A Question for Creationists

[-=Vagrant=-]

Originally posted by Jack the Bodiless
I think we can assume Vagrant was being sarcastic!

What on Eath makes you think so? Sorry, LDiCesare.

[VictorB212]

Ethelred
If he claimed ALL the information must have been in the first life he is bleeding moron. I don't think he said something so ignorant from what I have seen of his claims.

I am sorry for being misleading—I meant the majority of information. Nevertheless, you pay no attention to Behe, so this is largely irrelevant.

When I speak of random, I mean according to the laws of nature. Another way of wording it would be unguided – i.e. no designer was involved, no intelligent lifeform.

You claim Behe’s odds where wholly manufactured and made up – do the figures Evolutionists come up have any better foundation? Or do Evolutionists just avoid the issue (we are here, so we must have evolved/all the other pieces fit together, so this one probably does too)?

Evolution makes no claims about god one way or the other. However it does show that life as presently exists can evolve from simpler forms to reach the point we are now at. That does mean a god is not required but it does not say the one can't exist, in fact it says nothing about god on its own, except of course it does show Genesis wrong but that is unintional and comes from the evidence not from a desire to disprove. If the only reason you don't want accept the reality of evolution is because it would make it possible that your belief is wrong than your belief isn't worth much. Beliefs that depend on denial are worthless.

First of all you seem to be arguing against a point that I did not make. I said that Evolution claims that no intelligent designer is needed. You use weighted statements like “the reality of evolution” – remember that I accept microevolution, but not macro. Reread the quote I made of Sir Julian Huxley – for him, evolution provided him a way to deny that a “creator-god” existed, and thus he could do anything he wanted and not be ultimately held accountable. Thus, I could call your beliefs ones that depend on denial. My point is that such comments are useless in such a discussion as this.

You claim creationists lie. Well, the truth is that you Evolutionists lie too. Remember Piltdown Man? That lie survived for a few decades, if I remember correctly.

You appear to be utterly arrogant in that I am the misinformed one and you are 100% correct. I don’t think any of us here aren’t misinformed to some extent. Let me make sure: are you clear on my distinction between micro and macro evolution?

You took my statement about two scientists in Alaska way too seriously. It was merely an illustration – you seem to claim that there is 0% dissent about macroevolution and abiogenesis, persecuting those who doubt. That seems awfully like the Spanish Inquisition to me.

With respect to the bacteria which can metabolize nylon when a certain enzyme is mutated – once again you play with definitions. I meant “feature” as in a new membrane, arm, leg, or something like that. The fact that an enzyme can go from metabolizing one material to another proves NOTHING about how that enzyme could have originated – it only presents the possibility that when one DNA pair shift a whole sequence over, that could provide new, unparalleled capabilities. Can you understand my point here? If not, we will need to degenerate into definitions first.

There is no difference between micro and macro evolution except time. Since there is billions of years of time that covers the time apsect very well indeed.

Microevolution has been observed. Macroevolution has never been observed. You will tear the aforementioned statement apart, saying that either the only limitation is time, or your bacteria example proves it. Wait a few more posts before you do that; I think my points will become more refined and clear.

I think that paragraph shows pretty clearly that you DO believe in the Flood. So its clear that science is not something you tolerate since it clearly shows the Flood never happened.

You severely underestimate me. I mean this to prove a point, not brag or be arrogant: several people have told me that I am one of the top if not the top student in my high school (out of ~250 students, a wealthy suburb). I think you are interpreting things incorrectly if you say science proved that the flood never happened. I have a feeling (I have not investigated the flood evidence much at all to be honest) that scientists have to make some fundamental assumptions about what the flood was in order to prove it wrong – assumptions that are not necessarily valid. Right now I don’t see investigating the flood as a good use of my time – I’d rather learn about why Evolutionists think mutations can provide the building block for evolution of new organs, etc.

You want my position. I believe that when interpreted in a certain way, scientific evidence can point to the need for an intelligent designer. Until I can demonstrate this, you will attack anything I say with the “Evolution is a FACT” attitude. My position of the flood and God creating the earth is faith. There is very little evidence for my faith; that is why it is faith. When a scientist attacks a theory, does he always have to provide an alternate theory? I openly admit that my belief in the Bible and of the God it describes is all built on faith – I thought I had never denied that in this thread. What I am pushing is intelligent design, something that is not a religion.

Class is over -- more to come.

[VictorB212]

Zhu Yuanzhang, you blatantly ignored my request for the transitional statistics. Here is a refined version of the question: Darwin himself stated that there was a problematic lack of transitional fossils. For some guy I forget the name of (he was actually a Chrisitan) had classified most of the species into well defined groups (the same classification system used today), and there were very few that could bridge the gaps between these well defined groups. As far as I know, people like Gould who thought up "punctuated equilibrium" did so because of this astounding lack of transitional fossils. I am unaware of the complete (or even 25%) filling of these gaps. I apologize for the history lesson, but it seems that you will not understand the question if not fully explained. As usual, please point out where I'm wrong and I will try to clarify.

Other way round, ID has to come up with a sorting mechanism that can tell the difference between something natural and something designed. Behe tried irreducible complexity, which didn't pan out, and there's no real replacement that I'm aware of.

I was unaware that this is how science works. Behe's point was not of a sorting mechanism (was that what he did?) -- his point was that successive mutations of any sort could not produce certain organs/processes. Evolutionists have made a claim that successive mutations can form organs (please allow this poetic license) -- I am not convinced. You are the only person I know who claims that ID'ers have to come up with such a "sorting mechanism."

Quote by Jack:

When a chunk has been duplicated, further point mutations in the duplicated section can produce a new trait without knocking out something essential…

My point is that this cannot do much more than alter an enzyme, so please provide me with more examples .

Gotta go again (wrote this during lunch).

[Bosh]

Remember Piltdown Man? That lie survived for a few decades, if I remember correctly.

Until debunked by "evolutionists" . There's dozens of equally phony creationists claims (dinosaur and human footprint next to each other etc.) any creationists don't engage in anywhere near as much scrutiny of evidence that appears to support their position as "evolutionists" do, hell with a very few exceptions such scrutiny is non-existant.

You appear to be utterly arrogant in that I am the misinformed one and you are 100% correct.

No, just that evolution is the only theory on the table that comes anywhere close to explaining reality (unless you want to go solopistic or something).

persecuting those who doubt. That seems awfully like the Spanish Inquisition to me.

In science everything gets "persecuted" via peer review, and there is 99% consensus on the major issues.

I meant “feature” as in a new membrane, arm, leg, or something like that

The way evolution generally works is coopting existing "features" for new uses, not having them pop out of thin air. And there are mutant strains of fruit flies with extra lets etc. etc.

Macroevolution has never been observed.

Things like the mamalian ear show a clear progessions from jaw bones to earbones through a thousand small steps. Of course it can't be 100% that these changes happened via evolution, but all these changes are pretty "micro" (meaningless distinction really) and since its been established that "micro" happens...

What I am pushing is intelligent design, something that is not a religion.

How so?

For some guy I forget the name of (he was actually a Chrisitan) had classified most of the species into well defined groups

Well when you classify animal you classify them into groups and are then surprised that all the animals that you classified are in groups? I know what you're getting at but unless you provide a clearer definition of "transitional" 90% of the fossil record is "transitional" (ie it descented from something and something else descended from it).

You are the only person I know who claims that ID'ers have to come up with such a "sorting mechanism."

There's another IDer (whose name escapes me) who does more Comp Sci sorts of stuff who's working on this very issue, this is nothing terribly origonal on my part but ID doesn't get very far unless there's a good simple way of telling wether something is designed or now, otherwise its a rather silly exercise in obscure biology where the ID finds something and says "ooooh I bet you can't figure out how this evolved," then it gets figured out, and the IDer moves on to the next biological oddity, quite futile really.

[Rogan Josh]

Originally posted by Aeson
Free will is a nice concept (for human ego), but it doesn't have any chance to work with an omniscient being. God would have had to have known what choices we would make before he created us. That means there must be some sort of predictable mechanism for our choices. Thus by creating us as he did, he would have predestined our choices.

Actually, free-will is not a problem for an omniscient God. If God were omnipotent he must be considered as outside time and therefore not bound by causality. There is no contradiction there because He runs the show. To put it another way, the objection to causality violation is that it causes observations wich are inconsistent with one another - by having a cosmic referee to censor tese contriadictions there is no problem. Causality violation is allowed if it causes no observable consequences.

Funnily enough, free-will is not consistent within the current framework of science. Unless one completely restructures the way in which science is done, one has to throw away the concept of free-will. I made a thread on this a while ago (intended from a scientific rather than religious perspective).

As for Ethel, maybe his arrogance fooled me into thinking he was an atheist. You have to admit that he certainly does not behave as if he would ever entertain the idea of a creator.

[Aeson]

Originally posted by Rogan Josh
There is no contradiction there because He runs the show. To put it another way, the objection to causality violation is that it causes observations wich are inconsistent with one another - by having a cosmic referee to censor tese contriadictions there is no problem. Causality violation is allowed if it causes no observable consequences.

I wasn't talking about God's free will, but our own.

If I were to hold a bowling ball over your head and drop it, the bowling ball didn't choose to hit you in the head, and neither did the principles of gravity. I made that choice if I understand how gravity will affect the ball. An omniscient being would obviously have a perfect understanding of the consequences of any of his actions, even if he is omnipotent and instigates those consequences.

With an omniscient creator, the outcome was known, and thus predestined. I don't see any room for human free will, except as an illusion.

Funnily enough, free-will is not consistent within the current framework of science. Unless one completely restructures the way in which science is done, one has to throw away the concept of free-will. I made a thread on this a while ago (intended from a scientific rather than religious perspective).

I agree that free will doesn't exist from a scientific standpoint. That was what I meant by:

There's still a problem with free will and causality though. Even if you allow for randomness that doesn't allow for choice.

[Ethelred]

Originally posted by Rogan Josh
Actually, free-will is not a problem for an omniscient God. If God were omnipotent he must be considered as outside time and therefore not bound by causality. There is no contradiction there because He runs the show. To put it another way, the objection to causality violation is that it causes observations wich are inconsistent with one another - by having a cosmic referee to censor tese contriadictions there is no problem. Causality violation is allowed if it causes no observable consequences.

Its not the god that is constrained by causality. Its us. We are fixed at the start if god knows what the results will be for given starting condition.

Funnily enough, free-will is not consistent within the current framework of science. Unless one completely restructures the way in which science is done, one has to throw away the concept of free-will. I made a thread on this a while ago (intended from a scientific rather than religious perspective).

Well Free Will as you think of it isn't something that anyone can show as being a real thing. So you are basing your conclusions on a purely hypothetical idea.

As for Ethel, maybe his arrogance fooled me into thinking he was an atheist. You have to admit that he certainly does not behave as if he would ever entertain the idea of a creator.

A physisicist is calling me arrogant. Talk about the pot and the kettle.

I can entertain the idea of a creator. So far I see no reason to consider one likely but some kind is possible. You, as most of christians do in this discusion, think your version of god is the only one that can exist. So when I show that it cannot exist you mistake that for saying no possible god can exist.

[Ethelred]

Originally posted by VictorB212
I am sorry for being misleading—I meant the majority of information. Nevertheless, you pay no attention to Behe, so this is largely irrelevant.

I paid enough attention to him to find out that he wrong.

When I speak of random, I mean according to the laws of nature. Another way of wording it would be unguided – i.e. no designer was involved, no intelligent lifeform.

I am merely trying to avoid false claims that its purely random. That is a standard and false claim by Creationist. If you use it like they do I will point out that it is wrong.

You claim Behe’s odds where wholly manufactured and made up – do the figures Evolutionists come up have any better foundation? Or do Evolutionists just avoid the issue (we are here, so we must have evolved/all the other pieces fit together, so this one probably does too)?

There is no evidence to base the odds on except of course for some of the lab data. What little lab data there is does not support Behe's chosen numbers. Biologists have neither avoided the issue nor come up with an answer. Its being researched. To pretend you have an answer when you clearly don't is really bad science. Behe did exactly that.

First of all you seem to be arguing against a point that I did not make. I said that Evolution claims that no intelligent designer is needed.

It makes no statement about a god at all. It does however show that one is not needed for the many changes that have occured in life over millions of years.

You use weighted statements like “the reality of evolution” – remember that I accept microevolution, but not macro.

If you accept microevolution than you accepting the reality of evolution. On top of which the only difference between micro and macro evolution is time.

Reread the quote I made of Sir Julian Huxley – for him, evolution provided him a way to deny that a “creator-god” existed, and thus he could do anything he wanted and not be ultimately held accountable. Thus, I could call your beliefs ones that depend on denial. My point is that such comments are useless in such a discussion as this.

Huxley was speaking for himself. It did give him a way to say the a god was not needed for life to evolve. It says nothing about the Universe.

You could lie that I depend on denial. You couldn't say it honestly.

You claim creationists lie. Well, the truth is that you Evolutionists lie too. Remember Piltdown Man? That lie survived for a few decades, if I remember correctly.

How do you know that an 'Evolutionist' created Piltdown Man? One candidate for the hoax is Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. The other is Dawson himself. Whoever it was it was only one man. Only one instance and it was Anthropologists that cleared up the problem. The two men, and many other Anthropologists, had noticed that Eoanthropus Dawsoni made no sense in the light of other evidence. Thus it was science that found the problem. Few if any Creationista have ever exposed the MANY fraudulent and just plain ignorant Creationist claims.

You appear to be utterly arrogant in that I am the misinformed one and you are 100% correct. I don’t think any of us here aren’t misinformed to some extent. Let me make sure: are you clear on my distinction between micro and macro evolution?

Funny how I get called arrogant for telling the truth by believers. They can't deny with evidence so I get called things.

First you are not telling the truth in you efforts to paint me as claiming to be 100% percent correct. I don't think anyone but a Creationist has ever made that claim for themselves.

I am clear on you mistaken distinction between micro and macro. You have nothing to support your claim that there is such a difference in the real world.

You took my statement about two scientists in Alaska way too seriously. It was merely an illustration – you seem to claim that there is 0% dissent about macroevolution and abiogenesis, persecuting those who doubt. That seems awfully like the Spanish Inquisition to me.

If you deliberatly mistate reality I will call you on it. It was more than just a tiny exageration on your part. However not as much as you pretend as very few scientist can hide from reality like the Creationist do. I never ever claimed Zero dissent. People are really good at denying reality. That is why Creationists exist.

With respect to the bacteria which can metabolize nylon when a certain enzyme is mutated – once again you play with definitions.

Rather it is you that are playing with definitions. That was definitly a new feature.

I meant “feature” as in a new membrane, arm, leg, or something like that.

Flying squirels fit that concept quite well. So now you have an example of a macro feature in transition. Another is the panda's thumb. Both are real features. So is having extra fingers or toes for that matter.

We allready covered eyes quite well. That too fits your creeping featurism.

The fact that an enzyme can go from metabolizing one material to another proves NOTHING about how that enzyme could have originated – it only presents the possibility that when one DNA pair shift a whole sequence over, that could provide new, unparalleled capabilities.

Sure it shows how it can happen. There really is nothing in way of difficulty in understanding how it can happen and someone else here allready showed you with that specific example of how it could happen. The gene sequence could have been coppied twice and one version shifted and the other remaining as the original did. That sort of thing is known to happen. We have seven different forms of hemoglobin not counting the kind that leads to sickle cell anemia. Most of them are used prior to birth. One is the form we use after birth.

Hemoglobin is made up four subunits. Two different pairs. One pair looks exactly like its a mutated form of the other pair. A case of evolution through duplication and then specialization of the duplicate.

Its likely that poisonous bites came about the same way. A gene for a digestive enzyme is duplicated and one copy does the original job freeing up the other to mutate into something else like a killing enzyme.

Can you understand my point here? If not, we will need to degenerate into definitions first.

I understood your point long ago. Before you expressed it. Its based on lack of understanding of how the genes work. You simply don't seem to have a clue about duplication and specialization. It was pointed out to you before yet you still act as if it wasn't.

Microevolution has been observed. Macroevolution has never been observed.

We have only been looking for a short time. However macroevolution can easily be seen in the fossil record. Of course we do also have things like flying squirels as well.

You will tear the aforementioned statement apart, saying that either the only limitation is time, or your bacteria example proves it.

I did both. I also gave more examples. You have done nothing to show that even your version of macroevolution is impossible. You allready had your eye ploy shot down.

Wait a few more posts before you do that; I think my points will become more refined and clear.

I doubt it. Still there is no reason that I shouldn't adress what you say now.

You severely underestimate me. I mean this to prove a point, not brag or be arrogant: several people have told me that I am one of the top if not the top student in my high school (out of ~250 students, a wealthy suburb).

That is good evidence that I haven't underestimated you. You don't know any genetics or anything else that is mostly learned in college. For instance do you even read Scientific American? I am not questioning your inteligence. I am questioning your knowledge and you clear lack of it on many things that are relevant to this discussion.

I think you are interpreting things incorrectly if you say science proved that the flood never happened. I have a feeling (I have not investigated the flood evidence much at all to be honest) that scientists have to make some fundamental assumptions about what the flood was in order to prove it wrong – assumptions that are not necessarily valid. Right now I don’t see investigating the flood as a good use of my time – I’d rather learn about why Evolutionists think mutations can provide the building block for evolution of new organs, etc.

You may think what you want. However I will continue to point out the errors. I don't have to make a lot of assumptions about the Flood. Its described adequatly in the Bible. A world wide flood covering the highest mountain and intended to kill all that breathed and all mankind. Thats a pretty darn big flood. And the Bible has ample information to fix it in time to a high enough degree of accuracy. That time is 4400 years ago give or take about 100 years assuming they have the right date for Temple and Solomon. At least I think that is what the baseline is. The baseling date could be too late by 300 years if one theory about the standard Egyptian timeline is correct. So the most you can move it back is 400 years. Thats still with written history. No one in Egypt or Sumeria noticed that everyone had been killed. I think they would notice a thing like that.

On top of which. There is no geophysical evidence to support a worldwide flood. The genetic evidence is more clear that humans were not down to four related men and four unrelated women. Few if any species have any indication in their genes that they were down to just two individual 4400 years ago. Nearly ALL species of life should show that. A few could show seven pairs of ancestors 4400 years ago. Those would all be the 'clean' animals.

The evidence for the flood consists of some really poorly researched claims of flood stories that are nowhere near as consistent as the Creationists claim. Some claims about geology that actually disproves the flood despite the Creationist claim that its evidence for it. Thats it really. Nothing that can stand up to thought for long.

You want my position. I believe that when interpreted in a certain way, scientific evidence can point to the need for an intelligent designer.

Only if you don't want to think about how things could happen without one. Like Behe did.

Until I can demonstrate this, you will attack anything I say with the “Evolution is a FACT” attitude.

Well since you do accept microevolution than you are accepting that evolution is a fact.

My position of the flood and God creating the earth is faith. There is very little evidence for my faith; that is why it is faith.

I am not impressed by faith. Especially a faith that requires a world that is not the one we live in.

When a scientist attacks a theory, does he always have to provide an alternate theory?

No and am pretty sure you agree with that. Which is why its disenguous of you to insist that we must have evidence of macroevolution, evidence that you will admit is incontrovertible, to say that an inteligent designer need not exist. All we have to do is to show that your particular ID does not exist. The fact that the Flood didn't happen show that Jehovah does not exist. At least not the Jehovah of Genesis.

I openly admit that my belief in the Bible and of the God it describes is all built on faith – I thought I had never denied that in this thread. What I am pushing is intelligent design, something that is not a religion.

Class is over -- more to come.

Inteligent design is religion. Its a belief about a god. In your case you have a very specific god in mind at that.

[VictorB212]

Zhu Yuanzhang:
When I said “persecute”, I meant persecuting the person, not the idea.

And there are mutant strains of fruit flies with extra lets etc. etc.

Excuse me for any ignorance, but the fact that fruit flies can mutate and be born with extra legs proves very little besides that an existing organ that already exists can be duplicated – it does not explain how legs could have come about in the first place.

Things like the mamalian ear show a clear progessions from jaw bones to earbones through a thousand small steps. Of course it can't be 100% that these changes happened via evolution, but all these changes are pretty "micro" (meaningless distinction really) and since its been established that "micro" happens...

Be careful of this argument. What you are saying is that since the progression observed (in fossils? I am not sure how disputed that is) comes close to proving the fact that they evolved that way. I would like to examine the process by which this new feature can come about via random (I believe it is pretty random in this case) mutations.

Intelligent design starts from the premise that random mutations (selected by natural selection) cannot explain the genetic information observed today. It argues from within science, no matter how much you don’t like that Evolution is being attacked from a scientific standpoint.

I meant “transitional” as a fossil that provides a link between two distinct groups. You continually play with the definition of that word. Could you address punctuated equilibrium, by Stephen Jay Gould, who thought it up because he did not see support for gradual evolution in the fossil record? Are the quotations (you have probably heard them; I can find them if need be) by paleontologists that the fossil record is severely lacking obsolete, or were they false from the beginning? Are you saying that if you were to show Darwin the fossil record as it is today, he would be totally satisfied? Maybe defining transitional as a fossil linking distinct groups of organisms would be useful. Do any of you know of any good resources where I could see how the fossil record in Darwin’s time “grew” into that of today? Or do you dispute Darwin’s claim that at his time, the fossil record clearly did not support Evolution? (Please note that I am just curious as to how the fossil record has suddenly become so supporting of Evolution.)

On free will vs. predestination: it is a very interesting paradox. Sort of like particle-wave duality. One way to word it is that God knew what “free will choices” you were going to make. I find it curious how you challenge me when I say that I can either post here or not, it is truly up to me. Your example of the bowling ball is silly – bowling balls aren’t sentient and therefore do not make choices. We can’t make any choice we want – we can’t defy gravity (at least until someone discovers the graviton particle). You probably know that this specific topic is debated and has been debated for centuries by Christians. Thus, do not expect to get anywhere.

Gotta go – more to come as usual.

Do any of you still claim that I am close minded? If so, please explain how. (Remember that I won’t just accept many of your claims, but I am asking for you to “show me the way.”)

[Ethelred]

Originally posted by VictorB212
Excuse me for any ignorance, but the fact that fruit flies can mutate and be born with extra legs proves very little besides that an existing organ that already exists can be duplicated – it does not explain how legs could have come about in the first place.

OK your excused. It shows how things can be adapted for other things. Its likely that legs started as a way to swim before arthropoda came onto the land. A leg can be merely something that stuck out of a segmented worm to start with. As the segments undulate the projection does as well driving the creature along the bottom.

For us legs clearly came from fins. Now of course you will ask where the fins came from. You figure can out how it could have happened as an exercise in understanding how things can evolve rather than your continuing efforts to deny that it happens.

Be careful of this argument. What you are saying is that since the progression observed (in fossils? I am not sure how disputed that is) comes close to proving the fact that they evolved that way. I would like to examine the process by which this new feature can come about via random (I believe it is pretty random in this case) mutations.

Whats to be carefull about? It does prove it. Only your need to deny evolution has you claiming it doesn't.

Go buy the Blind Watchmaker by Richard Dawkins. He does exactly that with eyes.

Intelligent design starts from the premise that random mutations (selected by natural selection) cannot explain the genetic information observed today. It argues from within science, no matter how much you don’t like that Evolution is being attacked from a scientific standpoint.

It does NOT do that within science. The evidence fully supports the idea of evolution. I have nothing against evolution being attacked from a scientific viewpoint. I am still waiting for the first occurance of that.

I meant “transitional” as a fossil that provides a link between two distinct groups. You continually play with the definition of that word.

Each time you are given and example you go fall back to a even more extreme version of transitional. That is playing with the definition. There is never going to be what you asked for THIS time. Thats because its a delibate chosen false definition. If the groups are distinct then there is no transition at that level. Transitions happen at when the animals are not highly specialized.

The flying squirel however IS a transition between a flying animal and a non-flying animal. It is EXACTLY what you were demanding. Now of course you have changed your demand. Carefully ambiguous as before of course. EXACTLY what constitutes a distinct type? Exactly what would you finally admit was a transition? Your evolving and mutating definition is the epitomy of playing with a definition.

If you say the ever popular cat being born from dog I will give you such a hit.

Could you address punctuated equilibrium, by Stephen Jay Gould, who thought it up because he did not see support for gradual evolution in the fossil record?

He didn't see ENOUGH of those fossils to show the gradual evolution was the major way animals evolve.

Are the quotations (you have probably heard them; I can find them if need be) by paleontologists that the fossil record is severely lacking obsolete, or were they false from the beginning? Are you saying that if you were to show Darwin the fossil record as it is today, he would be totally satisfied?

As long as I also showed him the modern version of his theory I would expect him to be pretty satisfied that he came close.

Maybe defining transitional as a fossil linking distinct groups of organisms would be useful.

Yes it would be good it you did that. That way you would stop changing your definition all the time.

Do any of you know of any good resources where I could see how the fossil record in Darwin’s time “grew” into that of today?

Just open any book on paleontology. Nearly every fossil in it will be post Darwin.

Or do you dispute Darwin’s claim that at his time, the fossil record clearly did not support Evolution? (Please note that I am just curious as to how the fossil record has suddenly become so supporting of Evolution.)

I dispute your version of it anyway. The fossils and living animals did support it. They weren't as good as what we have today of course but at the time, just as today, there was nothing in the fossil record that showed him wrong and everything there was did fit the theory.

On free will vs. predestination: it is a very interesting paradox. Sort of like particle-wave duality. One way to word it is that God knew what “free will choices” you were going to make. I find it curious how you challenge me when I say that I can either post here or not, it is truly up to me.

Well at least it appears to be up to you. If god knew you would do it given a specific start to the universe than he made the decision when he set the starting conditions.

Different starting conditions would result in you makeing a different decision.

Do any of you still claim that I am close minded? If so, please explain how. (Remember that I won’t just accept many of your claims, but I am asking for you to “show me the way.”)

Yeah. You keep changing your definition of transitional so you can pretend the given examples aren't transitional. Thats a sign of a closed mind. Your evasions on the Flood also look suspiciously like you have closed your mind on the issue at the moment. Someday you may open it again.

[Aeson]

Originally posted by VictorB212
On free will vs. predestination: it is a very interesting paradox. Sort of like particle-wave duality. One way to word it is that God knew what “free will choices” you were going to make.

And he would have known so before he created us in the manner he did. He could have changed how we "chose" by creating us in a different manner. In the case of an omniscient intelligent designer, it was his choice what we ended up doing.

I find it curious how you challenge me when I say that I can either post here or not, it is truly up to me.

So you post without reason?

The series of interactions on a molecular level that lead a person to do anything are incredibly complex, and so numerous that we don't have the capacity to keep track of them all yet. This post by me is a reaction to this circumstance by a lifetime of environmental conditioning working on the basic form and instincts I was born with.

Your example of the bowling ball is silly – bowling balls aren’t sentient and therefore do not make choices. We can’t make any choice we want – we can’t defy gravity (at least until someone discovers the graviton particle).

If I dropped a person on your head who's choice was it?

It really has nothing to do with sentience. The bowling ball could be sentient and it still wouldn't have the means to change a predictable outcome. I used very straightforward and uncomplex object (bowling ball) and force (gravity) to unclutter the principle involved.

In the case of an omniscient intelligent designer, we are limited by his knowlege of what will happen. What he knows will happen has to happen because he is omniscient and cannot be wrong. We can't choose whether to post here or not, it was predestined when he chose in what manner to create us. He could have chosen to create us so that we wouldn't post here right? Or even that we wouldn't have existed. So it was his choice if indeed we are products of an omniscient intelligent designer.

[Rogan Josh]

Originally posted by Aeson
In the case of an omniscient intelligent designer, we are limited by his knowlege of what will happen. What he knows will happen has to happen because he is omniscient and cannot be wrong. We can't choose whether to post here or not, it was predestined when he chose in what manner to create us. He could have chosen to create us so that we wouldn't post here right? Or even that we wouldn't have existed. So it was his choice if indeed we are products of an omniscient intelligent designer.

I think you are really just misuderstanding the concept of time and causality. God's knowledge of our actions in no way predestines them. If we have free will then the decisions are ours to make by definition.

Since you like examples, let me give you one. Say I watch everything you do, and note down every decision you make for your entire life. And then, after you are dead, I build a time machine and travel back to your birth and observe you once again. Assuming that my presence goes undetected (and doesn't cause chaotic effects through the collapse of wave functions) you will make exactly the same decisions as 'before'. Just because I know what you will do, does not make them my decisions - you still have free-will.

If you do not believe that we have you are on a sticky wicket, because even most atheists would disagree with you. I do however agree that one can come up with a consistent model if you are willing to abbandon free-will, but then you really have to ask yourself: why bother?

[Jack the Bodiless]

As far as I know, people like Gould who thought up "punctuated equilibrium" did so because of this astounding lack of transitional fossils.

Not quite. PE is an explanation for the periods of stasis in the fossil record: long periods in which not a lot happens, followed by periods of relatively rapid change. The relative lack of "transitional fossils" from these periods is entirely consistent with the rarity of good conditions for fossilization in general.

The notion of "gradualism" came from Charles Lyell, not Charles Darwin. Darwin anticipated PE when he described how a single event, such as the arrival of a new predator from another region, can cause a rapid cascade of changes throughout an ecosystem.

When a chunk has been duplicated, further point mutations in the duplicated section can produce a new trait without knocking out something essential...

My point is that this cannot do much more than alter an enzyme, so please provide me with more examples

Your entire "design" is encoded within your genes. If there is no theoretical limit to the magnitude of the changes that mutations can make to a genome, then there is no reason in principle that a microbe cannot evolve into a human. And the mechanisms we know of can enlarge a genome without limit and alter its contents without limit. Evolution has all the mutation "tools" required for the job.

Things like the mamalian ear show a clear progessions from jaw bones to earbones through a thousand small steps. Of course it can't be 100% that these changes happened via evolution, but all these changes are pretty "micro" (meaningless distinction really) and since its been established that "micro" happens...

Be careful of this argument. What you are saying is that since the progression observed (in fossils? I am not sure how disputed that is) comes close to proving the fact that they evolved that way. I would like to examine the process by which this new feature can come about via random (I believe it is pretty random in this case) mutations.

In the case of the mammalian ear, its development in the embryo can be compared with the development of reptilian "hearing jaws" and the structures which support the gills in fish. DNA analysis has also shown that these structures are regulated by the same genes. This, combined with fossil evidence, allows scientists to construct a scenario in which the unused gill cavities in land-dwelling amphibians evolved into ears.

[Robert]

I could write down an enormous reply to all of your arguments,
but sine that would be more or less a big waste of time, I'll reduce it to a few simple questions:

- Jack, will you ever going to answer my last few questions about the eye-mutations ?

- Can anybody give a simple step-by-step explanation about how the 2 sexes evolved

- Vacuum Fluctuations....... someone dropped (must have been Zu again) don't just mention it, explain it. (briefly, if you won't spend much time)

(how can vacuum fluctuations happen if there's no vacuum ? is just a simple question you could answer as well)

- We've been through many micro-evolution examples so far. (animals changing color and all that kind of degenaration. Now come with some macro-evolution examples) (NEW functionalities, not mutated functionalities)

oh well, that's about it for now.

CyberShy

[Jack the Bodiless]

Jack, will you ever going to answer my last few questions about the eye-mutations ?

Uh... what's left to answer? I can't answer the one about the number of mutations involved in the whole process, I don't know that.

Can anybody give a simple step-by-step explanation about how the 2 sexes evolved

That's easier, because we still have living examples of creatures that can reproduce both sexually and asexually. Even bacteria can exchange DNA via "plasmids" (little hoops of DNA). There are also various creatures that can reproduce by parthenogenesis (virgin birth) or sexually if males are available, hermaphrodites (like snails) who haven't yet specialized as male or female, and so forth.

We've been through many micro-evolution examples so far. (animals changing color and all that kind of degenaration. Now come with some macro-evolution examples) (NEW functionalities, not mutated functionalities)

The nylon bug certainly has a "new" functionality, because it didn't exist before nylon. Of course, any new functionality WOULD be a "mutated" functionality. That's the point!