Some things I just don't think most of you understand...

[Zosimus]

How did I get into this discussion? Let's see, immediately after your first quotation, from Helena Curtis and N. Sue Barnes, Biology, 5th edition, 1989 Worth Publishers, p. 974, the article continues 'One can quibble about the accuracy of this definition (and we have often quibbled on these newsgroups) but it also conveys the essence of what evolution really is.'

Your second quotation, 'These definitions are simply wrong' immediately follows 'common definitions of evolution outside of the scientific community', namely "evolution: The gradual process by which the present diversity of plant and animal life arose from the earliest and most primitive organisms, which is believed to have been continuing for the past 3000 million years" (The Oxford Concise Science Dictionary); "evolution ... the doctrine according to which higher forms of life have gradually arisen out of lower" (Chambers' Dictionary); "evolution ... the development of a species, organism, or organ from its original or primitive state to its present or specialized state; phylogeny or ontogeny" (Webster's Dictionary).

It is these three definitions that the author describes as 'simply wrong', not the definition based on a change in the frequency of alleles given by Curtis and Barnes.

Of course, none of these definitions apply to stellar evolution, and that is my reason for wanting to use a different word for the changes in stars as they grow older and use up the different nuclear fuels that are available to them.

So you deny that stellar evolution is a change?

 

[Zosimus]

That humans gradually evolved from ape-like ancestors over 5 million years.

And if you say anything that contradicts that, it's not evidence -- by very definition.

 

[Justatruthseeker]

The Bog Bodies are a pretty good example of that. They span a period of time from 8000 B.C. up to the middle of the 20th century. They're at many different levels of preservation, too. The oldest bog bodies are mostly just skeletons, but some of the more recent ones still have most of their skin and muscle.

No, they are an example of mummification - not fossilization. The fossilization process has never began. They are preserved - not in the process of fossilization - i.e. the bones being replaced by minerals.

I'd assume that when a bog body belongs to a dead World War II soldier, you wouldn't consider it to be from Noah's flood. But bog bodies exist at nearly every age between World War II and prehistory, so there's no easy place to draw a line between those bodies you think were buried by the Flood and those that were buried after it. In any case, some of the more recent bodies are clearly undergoing fossilization, and the older ones have undergone it already.

I wouldn't assume in the first place I was referring to Noah's flood for fossilized dinosaur bones. That will just lead you to a useless waste of your time and mine. There have been 6 creations and 5 destruction's - man being part of the sixth creation. And during each creation all new forms of life arose suddenly - as supported by the fossil record, ice core data and geological strata. And during the times between all life stayed exactly what it was except for breed mating with breed creating new breeds (variation) within the species. There is no sense arguing against a young earth - because I don't accept the flawed young earth interpretation.

If this makes a difference to you, Answers in Genesis considers Sinornithosaurus a dinosaur. They consider Microraptor a bird, but I think this actually makes their position weaker, when you consider how similar the two animals' anatomies are to one another in the fossils I linked to. On the other hand, if you disagree with AiG and consider Sinornithosaurus a bird, that doesn't really make the situation any easier, because Sinornithosaurus is only slightly more birdlike than Epidexipteryx and Velociraptor.

Sinornithosaurus for one had fangs for injecting venom, while the Microraptor did not. They perhaps could be different breeds of the same species, likely reptile - since some reptiles still carry the same sort of teeth and jaw structure. They once thought dinosaurs were reptiles - had a complete lineage for them - and now they believe they were warm blooded - but still have the same lineage for them. We have already gone from cold-blooded to warm-blooded without a change in lineage. So I doubt anyone's right.

The trouble with trying to find any dividing line between dinosaurs and birds is that there are fossils representing an unbroken sequence of anatomy from obvious dinosaurs (such as Compsognathus and Sciurumimus) to obvious birds (such as Jeholornis and Confuciusornis). Phil Senter demonstrated that in this study using BDISTMDS, the baraminology software that's used by creationists. Answers in Genesis initially claimed that Senter had misused this software, but a few months later David Cavanaugh (a creation scientist) performed his own analysis of this data, and got the same result. (Cavanaugh's study is the first one listed in that PDF.)

I've attached an image for a book I'm working on, that illustrates the problem creationists have to deal with in this area.

The trouble is is deciding what is merely another breed of the same species - and what is actually a different species. The problem is these fossils are not found in one's and two's, but usually mixed in with bunches of other fossils - showing they all died at the same time. The problem is in your dating, where they claim ice core samples support it, but in reality the dated ice cores at 260 feet do not match reality, since they claim hundreds of thousands of years - and yet we find a plane from WWII right there amongst those ice core depths.

They have already lost any ability to claim anything as fact - what with all the incorrect classifications they refuse to change. They classify Darwin's Finches as seperate species - then study them and find they have all been interbreeding and producing fertile offspring since they arrived on the islands. Admit to the mistake and correct it? no-sir-ree, just continue on with the same old flawed classification so they can claim speciation occurred. And we both know it never did - that they are all just different breeds of the same species. Not 10 years ago Archaeopteryx was the prime example of that missing link - then oops. Coelacanth with fish and amphibians - then oops - one was found and it's DNA showed that wrong - not to mention they never even walked on the bottom at all.

So you got a long way to go to instill any confidence in any of their claims.

 

[lasthero]

The problem is in your dating, where they claim ice core samples support it, but in reality the dated ice cores at 260 feet do not match reality, since they claim hundreds of thousands of years - and yet we find a plane from WWII right there amongst those ice core depths.

I know you're not interested, but in case anyone is, RickG did a whole topic about what Justa is talking about here and why it's WRONG.

http://www.christianforums.com/threads/my-lost-squadron-challenge.7826110/

I would suggest anyone interested in the facts to go there. I'll also post his explanation here.

I think you have a misunderstanding. It works, but not in the way that you perceive it. There are several things that come into play. If I recall, what you are referring to is the "lots squadron", that is a squadron of P-38's that had to ditch over Greenland. One of the young earth claims there is that the planes were found 40 or 50 years later covered in over 200 feet of snow & ice. Their reasoning is that if they were buried that deep in so few years, ice cores would have to be hundreds of miles thick to represent the hundreds of thousands of years they ice core chronologies give. That of course is pure rubbish on several levels. (1) An annual layer has nothing to do with thickness. (2) The planes went down near the coast where large amounts of snow accumulates, unlike that of interior Greenland where snow fall is much less. (3) And I think this is the one you are specifically talking about AV, is that ice cores are generally not obtained for dating purposes from such locations because of the constant flow of ice. Rather, cores that are useful in obtaining paleoclimate data and dating are obtained from stable interior areas where ice flow is little if any.

By the way, Justa, I would appreciate it if you could find where someone claimed that the ice layers that they found the WWIi plane in were supposed to be hundreds of thousands years old. I know you're not going to, though.

They once thought dinosaurs were reptiles - had a complete lineage for them - and now they believe they were warm blooded - but still have the same lineage for them

Being warm-blooded doesn't mean that dinosaurs aren't reptiles. They still are.

And I'm still curious where you got that 98% figure from.

 

[Astrophile]

So you deny that stellar evolution is a change?

No, of course not. Stellar evolution is a change, but it is not
the sort of change described by the definitions that you cited.

Stellar evolution is not a "change in the frequency of alleles within a gene pool from one generation to the next", nor is it a process whereby "the present diversity of [stars] arose from the earliest and most primitive organisms", or "the doctrine according to which higher forms of [stars] have gradually arisen out of lower" or "the development of a species, organism, or organ from its original or primitive state to its present or specialized state; phylogeny or ontogeny".

Stellar evolution is change in the internal structure of stars and in their radii, temperatures and luminosities as they exhaust their nuclear fuels. If anything, it resembles biological development rather than evolution, although this analogy must not be pressed too far.

 

[Zosimus]

No, of course not. Stellar evolution is a change, but it is not
the sort of change described by the definitions that you cited.

Stellar evolution is not a nor is it a process whereby "the present diversity of [stars] arose from the earliest and most primitive organisms", or "the doctrine according to which higher forms of [stars] have gradually arisen out of lower" or "the development of a species, organism, or organ from its original or primitive state to its present or specialized state; phylogeny or ontogeny".

Stellar evolution is change in the internal structure of stars and in their radii, temperatures and luminosities as they exhaust their nuclear fuels. If anything, it resembles biological development rather than evolution, although this analogy must not be pressed too far.

Actually, everywhere else evolution means the progress of something under the direction of intelligent actors. The evolution of the car, the plane, teaching methodology, computers, etc., are all examples of evolution. Biological evolution is the aberration as it is often claimed that biological evolution occurs without intelligent action.

 

[Astrophile]

This merely shows that you misunderstand the meaning of the word evolution. Evolution is just change. It is not inappropriate to talk about the evolution of stars, the evolution of the automobile, or the evolution of words in the human language.

Perhaps you are right; if you define evolution as 'just change' or as 'secular (non-cyclical) change over a long period of time', then it is reasonable to talk about the evolution of stars and galaxies, or about the evolution of the universe as a whole, as well as about the evolution of populations of living things. However, we must still remember that biological evolution relies on descent with modification, 'the change in the frequency of alleles within a gene pool from one generation to the next', whereas the other forms of evolution do not.

 

[Astrophile]

Actually, everywhere else evolution means the progress of something under the direction of intelligent actors. The evolution of the car, the plane, teaching methodology, computers, etc., are all examples of evolution. Biological evolution is the aberration as it is often claimed that biological evolution occurs without intelligent action.

You seem to be contradicting yourself. Earlier you said that it was not inappropriate to talk about the evolution of stars, which is not something under the direction of intelligent actors.

 

[Loudmouth]

And if you say anything that contradicts that, it's not evidence -- by very definition.

Just saying something is not a contradiction. I am completely open to empirical evidence, even if you aren't.

 

[Zosimus]

Just saying something is not a contradiction. I am completely open to empirical evidence, even if you aren't.

I'm open to empirical evidence. I just want to see a logical framework that shows said evidence is relevant.

Strangely, all your arguments seem to be along the lines of:

My horoscope predicted that I would get a new job. I got a new job. Accordingly, my horoscope was right. Therefore, astrology works.

 

[Loudmouth]

I'm open to empirical evidence.

You reject empirical evidence when it is shown to you.

I just want to see a logical framework that shows said evidence is relevant.

No, you ignore logic as well. Logic says that the definitions of axioms in an epistemology do not have to "prove themselves", yet that is exactly what you continually demand.

 

[Zosimus]

You reject empirical evidence when it is shown to you.

Untrue. I simply ask why it is relevant.

No, you ignore logic as well. Logic says that the definitions of axioms in an epistemology do not have to "prove themselves", yet that is exactly what you continually demand.

No, I merely point out all the times that your starting axioms contradict themselves or one another.

For example, if your starting axiom is "All generalizations are false" then your starting axiom, which is a generalization, is false according to its own standard.

¿Get it?

 

[Loudmouth]

Untrue. I simply ask why it is relevant.

"Science is not a good way of modeling how reality works."--Zosimus

No, I merely point out all the times that your starting axioms contradict themselves or one another.

Where? You claim that fact has to "prove itself", which is illogical.

 

[joshua 1 9]

'One can quibble about the accuracy of this definition (and we have often quibbled on these newsgroups) but it also conveys the essence of what evolution really is.'

People even quibble about what what we should and should not quibble about.

 

[Zosimus]

Where? You claim that fact has to "prove itself", which is illogical.

No, all I am saying is that if a fact is "something that can be proved" then unless you can prove that a fact is something that can be proved then the statement: "A fact is something that can be proved" is not a fact. This is what we call a self-refuting statement.

 

[joshua 1 9]

The clear level of ignorance you have of the evidence, appears to cause the problem for you. Because you have a problem understanding it, doesn't mean everyone does.

That is the exact same argument they use for multi level marketing? Did you work your way through college selling Amway?

 

[Loudmouth]

No, all I am saying is that if a fact is "something that can be proved" then unless you can prove that a fact is something that can be proved then the statement: "A fact is something that can be proved" is not a fact. This is what we call a self-refuting statement.

The definition of fact is an axiom.

 

[bhsmte]

That is the exact same argument they use for multi level marketing? Did you work your way through college selling Amway?

Evasion.

 

[crjmurray]

Evasion.

Well did you?!

 

[Zosimus]

The definition of fact is an axiom.

Axioms can still be self refuting. See http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Self-refuting_idea
Here is a quote:

'... the claim "everything is subjective" would require the statement itself be objectively true and is thus self-negating; any attempt to rescue it using logic would fall prey to special pleading by demanding one arbitrary exemption to the claim. Similarly the attempt at proving the existence of God by positing that everything must have a cause, while making one special exemption (namely, God) to the need for a cause.'