Looking for all the missing links

[Jazer]

See, this is where you are wrong. You start with a finch... and where you will end, you cannot say.

Of course I can say. People go to Darwin's island all the time. They take pictures of Darwin's finch. You can compare Darwin's finch with the finch on the mainland. Your make believe story that someday it maybe more then a finch is not even relevant to the evidence that we have. You have evidence for what you have evidence for and that is all you have. You start with a finch and you end up with a finch. End of story.

 

[Split Rock]

Care to expand? If you are saying they both have DNA, thus they are both related, I could go for that. However, if you are saying their DNA is similar, I'm gonna have to require a scosche more evidence than a condescending sentence in passing.

In Christ, GB

The Hippo is the closest living relative, though other even-toed ungulates (including cows) are also close.

From:
A complete phylogeny of the whales,
dolphins and even-toed hoofed
mammals (Cetartiodactyla)
Samantha A. Price1*, Olaf R. P. Bininda-Emonds2 and John L. Gittleman, Biol. Rev. (2005), 80, pp. 445–473


"We present the first phylogeny to include all 290
extant species of artiodactyls and cetaceans recognised
in Wilson and Reeder (1993). The supertree topology is
fully resolved at the family level and is highly congruent
(72–79%) with the largest total-evidence cetartiodactyl tree.
It supports the current consensus that Cetacea are nested
within Artiodactyla as sister taxa to Hippopotamidae rather
than to Artiodactyla as a whole and that the sub-order
Ruminantia is a valid monophyletic clade. The other relationships
within the tree are more controversial because
no consensus exists within the literature and support is often
inconclusive due to inadequate taxon sampling."
http://blackbear.ecology.uga.edu/gittleman/pdfs/Priceetal2005.pdf

Also:

Hippopotamus and whale phylogeny
Jonathan H. Geisler1 & Jessica M. Theodor2

Top of pageAbstractArising from: J. G. M. Thewissen, L. N. Cooper, M. T. Clementz, S. Bajpai & B. N. Tiwari Nature 450, 1190–1194 (2007); Thewissen et al. reply

Thewissen et al.1 describe new fossils from India that apparently support a phylogeny that places Cetacea (that is, whales, dolphins, porpoises) as the sister group to the extinct family Raoellidae, and Hippopotamidae as more closely related to pigs and peccaries (that is, Suina) than to cetaceans. However, our reanalysis of a modified version of the data set they used2 differs in retaining molecular characters and demonstrates that Hippopotamidae is the closest extant family to Cetacea and that raoellids are the closest extinct group, consistent with previous phylogenetic studies2, 3. This topology supports the view that the aquatic adaptations in hippopotamids and cetaceans are inherited from their common ancestor4.
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v458/n7236/full/nature07776.html

 

[verysincere]

....And the No True Scotsman.
You said, and I quote:

Indeed, it is very difficult to find a scientist who rejects evolution who does so without having religious reasons for doing so.
​

In other words, no true scientist would reject evolution, thus the "no true Scotsman".

You just did it again! You substituted your own declaration for mine. I will leave it to the reader to decide whether that is simply sloppy thinking OR if it is an outright lie.

I said NOTHING about a "true scientist". Instead, I proposed a CHALLENGE which bothered you because you knew it was true. (How many scientists can you name who reject evolution and have no religion reason to do so? I don't care whether they meet your definition of a "true scientist" or not.)

Dr. Kurt Wise and Dr. Todd Wood were examples already cited of "true scientists" (and Bible-believing Young Earth Creationist Christians) who freely admit that their rejection of the Theory of Evolution is for religious reasons and NOT because of the weight of the evidence. In fact, both ADMIT that the scientific evidence for evolution is absolutely enormous.

So you throw about the No True Scotsman fallacy in hopes that someone will be impressed. (They weren't.)

These kinds of tactics do NOT further the Kingdom of God. They lead to mockery, accusations of ignorance, and even contempt from the average scientifically-literate reader.

As I've often observed, anti-evolution Christian leaders who ignore the overwhelming evidence in God's creation and who regularly lie as a debate tactic are creating far more atheists and agnostics than "evilution" ever will. I've seen it (among teenagers especially) in pastoral ministry and I hear the story regularly from people who've joined the Bible.and.Science.Forum.

Oil-field geologist Glen Morton's story is not atypical. (In my case it was actually the Hebrew scriptures which first convinced me of my "creation science" errors. And once I finally began to look at the complete panoply of scientific evidence, I was amazed at my prior blindness. In those days the "Lying for Jesus" trend was not nearly as serious as today---but it was sufficiently present to bother me greatly. Today it is a hundred times worse, even though the Internet has made it much easier for the average person to identify the lies!) Here's Morton's story:

http://home.entouch.net/dmd/gstory.htm


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[Split Rock]

You just did it again! You substituted your own declaration for mine. I will leave it to the reader to decide whether that is simply sloppy thinking OR if it is an outright lie.

I said NOTHING about a "true scientist". Instead, I proposed a CHALLENGE which bothered you because you knew it was true. (How many scientists can you name who reject evolution and have no religion reason to do so? I don't care whether they meet your definition of a "true scientist" or not.)

Dr. Kurt Wise and Dr. Todd Wood were examples already cited of "true scientists" (and Bible-believing Young Earth Creationist Christians) who freely admit that their rejection of the Theory of Evolution is for religious reasons and NOT because of the weight of the evidence. In fact, both ADMIT that the scientific evidence for evolution is absolutely enormous.

So you throw about the No True Scotsman fallacy in hopes that someone will be impressed. (They weren't.)

These kinds of tactics do NOT further the Kingdom of God. They lead to mockery, accusations of ignorance, and even contempt from the average scientifically-literate reader.

.

I noticed this right away... it seems hard to believe good brother didn't see what he was doing as well. All a part of the "debate" tactics so commonly used by creationists.

I often cite Dr. Kurt Wise as an example of an honest Professional Creationist. There aren't too many, unfortunately. I'm not very familar with Dr. Todd Wood, however. I will look into him some.

 

[Freodin]

Of course I can say. People go to Darwin's island all the time. They take pictures of Darwin's finch. You can compare Darwin's finch with the finch on the mainland. Your make believe story that someday it maybe more then a finch is not even relevant to the evidence that we have. You have evidence for what you have evidence for and that is all you have. You start with a finch and you end up with a finch. End of story.

No, that's not the end of story. Just look at the picture you posted and see how much they have already changed, in rather a short time. I'm quite certain that you wouldn't be able to take two of these and a magpie and find out which of these are "finches". And they will change further. In ways that we do not have "evidence" for, because it hasn't happened yet. But it will happen.

This will the outlook of the birds. But it will leave traces in their genetics. We already can and do find out relationships between different groups by looking at these traces. And there we find the "evidence" that you are looking for... that "macroevolution" happened.

 

[Guy1]

Of course I can say. People go to Darwin's island all the time. They take pictures of Darwin's finch. You can compare Darwin's finch with the finch on the mainland. Your make believe story that someday it maybe more then a finch is not even relevant to the evidence that we have. You have evidence for what you have evidence for and that is all you have. You start with a finch and you end up with a finch. End of story.

So they're the same "Kind"? How would you define a kind?

 

[verysincere]

You start with a finch and you end up with a finch. End of story.

1) No.

"You start with a finch and you end up with a finch" is like saying "You start with a baby and if you check the next day, it's still a baby. Check the next day, and it's still a baby. I did it again and again and it was still a baby." Obviously, only when you investigate the evidence from a much longer span of time do you find lots of evidence to indicate that the baby eventually became an adult. Even so, exactly when did the baby become an adult? Can you tell me that? And when does a finch cease to be a finch?

Of course, with finches and most other organisms, it takes MANY GENERATIONS to observe easily the transformation processes.

Moreover, what makes you think that the English language semantic domain of "finch" somehow limits or defines a taxonomic classification? Why should an accident of linguistic history determine science? Ridiculous.

Meanwhile, explain to me RING SPECIES without mentioning evolutionary processes.


2) You wrote "End of story." Hardly, from that study of finches written over 150 years ago, the "story" has continued, in many new details and thousands of examples.

Indeed, the reasons why amateurs on this forum disagree with the world's scientific community is not because all of the scientists are their intellectual inferiors. Nor is it because the arm-chair critics of evolution know more about the scientific method and the science of biology. No, it is all about Dunning-Kruger.

If I need surgery, I'm going to choose a trained physician who has studied anatomy and surgical techniques for many years. Not a bunch of vocal but clueless critics. And I will bet that you would make the same choice.

Somehow the scientific method is fine when it comes to the Germ Theory of Disease and modern medical science. But when it comes to biology, I'm being asked to believe that the scientifically-illiterate masses know far more than the trained scientists who've spent years studying the evidence.

So why so much contrast?

Is it due to scientific evidence favoring the arm-chair critics? No.

Is it due to real controversy and debate as to the reality of evolution within the biology community? No.

Is it due to what the Bible says about evolution or related topics? No.

It is due to a specific kind of cherished traditions that have been promoted and perpetuated in some subgroups of Christianity. It is NOT a science issue. It is certainly not an evidence issue. (As creationists such as Dr. Kurt Wise and Dr. Todd Wood have admitted publicly on multiple occasions.) It is a matter of favored traditions.

Accordingly, just because someone is a Christian and affirms the truths of the Bible does NOT determine their stand on evolutionary processes. No, it is usually explained by the traditions of their church background and the beliefs of their Christian peers. Let's admit it. And that often explains why two Christians who both hold to verbal plenary inspiration of the Bible and both accept the inerrancy of Genesis can nevertheless hold opposite views on evolution.

Meanwhile, the fact that so many American Christians deny the enormous volume of evidence God has provided within his Creation and the fact that so many anti-evolution Christians dishonestly quote-mine and distort the evidence (and generally create the impression that they think they know more than the scientists), it is no surprise that the origins controversy has tended to destroy the credibility of ALL Christians in the minds of many non-believers. (Yes, it is not fair that they associate the behavior of a minority to all Christians, but it happens, in part because they have been told that THE BIBLE requires an anti-evolution viewpoint. And that is a tragic, deplorable situation.)

Is this embarrassment good for the progress of the Kingdom of God? Is it to be part of the Great Commission?

No.


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.

 

[good brother]

Unless you are going to tell me that you failed to understand the illustration of using one out every thousand movie frames to tell a story (i.e., use ignorance as your excuse), you KNOW that you misrepresented the analogy. And that misrepresentation is also known by another term: a lie.

I'm OK with hyperbole to emphasize a point, but here you tried to dodge and ignore the very heart of the analogy by several lies:

1) I never said that an entire movie could be replaced in every artistic sense by a "single stationary picture". Instead, on a typical movie, preserving just one frame in a thousand would be about one "photo" per 42 seconds of the movie. A film synopsis often involves a far lower "resolution" than that. I stated that the movie story could be told even after removing 99.9% of the frames.

You said you could tell the entire story even after removing 99.9% of the frames. If an average movie is 2 hours long, you are claiming that you can tell an equally convincing story in one minute and twenty seconds. While it takes Hollywood two hours to persuade people of something, you could do it in one minute and twenty seconds. A more appropriate analogy would have been for you to say that you could convince a jury of guilt or innocence with 99.9% of the vital evidence removed. In either case, you are still incorrect my friend.

In Christ, GB

 

[Jazer]

Dr. Kurt Wise and Dr. Todd Wood were examples already cited of "true scientists" (and Bible-believing Young Earth Creationist Christians) who freely admit that their rejection of the Theory of Evolution is for religious reasons and NOT because of the weight of the evidence. In fact, both ADMIT that the scientific evidence for evolution is absolutely enormous.

Oh, yeah right, do you just make this stuff up as you go along. We are told that "Richard Dawkins (2001) singled Wise out as "an honest creationist," willing to admit when scientific evidence does not weigh in his favor." A Visit to the New Creation "Museum" | NCSE Somehow you manage to tell a different story.

 

[verysincere]

Let's End the "Creation Science" War on Evolution!

In fact, let's end the Evangelical Christian War on Science.
For those who care about the Great Commission and the progress of the Kingdom of God in this world, reading this thread can be a very painful experience. Some are determined to undermine the credibility not only of Christians, but the teachings of Jesus and the Bible in general.

Can we truly blame non-Christians for assessing the Christian community based on the intellect, treatment of evidence, types of tactics, and overall strategies demonstrated here?

Indeed, just as Poe's Law would summarize it, I'm not entirely sure which posts are coming from the sincere and which ones appear to be parodying the worst extremes of satirized "creation science" arguments. At times I have the strong suspicion somebody is pulling my leg. (I read some posts on these forums which I think are from anti-Christian mockers who like to role-play as what they like to call "fundies.") When I see absolutely "no shame" at stooping to the lowest levels of evidence denial, dishonest quote-mining, and general buffoonery, I strongly doubt that a Bible-believing follower of Jesus Christ is behind the text.

A Bible-believing Christian who truly believes that the Bible denies evolutionary processes and who thinks that the indwelling Holy Spirit has called them to leading both their Christian brethren and non-Christians to an understanding of the truth would first devote themselves to understanding the FUNDAMENTALS of the theory of evolution and then the evidence which supports it. They would investigate what the Bible says about origins topics and they would learn at the least the major results of Hebrew exegesis of Genesis if not the language. They would consult TalkOrigins.org for a better understanding of the counter-arguments which discredit the teachings and traditions of Ken Ham, Kent Hovind, Carl Baugh, Jason Lisle, Walter Brown, Chuck Missler, Ray Comfort and other ministry entrepreneurs who have attracted laughter and general mockery to their poor understanding of both the Bible and Science.

I know what it takes to defend the traditional Young Earth Creationist view because for many years I did exactly those thinks to prepare myself! (I did so long before the Internet made it so much easier to educate oneself but I know what is required to tackle both the Biblical exegesis and the Science.) And as a result of that process, what happened? Both the Biblical evidence and the Scientific evidence forced me to "change sides"! The 9th Commandment DEMANDED a change of mind.

Prior to that change, I was the kind of "double-minded man" who the Bible describes. I tried to live in a world where I imagined that God gave us one set of answers in His scriptures and another set of answers in His Creation. I pretended that there were two contradictory realities! (Indeed, I came to the same kind of "crisis of faith" which creationist Dr. Kurt Wise describes. But the difference is that he decided to abandon the scientific realities. In my case, I dug deeper into BOTH the Biblical and Scientific evidence.)

Fortunately, from the study of the Hebrew scriptures I realized that I had NOT been "defending the Bible." I had been defending MY CHURCH'S CHERISHED TRADITIONS about the Bible. The Bible says NOTHING to deny the theory of evolution. (Nor the Big Bang. Nor abiogenesis, which is actually endorses explicitly in Genesis 2:7 among other passages.)

God is not a deceiver who filled his creation with "appearance of age" and "embedded age" and other lies. He didn't intend for us to be confused by alleged contradictions. Instead, Jesus warned us of "the leaven of the Pharisees" which leads us to favor TRADITION over what God has actually said to us---in both His Bible and His Creation.

We need not pick fights and declare war on Science and scientists (and the scientifically-literate participants of this forum.) Jesus did not ask us to fight battles over scientific theories. Instead, we are called to appreciate the hand of God in creation, including the astounding evolutionary processes which adapt and diversify life on earth! Christ-followers should THANK the scientific community for giving us a better understanding of the WONDERS of the universe. And we should STOP confuse the methodological naturalism of science with the philosophical naturalism of some. We should STOP confusing biological evolution with evolutionary philosophy when expressed in Social Darwinism. (They are NOT the same thing. I'm talking to YOU, Ken Ham, Albert Mohler, Jason Lisle, et al.)


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[Jazer]

Obviously, only when you investigate the evidence from a much longer span of time do you find lots of evidence to indicate that the baby eventually became an adult.

Then show me your evidence. You are not showing me anything.

 

[juvenissun]

Here's a letter in response:

"To whom it may concern,

I'm looking for a garden. The only problem with my "garden" is I have only an old book telling me it exists. Of the scant few hints I have as to its location, some of them do bear a vague resemblance to the Fertile Cresent, but I cannot get them to fit with each other. One of the problems I have with my "garden", among the many, is that it is filled with mythological creatures, like a talking snake and a man made from dirt.

I am also looking for a huge wooden ark made from gopher wood. I don't know what the heck gopher wood is, but I know it is made of gopher wood. The ark is really big and held all the "kinds" of animals that have ever existed on earth. I have no idea what a "kind" is, but I know my god made them and they aren't related to each other at all.

Most people have given up on a 6,000 year old earth, who's geography was shaped by a global flood, but I haven't. Because scientists agree my ideas are outdated and wrong, science is bad. Scientists are bad, and any idea they come up with is a fraud.

I really must find some real evidence for the "garden" and the "ark" if I am going to sell this "old story" to every thinking person. Some of those pesky people that won't buy my whole "old story" believe in this "evidence" idea that says we shouldn't believe everything an old book says if it conflicts with reality.

So please, if you see any evidence of my "old story," any at all, please send it to me. Also, if you know of anyway I can convince everyone that science is a lie and full of frauds, I would be much obliged."

Thanks.

Sincerely, Creationism."

In creationism, everything only happened ONCE. If you try to find something which is created, either you find it, or you don't find it. Not finding something, in this case, is not a big deal.

But in evolution, the name suggests a CONTINUOUS process. In my mind, this kind of model simply asks for trouble. Because if you do not find a continuous feature, then the theory can not stand. If you do find a sor-of continuous feature on one example, then you have to apply that to other examples. Otherwise, the theory fails too.

Now, the argument is: how continuous the record should be? Should it be like 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 ... or it needs to be 1.1, 1.2, 1.3, 1.4 ... or a jumpy one like 1, 2, 5, 15 ... is also acceptable. Further more, if we find one quality of continuity on one species, should the same quality of continuity be expected on another similar species?

So, before we use this example of that example in an argument, it is the evolutionist's burden to define the degree of continuity and whether a described continuity is a general case or a special case. So far, everything evolutionists presented is spotty, fragmented, special case, and discontinuous. if we use a well-documented example of continuous morphological change as a ruler, then most other species will fail to meet the standard.

There is no need to use the same standard on creationism. It simply does not apply. It is a unique, heavy burden to evolutionism. This made the evolutionism an art, but not a science.

 

[Jazer]

see how much they have already changed,

I can see what I can see. I do not see what your imagination adds to what we can all see. The finches have simply adapted to their environment. Ok, why don't we look at the Saber tooth Tiger and the woolly mammoth. Even though they went extinct in the Holocene Extinction. R U suggesting that when the elephant adapts to a cold climate with long hair that he is no longer an elephant? That the Saber tooth Tiger has become a new species? Tell me what you think is going on here. Because you may have a better chance to make your point using them as an example.

 

[good brother]

The Hippo is the closest living relative, though other even-toed ungulates (including cows) are also close.

From:
A complete phylogeny of the whales,
dolphins and even-toed hoofed
mammals


Thewissen et al.1 describe new fossils from India that apparently support a phylogeny that places Cetacea


(consistent with previous phylogenetic studies


2, 3. This topology supports the view that the aquatic adaptations in hippopotamids and cetaceans are inherited from their common ancestor4.
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v458/n7236/full/nature07776.html

Did you just use "phylogeny" to support evolution? Phylogeny was dreamt up for evolution! I thought you said real GENETICS supported their ancestry.

GB

 

[Freodin]

I can see what I can see. I do not see what your imagination adds to what we can all see. The finches have simply adapted to their environment. Ok, why don't we look at the Saber tooth Tiger and the woolly mammoth. Even though they went extinct in the Holocene Extinction. R U suggesting that when the elephant adapts to a cold climate with long hair that he is no longer an elephant? That the Saber tooth Tiger has become a new species? Tell me what you think is going on here. Because you may have a better chance to make your point using them as an example.

The misconception you (as most creationists) show here is that of "species" as fixed categories that "macroevolution" would have to cross.

What "new species" should they become? Give an example, if you can. Any example that you can think of, if you can think of one at all.

 

[good brother]

Someone asked for more of the missing links than the few we are presented and told to trust fully in for the rest. No one was able to produce one such link. Therefore,

Let's End the "Creation Science" War on Evolution!

.

I think the other side is saying "Head for the hills! We've been shooting blanks and don't have any real ammo and now they know it! Let's stop this crazy war!"

 

[Jazer]

If I need surgery, I'm going to choose a trained physician who has studied anatomy and surgical techniques for many years. Not a bunch of vocal but clueless critics. And I will bet that you would make the same choice.

No, not me, you have to talk to my wife and brother about that. I would like to know your opinion on that though. Should I tell my wife to revive me, or should I tell her to tell the doctors to leave me alone? It is not really my choice that I am alive. People like you make that choice for me. In fact yesterday I told my wife NOT to revive me. Should I go back and tell her I was not serious and if something were to happen that it would be ok to revive me?

 

[verysincere]

While it takes Hollywood two hours to persuade people of something, you could do it in one minute and twenty seconds.

Yet, again you dishonestly quote-mined.

I said NOTHING about an 80 second story. A movie Director's storyboard tells the entire story in a series of "frames".

[Perhaps you truly have no idea what a storyboard is and does. Imagine an entire movie as a series of cartoon frames. Most movies involve converting a screenplay into that storyboard and then the movie is filmed based upon that storyboard.]

The shame in your distortions is not simply because they utterly fail at making your "argument" convincing. (Such an experience in and of itself may be humbling for you but it is not an ethical issue.)

The shame is that you give the reader the impression that you habitually intend to be dishonest in restating (and changing) what my illustration demonstrates.

Rather than trying to salvage a worthless argument which backed you into a corner---and refusing to admit that the sequence of photos at an auto plant demolished your flawed characterization of the fossil evidence---you could at the very least have moved on to some other (and, hopefully, well-considered) argument.

Yes, the lack of evidential foundations for anti-evolution arguments bothers me plenty enough. But as a Bible-believing follower of Jesus Christ, the ETHICS of so many "creation science" attacks on the theory of evolution bother me much more.

And I would gamble that the non-Christian readers on this forum would deplore the ETHICS of "creation science" debates just as much as I do. If you doubt that, I invite you to ask them.


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[Split Rock]

Did you just use "phylogeny" to support evolution? Phylogeny was dreamt up for evolution! I thought you said real GENETICS supported their ancestry.

GB

These are genetic phylogenies. What do you think a Family Tree is?

 

[good brother]

The misconception you (as most creationists) show here is that of "species" as fixed categories that "macroevolution" would have to cross.

What "new species" should they become? Give an example, if you can. Any example that you can think of, if you can think of one at all.

What would you call dinosaur to bird evolution? Is that now a huge change from one species to another? What about reptiles to mammals? What about invertebrates to vertebrates? What about unicellular to multicellular? What about plants and animals? Are none of those spectacular jumps that must be made from one fixed category to another? and that is exactly what they are too, jumps. There are no smooth lines of transition, only jumps millions of years and billions of changes at a time.

GB