

So that has no meaning to your claim. I allready pointed out the we can do math that is outside our brain capicity to percieve.

You tried to but you didn't. What the omega people (forgot his name) did do they obviously did perceive. What they did not percieve isn't maths anyone did do. The fact that there are things that belong to the realm of maths are outside the grasp of the human brain is no proof that they have a reality outside the human brain. A (admittedly silly) example: nobody knows what aasnvgafhga is, thus it is outside the grasp of the human brain, but it has no reality outside the human brain.

All attempts to disprove it are circular. Yours sure has been anyway.

If you had read my posts you could have observed that I never tried to prove that logic has no existence outside of the human brain. I said that we cannot be sure about logic being a universal truth. Even if we are bound to use it as such (or stop thinking at all).

The thing is that we have some structures in ourselves (logic, maths, but also intuition) which we use to understand what is outside. This is analog to painting a picture. The picture is not the same thing as what is painted.
We have no guarantee that one of those structures in ourselves is a 1:1 correspondence to something found in nature. For intuition it is already disproved by relativity and quantum theory. There is no reason why we never should reach such a point with maths and logic. And maybe we already have reached this point in the probability description of quantum mechanics. We don't know if quantum fluctuations are really random, a god weaving the world or something else. The assumption of a hidden parameter has been disproved, and so we cannot go deeper into it (at the moment, at least).

Logical Realist:
I still would like to see a disproval of Descartes' claim under the assumption that logic is a universal truth.

[Jack_www]

Originally posted by -=Vagrant=-

http://www2.uic.edu/~vuletic/cefec.html#4.7

Explains something about mutation.

http://www2.uic.edu/~vuletic/cefec.html#4.12

We have seen the "birth" of a new species.

I agree with our first scource, yes mutations that occur in the DNA of living things can have a benifical effect on the orginism it occurs in. Say a mutation occured in a plant that allowed its roots to grow longer and make it earier for it to get water would be an example of this, note this is just an example I made up. It would be similar to the orginism in the souce you site have had a mutation occur in them that allows them to consum some sort of toxic waste in their envirment. But most mutations that occur in living things are harmfull or even leathel to the living thing. Also these living things in which the mutations occur are still what they were before the muatation, they have not changed into a new species.

DNA has the ability to repair mutations in its genic code, and does do this all the time.

If evolution were true and interminate forms between the species existed, then there would be evidence of their existence in the fosil record. These missing links are very important to the theory of Evolution. Since the time of Darwin, no such interminate forms between species have been found. If you think this is incorrect show me a fosil between species that has been found, and we will see who is right.

You can change dog through breeding to a limited extent, and in the end they will still be dogs, just different varrieties of them.

[Adalbertus]

If evolution were true and interminate forms between the species existed, then there would be evidence of their existence in the fosil record.

A lot of this evidence already has been found. On the other hand you cannot expect to find too much, because
1) organisms have the tendency to decay. To be conserved over a million years, even bones need special conditions. So remainders of only a little fraction of individuals that lived could be found today
2) Only by chance you can find these remainders. Imagine you would have to dig through all of africa to find one of 10000 cars which are buried in some place you don't have any idea of.

[Jack_www]

Again missunderstanding the stuff I posted. The stats i posted was looking at all the possible proteins that could be formed form any 10 amino acids. I dont see how this is wrong, decitfull or twisting of the facts. Again it most likely most of my fault for not being clear, thought that people would understand this. Again it is based how many different protiens can be formed form any ten amino acids.

Can you explain to me how self reproducing mocules "evolve" as you say? Any studies that have been done on this subject? Have there been any lab experiments with these self reproducing mocules that show that they can change shape over time?

Ethelred
That really isn't the question though. You are still talking about cells and which is not likely to be the first life. Life almost certainly started as a self reproducing molecule and its likely that it wasn't protein.

Some proteins are very short. Most of the short ones are what are called polypeptides. A dozen or so amino acids long. Perhaps less for some, I am not a bio-chemist so I don't know the shortest. Also the length of modern proteins are not likely to be the same as the earliest proteins even after cells were developed.

Also there are two basic kinds of celular life. Prokaryotes and eukaryotes. We are eukaryotes, we have complex cells with a nucleus and what look very much like symbiotic ex bacteria in every single cell called mitochondria. Mitochondria have their own DNA that is seperate from the DNA in the nucleus. Mitocondria are inherented from the female side only. You and I have no mitochondrial DNA from our fathers only our mothers.

Thats one of the bits of evidence against the flood. Only four women on the Ark means we would only have four lines of mitochondrial DNA for whole human race. In 4400 years there isn't enough time to mutate to the level of diversity we see today. That level shows us as being at least 100,000 years old as a species.

Prokaryotes are the simpler form of life. None are multicellur like many eukaryotes are. Bacteria are prokaryotes. They have no nucleus and no mitochondria. The links that follows for ancient cells are all prokaryotes. The protein chains are generally shorter and they don't have as many of the proteins we have, not even in simpler forms. For instance they don't have homeobox genes because those controll cell growth in multicellular life.

Speaking of homeobox genes. Those can produce proteins that are considerably shorter than that example you were using. 60 amino acids. Not exactly 2000 is it. True it isn't a dozen but then it never even devloped untill life had been around for billions of years.

I was never taking about a protein with 2000 amino acids, I said that the cells we see today need 2000 protiens to be able to live and function properly
There have been studies done on mitochondrial DNA to see if humans have common acestery. I will post them latter and comment on them. I want to make sure I back up what I say and that it is not missleading information as you think is the casee with very peice of data or info I post Ethelred. There is a lot of information I have read form scientist that support evolution and I dont think that the info they hgave is twisting of facts. Often times the problem lies in interpeting the evidence. Sometimes scientist think that evidence points to one thing, but latter find out it points to anther. This just happens, because we are human and make misstakes. Also too scientist can be prejudice and missinterpet evidence because of this, on both sides of this debate and when dealing with other fields of study in science.

[Jack_www]

Originally posted by Adalbertus

A lot of this evidence already has been found. On the other hand you cannot expect to find too much, because
1) organisms have the tendency to decay. To be conserved over a million years, even bones need special conditions. So remainders of only a little fraction of individuals that lived could be found today
2) Only by chance you can find these remainders. Imagine you would have to dig through all of africa to find one of 10000 cars which are buried in some place you don't have any idea of.

The fact is these missing links have not been found yet, so how can people who support it claim that it is fact that has been supported with lots of evidence? At the very best we can say it is a theory, or maybe still a hyposthesis, but not a proven scientific fact.

[-=Vagrant=-]

Originally posted by Jack_www

If evolution were true and interminate forms between the species existed, then there would be evidence of their existence in the fosil record. These missing links are very important to the theory of Evolution. Since the time of Darwin, no such interminate forms between species have been found. If you think this is incorrect show me a fosil between species that has been found, and we will see who is right.

Same**** different day (sigh). Read a book, go to a museum of geology, biology, and the rest! If you don't want to find out about this evolution, then don't start...wait! You're just a troll!

You can change dog through breeding to a limited extent, and in the end they will still be dogs, just different varrieties of them.

Guess what? Yes, you are correct! And I agree with you 100%! However, there are new species born due to macroevolution. http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/speciation.html

[Jack the Bodiless]

Zealot:

Aha! So, you don't know the semantic meaning between the word evolution and the word mutation!

Of course I do. Mutation + natural selection = evolution.

Evolution is undeniable. Mutations have been observed (including beneficial mutations), natural selection has been observed, the formation of new species has been observed. Even creationists cannot deny this: that's why they call it "microevolution" and pretend that there is some magical barrier which separates "microevolution" from "macroevolution".

And the existence of DNA repair mechanisms isn't enough to halt evolution. Why should it? They aren't 100% reliable. If they were, then there'd be no problem with antibiotic-resistant "superbugs": the genome of the bug would be continually "reset", preventing the evolution of the resistant strain. This, unfortunately, does not happen.

Jack_www:

If evolution were true and interminate forms between the species existed, then there would be evidence of their existence in the fosil record. These missing links are very important to the theory of Evolution. Since the time of Darwin, no such interminate forms between species have been found. If you think this is incorrect show me a fosil between species that has been found, and we will see who is right.

Many thousands have been found. Archaeopteryx, therapsids, hominids: how many do you want?

Of course, the diehard creationist could still deny the obvious by saying (for instance) that all hominids are either "manlike apes" or "apelike men". But it is blatantly false for them to follow that by claiming "missing links". The links aren't missing. We see exactly what we should be seeing: manlike apes and apelike men. Transitional forms.

[Gibsie]

During a boring shift at work one day, I decided to label every female customer I served as either a girl or a woman, or some type of female who is a transition between the two. The whole night I served about 50 such customers, and at the end I had about 35 women to 15 girls- no transitional types. There were some women with girly features and some girls with more woman-like characteristics, but no clear transition between the two types. Good thing I'm not a Creationist, or this would lead me to believe that girls do not turn into women, they we're just created like that...

[Jack_www]

In all the examples you state of claiming new species are being formed through evolution, are they really new species?

Like I said, mutations occur in living things. Most often then not, these mutations are leathal, or at very least harmfull giving the living organism a dissanvantage. These mutations are random accendents. What I was refering to is transional links between spcies. With example of flight. In the fosil record we see no interminate stages of animals with partly formed wings which could have been used for something else. All fosil of flying animals have fully formed wings, and all of them can fly. I looked at the link Ethelred gave me, have to look at it some more, but the fosil they had in there which many scientist believe is first diansore evolving to bird, acuatlly have feather and other features birds have which are fully formed, no interminate forms. If birds evolved from reptiles or simlar animals we would see interminate forms of various features we see on bird today, which we dont. They also adimited that they dont really know how the ablilty of fight came into being, and dont have any fosil records to show how it evolved.

I am familar with these ape-man, what ever you like to call them, like fosils. Some of these so called ape-men are based on a single fargement of jaw bone. I will site such examples.
They can be variations in a certain species, or type of animal, but it is limited to an extent. Dogs will always be dogs, cats will always be cats, bacterria wil always be baccterria, trees will always be tress. We have a great varties of each kind, but they will never evolve into something else.

Again the best we can say with evolution is that it is a theory, and nothing more. It has many problems with it and much of it is based on guess work and conjecture. Hypothesis mostly. Yet so many claim that evolution is an established fact.

Also many scientist who support the theory of evolution do admit that the fosil record contains many wholes, missing links.
All I ask is for people to at least see that life being created is not some idea with no basis. Why cant you accept the possiblity that life was created? For a truely objective study of the evidence we must be opened to both possiblities. But only one is right. There are many people who believe many strange things about the earth bieing created, and they might not even look at any kind of scienefic evidence. Many who claim to believe in the Bible have ruthlessly supressed anyone who changled their beliefs. They have missintreputed the Bible and have twisted it to make it fit there own beliefs. But please do not group all people who believe that life was created with such people. And even if I believed in evolution, I would think the idea that life was created could be a very valid explanation on how life got here.

Does not it seems somewhat logical to conclude that something as complicated as life could be created?

[Jack the Bodiless]

Like I said, mutations occur in living things. Most often then not, these mutations are leathal, or at very least harmfull giving the living organism a dissanvantage. These mutations are random accendents.

True, but irrelevant. It doesn't actually matter how many mutations are harmful: only that some are beneficial. Even if 99.999% are harmful, natural selection eliminates them.

What I was refering to is transional links between spcies. With example of flight. In the fosil record we see no interminate stages of animals with partly formed wings which could have been used for something else. All fosil of flying animals have fully formed wings, and all of them can fly. I looked at the link Ethelred gave me, have to look at it some more, but the fosil they had in there which many scientist believe is first diansore evolving to bird, acuatlly have feather and other features birds have which are fully formed, no interminate forms. If birds evolved from reptiles or simlar animals we would see interminate forms of various features we see on bird today, which we dont. They also adimited that they dont really know how the ablilty of fight came into being, and dont have any fosil records to show how it evolved.

Arcaeopteryx has teeth and wing claws, and a skeleton virtually identical to some land-based creatures of the period. In fact, the resemblance is so good that some creationists have tried to claim that Arcaeopteryx is a fake: that the feathers aren't genuine. It appears from the fossil record that feathers evolved before flight did, possibly as insulation.

I am familar with these ape-man, what ever you like to call them, like fosils. Some of these so called ape-men are based on a single fargement of jaw bone. I will site such examples.

And what about the many skeletons? And the fact that the hominids appear between early apes and humans in the sequence?

They can be variations in a certain species, or type of animal, but it is limited to an extent. Dogs will always be dogs, cats will always be cats, bacterria wil always be baccterria, trees will always be tress. We have a great varties of each kind, but they will never evolve into something else.

Dogs and cats are both Carnivora, which are a subset of Mammals, itself a subset of Vertebrates... and so on. All living things, and all fossils, can be placed on the branching "tree of life" structure of evolution. There is no visible barrier between "kinds".

Again the best we can say with evolution is that it is a theory, and nothing more. It has many problems with it and much of it is based on guess work and conjecture. Hypothesis mostly. Yet so many claim that evolution is an established fact.

The process of evolution is fact. The common descent of all living organisms from shared ancestors is also fact (as shown by DNA analysis etc). The only "hypothesis" is that the fact of evolution is sufficient to account for the fact of common descent: it appears to be sufficient.

Also many scientist who support the theory of evolution do admit that the fosil record contains many wholes, missing links.

Of course. We don't have a fossil of every creature that ever lived. But the general pattern is quite clear. We evolved from apes, which evolved from other primates, which evolved from other mammals, which evolved from the therapsids, which evolved from reptiles, which evolved from amphibians, which evolved from fish, which evolved from eel-like vertabrates. This is clear from the pattern of similarities in living organisms, the pattern of DNA relationships, and the fossil record.

Does not it seems somewhat logical to conclude that something as complicated as life could be created?

It's possible that some other creative force might have been at work, but there is no evidence of this. It is NOT logical to conclude that species were individually created over millions of years in a sequence which so precisely mimics common descent. It's rather like arguing that the Earth is flat but appears round due to a series of bizarre optical illusions.

[Lung]

Originally posted by Gibsie
During a boring shift at work one day, I decided to label every female customer I served as either a girl or a woman, or some type of female who is a transition between the two. The whole night I served about 50 such customers, and at the end I had about 35 women to 15 girls- no transitional types. There were some women with girly features and some girls with more woman-like characteristics, but no clear transition between the two types. Good thing I'm not a Creationist, or this would lead me to believe that girls do not turn into women, they we're just created like that...

Girl with womanly features - "Sir, why are you perving on my breasts?"

Gibsie - "Don't worry. Your ample bosom's attractiveness is of no concern to me. I am simply conducting a study on human evolution".

Is that what you tell all the girls?

[Ethelred]

Originally posted by Zealot


Why am I not surprised?

Because you know he will tell the truth. The answer to your question was and is evolution.

That's only sparkling in your own mind, buddy. Otherwise we wouldn't be discussing this subject.

In his mind, the mind of nearly every single biologist on Earth and in the evidence the Earth itself shows us.

[QUOTE]
I find it amazing how evolutionists take a side so easily, without thinking on how important or not are some missing links to give the minimum credit to the theory! Yet, you defend it with all your energy![.QUOTE]

Its the simple truth. To deny it would be to deny reality.

So, since I can't think for you (despite thinking for myself), we will never talk about details, because you don't know any details on the subject.

You haven't had a single thought of your own here. You have been parroting creationist nonsense.

You keep blending mutation with evolution! And while I do backup that mutations occur, causing deformations on a specie suffering from the mutating event, it does NOT cause a new specie!

Its not a blend. Mutation drives evolution. Selection directs it. It can and does create new species. The evidence is clear. The biology is clear. Genetics show how it works. Biologists use the theory to create new foods.

That's why I keep saying that there's no evolution, while you say there's lot's of evidence on evolution! So keep in mind that there isn't! Only evidence for mutations!

You keep saying because you think you would be denying the Bible otherwise. You have no other reason for saying it. The evidence is overwhelming. Only a tightly shuttered mind can deny it.

But they'll always be dogs, won't they?
Are your grandparents creating a new specie? No, they aren't.

Our umpteen great grandparents WERE a new species. Dogs ancient ancestors were once a new species. A new species could be made from dogs with perserverence over a long time. You would still call them dogs but only to continue to deny evolution.

Uuuuuuh, yeah, tons of piles! Too bad no one knows where those piles may be, or what they might have as evidence!

He knows where to find it. I know where to find it. You don't want to know thats all.

Here are places you can go to see real evidence.

THE site for information on evolution

http://www.talkorigins.org/

A biology magazine

http://www.the-scientist.com/homepage.htm

UC Berkeley's Paleontology site.

http://www.the-scientist.com/homepage.htm

Reality vs. the ICR regarding the fossil known as Lucy

http://www.eskimo.com/~pierres/lucy.html#retraction

Specially for you.
Frequently Encountered Criticisms in Evolution vs. Creationism:

http://icarus.uic.edu/~vuletic/cefec.html#1.1

But you don't need to use the Bible argument Lung. If I didn't, why do you? I'm debating from a scientific standpoint! Am I bothering anyone this way?

You are denying the scientific viewpoint. For religious reasons.

[Ethelred]

Originally posted by Zealot


That's just it?
So, what's important after all? (Like you were going to tell us)

Follow the links I posted. Take a class in biology.

If they aren't scientific, then you can easily counter-argument them.

They have been. You merely wave your hands and deny it.

Like to what I do with your statements over and over!

Handwaving is what you have been doing.

It is true that there are fallacies in several creationists arguments, as you stated in earlier posts, but that doesn't apply to what I say, and I don't care about what others say wrong.
If others are ignorant, it doesn't make me an ignorant too.

You have been using standard falacious creationist arguements. All have been refuted many times.

Its true the ignorance of others does not make you ignorant. But you are borrowing from these ignorant people and are actively avoiding learning. Only you can make yourself ignorant in this era of the internet.

Aha! So, you don't know the semantic meaning between the word evolution and the word mutation!
Well I sugest you check it! Because a mutation doesn't cause evolution! You can see that in the fruit fly experiments! They mutated, they bred mutated flies, but:
1. They didn't stop being fruit flies
2. They were all weaker than the unmutated fruit flies

Not all just most, which is to be expected with mutations. There are fruit flys that have had none of the damaging mutations. Fruit flys have been bred with mutations that allow them to live twice as long as normal fruit flies.

http://abcnews.go.com/sections/science/DailyNews/fruitfly001215.html

No they are not a seperate species. However the could become a seperate species given enough time and mutations.

Hey wiseguy, how many missing passages are there in the Bible that weren't translated because no one could explain it?

How many were left out because someone didn't like what they said?

If you don't understand the Bible in your native language, that's another problem.

Perhaps you should learn Hebrew well enough to think in it. Many people do. Not just in Israel either.

If you must have the original language as your native language then the Bible really isn't worth much to those that don't speak BOTH Hebrew and Greek as their native languages. So follow your own thinking and give up on it because you claim you can't understand it.

[Ethelred]

Originally posted by Adalbertus

It claims that we discover it. I don't disagree with that mathematics is a discovering. But what we are discovering is a structure of ourselves (not a structure we made ourselves!).

Show some evidence that multidimensional space equations are inherent in the human mind.

Nonsense. If it were not, we wouldn't be able to do maths without constant reference to something outside. This exactly is the difference between maths and natural sciences.

We do math with constant reference to things outside the human mind. Calculus was invented by Newton to help him deal with his theory of Gravity.

So the nonsense is yours. Unless you can show something resembling support for you handwaving.

Missed the point. My point was that we can do maths by only thinking. We cannot do physics/chemistry/biology by only thinking. Ok, you can play with physical models, but if you don't test them against experiments, it's just nice physical models.

I didn't miss the point. You didn't have one. You still don't. Show me were the Mandelbrot quation is hiding in the human mind.

You tried to but you didn't. What the omega people (forgot his name) did do they obviously did perceive. What they did not percieve isn't maths anyone did do. The fact that there are things that belong to the realm of maths are outside the grasp of the human brain is no proof that they have a reality outside the human brain. A (admittedly silly) example: nobody knows what aasnvgafhga is, thus it is outside the grasp of the human brain, but it has no reality outside the human brain.

That we can grasp something does not mean it is part of the human brain. That is mere handwaving AND it ignore the reality of modern physics. Phyisics is advancing in Quantum Theory by people looking at what the math tells them despite the fact that is against the way the human mind thinks.

If you had read my posts you could have observed that I never tried to prove that logic has no existence outside of the human brain. I said that we cannot be sure about logic being a universal truth. Even if we are bound to use it as such (or stop thinking at all).

I obviously read your posts. You never tried to prove anything. All you are doing is engaging in a freshman bull session with carefull avoidence of what it means. If we can't use our minds to think about things we are just giving up. All you are doing is saying GIVE UP while using logic yourself.

We have no guarantee that one of those structures in ourselves is a 1:1 correspondence to something found in nature.

In fact we have proven quite well that WE DON'T have a one to one correspondence with the Universe. Or math.

For intuition it is already disproved by relativity and quantum theory. There is no reason why we never should reach such a point with maths and logic.

Glad you noticed. Now put that with your claim that math is part of the human mind and notice the contradiction. Then toss out your thinking about math being nothing a but a product of evolution.

And maybe we already have reached this point in the probability description of quantum mechanics. We don't know if quantum fluctuations are really random, a god weaving the world or something else.

The evidence and the math show it to be random. If a god is doing that it is very busy making every single sub atomic particle appear random without actually being so.

Logical Realist:
I still would like to see a disproval of Descartes' claim under the assumption that logic is a universal truth.

It can't be disproved but it can be derided as intelectual m@sturbation which is all it is.

[Ethelred]

Originally posted by Jack_www
If evolution were true and interminate forms between the species existed, then there would be evidence of their existence in the fosil record. These missing links are very important to the theory of Evolution.

There are no missing links. This simple to see in that there ARE NO LINKS. Every species is an intermediate form. Except for the ones that go extinct.

Since the time of Darwin, no such interminate forms between species have been found.

Of course they have. They aren't intermediate in any sense you are using they simply are a species that later evolved to become another species. Like Australopithecus Afarensis. Its not an ape except in the same sense we are. They aren't men either. Even the creationist can't figure out where to put Lucy but since they have to LIE that there are no imediate species they call Lucy EITHER an ape or a human. Different creationists put call Lucy different things. But they all pretend Lucy isn't intermediate.

So there is one intermediate for you.

If you think this is incorrect show me a fosil between species that has been found, and we will see who is right.

Some of these have been posted here allready. I get the feeling they are being avoided by the believers.

The fifth section on intermediate forms and Creationist obfuscation regarding them.

http://icarus.uic.edu/~vuletic/cefec.html#1.1

Lucy

http://www.eskimo.com/~pierres/lucy.html#retraction

Transitional Vertebrate Fossils FAQ

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/faq-transitional.html

Macro Evolution

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/comdesc/

You can change dog through breeding to a limited extent, and in the end they will still be dogs, just different varrieties of them.

That is only evidence that you don't understand the time involved. We have breeding dogs for a short period of time. They once were something that was not a dog before we started messing with them.

From Transitional Vertebrate Fossils FAQ link above

Dogs:

Cynodictis (late Eocene) -- First known arctoid (undifferentiated dog/bear).

Hesperocyon (early Oligocene) -- A later arctoid. Compared to miacids like Paroodectes, limbs have elongated, carnassials are more specialized, braincase is larger. From here, the main line of canid evolution can be traced in North America, with bears branching out into a Holarctic distribution.

Cynodesmus (Miocene) -- First true dog. The dog lineage continued through Tomarctus (Pliocene) to the modern dogs, wolves, & foxes, Canis (Pleistocene).

So much for dogs not changing.