How to choose between creation and evolution.

[AnotherAtheist]

Darwin didn't invent evolution and he didn't hate God, he was pretty much an agnostic his entire life. He proposed natural selection as a primary means by which one species developed from another, this process was cumulative in his estimation.

Some people claim the bolded bit. Not you, but some people do. That's what I was mentioning. I wasn't meaning to start a discussion about whether he hated God, but just meant to explain why I was being a bit pedantic about that bit.

I'm not sure that he was pretty much agonistic his entire life. He was, when young, planning to become a clergyman. See also his religious discussions with his wife Emma Wedgewood, which indicate belief.

Darwinism can be the same thing as ToE, the terms can be used interchangeably, depending on the context. It's not that big of a deal, I do think you should make a distinction between ToE as a theory and evolution as a phenomenon in nature. What is more Darwin proposed some pretty interesting things in this book and I've always thought it was well written. I get most of my information from evolutionists, even Darwinians like Richard Dawkins. Always wondered why more people don't appreciate the philosophical elements of Darwinism.

Darwinism is historically a very important step towards the ToE. I agree that there is a distinction between evolution in nature and the ToE. Evolution in nature is a natural process, and the ToE is our description of it. Is that what you mean.

I'm not sure that describing people as 'Darwinians' is all that accurate in many cases. The modern ToE owes a lot to Darwin, but it also owes an awful lot to people other than Darwin, both earlier than him and later. He is possibly the most important link in the chain, but far from the only one. E.g. the modern definition of evolution talks about gene frequencies, and Darwin didn't even know that genes existed.

 

[AnotherAtheist]

Thanks for making my point. We don't do it for anything else, but by golly we will do it for common ancestry evolution. It's illogical.

It's not illogical, because if we ignore your gross oversimplification the situations are very different. For a very simple start, buildings don't have the concept of descent as descent requires reproduction and buildings do not reproduce. Living things do reproduce and descent then makes sense. Buildings don't have biochemistry, nor genetics. Living things do. We observe common descent among living things because of the evidence of biochemistry and genetics. But, buildings don't have biochemistry nor genetics. Your whole argument doesn't work when we look at the actual detail.

It's no better than claims that if there was a great flood, then we'd find huge numbers of buried dead things all around the world. (A YEC claim that fossils support the flood.) As soon as you look at things in detail the argument simply falls to pieces as it doesn't work with the real detailed evidence

 

[AnotherAtheist]

Every single one of those 29 evidences shows common design. It does not show common ancestry. All it does is show commonalities between organisms. Commonalities of life do not show common ancestry. All it shows is commonalities of design. It's illogical to take to similar things and claim they came from the same thing without evidence they actually came from the same thing. All you can say is they have a common design.

Wrong. It shows commonalities that make no sense if we posit common design, but which make perfect sense if we posit naturalistic evolution.

Can you explain why a designer would put broken non-functional genes into organisms? And that some non-functional genes in very similar organisms are broken in the exact same way? But, where these genes are broken in very different organisms, they are broken in different ways?

 

[rjs330]

Except we can see from the fossil evidence and genetic evidence that humans and other animals share a common ancestor!

How? Because of similarities? All you have is similarity and commonality. Neither of which can be actually shown to lead to common ancestry. You are making an assumption. You still cannot show it ever happening. You can't test it, observe it or repeat it.

 

[Warden_of_the_Storm]

How? Because of similarities? All you have is similarity and commonality. Neither of which can be actually shown to lead to common ancestry. You are making an assumption. You still cannot show it ever happening. You can't test it, observe it or repeat it.

Ah, what a brilliant armchair scientist you are. How wonderful it must be to know that all of the world's scientists are wrong and you and only you are correct.

 

[rjs330]

It's not illogical, because if we ignore your gross oversimplification the situations are very different. For a very simple start, buildings don't have the concept of descent as descent requires reproduction and buildings do not reproduce. Living things do reproduce and descent then makes sense. Buildings don't have biochemistry, nor genetics. Living things do. We observe common descent among living things because of the evidence of biochemistry and genetics. But, buildings don't have biochemistry nor genetics. Your whole argument doesn't work when we look at the actual detail.

It's no better than claims that if there was a great flood, then we'd find huge numbers of buried dead things all around the world. (A YEC claim that fossils support the flood.) As soon as you look at things in detail the argument simply falls to pieces as it doesn't work with the real detailed evidence

But living those don't evolve in the manner you describe. Sure living things adapt in order to survive. But they don't evolve like described from common ancestry.

Living things also show similarities and commonalities. Just like buildings. But you would never look at a building and assume it has a common ancestor.

Yet without a common ancestor and without any observable evolution as prescribed by evolutionists you assume common ancestry. Dogs and cats came from a common ancestor is the claim. Yet any observable, verifiable, testable evidence has never shown that it happened. They have similarities in design and function such as eyes and ears and a mouth and digestive tract etc. But that's all you have. No evidence of where each creature came from and where they split off and how it happened. It's all guess work and assumption.
It's illogical. It's not based on verifiable science. We do not accept that from anything else except evolution.

 

[pitabread]

Continuing to mention my misunderstanding of what you were claiming is just more evidence obfuscation to the point you have no real evidence. It's a common tactic when you lack an actual argument.

Pointing out that you have no idea what you are talking about in regards to those fossils isn't obfuscation of anything. It's simply pointing out that you have no idea what you are talking about. Especially given the context of your claim was an attempted counter-argument to what was presented.

On top of that it doesn't matter what you're presented, because you'll just deny its existence. That's all you do.

Which makes me again wonder why you're even here. I could see coming for the arguments, but endless denialism doesn't even make for an interesting argument. So why *are* you here?

 

[pitabread]

Except we can see from the fossil evidence and genetic evidence that humans and other animals share a common ancestor!

Not if one shoves their head in the sand, they won't.

 

[mark kennedy]

Some people claim the bolded bit. Not you, but some people do. That's what I was mentioning. I wasn't meaning to start a discussion about whether he hated God, but just meant to explain why I was being a bit pedantic about that bit.

I'm not sure that he was pretty much agonistic his entire life. He was, when young, planning to become a clergyman. See also his religious discussions with his wife Emma Wedgewood, which indicate belief.

Ok, Darwin was never a Christian in any sense I can recognize. He started studying Medicine at Cambridge but decided he couldn't stand to see children suffer. So he finished his undergraduate degree as a ministry degree. It was a popular undergraduate degree, the equivalent of a liberal arts degree now, so did Mendel by the way. Before he graduated he was already a naturalist and indicated no intention of going into ministry. One of his Professors was from Brazil who was a taxidermist and told him about the rain forests. Darwin had a large beetles collection, the bug not the band. He also had raised orchids and pigeons which he mentions in his writings. Charles Darwin was never really religious, his wife was, but he was an agnostic with no real animosity toward religion, he just accepted it as it was.

His work is profoundly philosophical, it became a unified theory of biology which was a big help when genetic was in it's infancy. Darwinism is into far more then a simple theory of adaptive evolution, it's also into legal and political theory. Now Darwin was kind of oblivious to this aspect, he wasn't a philosopher he was a naturalist. Asa Grey and Hebert Spencer were the ones to develop it along those lines. The Modern Synthesis was the final touches that makes Darwinism an integral part of Biology and natural history to this day.

This isn't me being critical, I've just studied it a lot and that's just what I have taken away from my studies. But we all do our own thinking on this and your certainly capable of making your own conclusions.

Darwinism is historically a very important step towards the ToE. I agree that there is a distinction between evolution in nature and the ToE. Evolution in nature is a natural process, and the ToE is our description of it. Is that what you mean.

They grew up together and BTW, evolution isn't a theory its a known phenomenon in nature. The theory of evolution is a reference to natural history with implications for ongoing adaptive evolution. ToE can be synonymous with ToE, it can also be something else entirely. Yes, Darwinism was important to ToE but what has to be appreciated, evolution isn't a theory, it's simply the change of traits in populations over time. That definition comes from statistic genetics, while I don't agree with everything in ToE I would not deprecate by reducing it to the limited confines of Darwinian natural selection.

I'm not sure that describing people as 'Darwinians' is all that accurate in many cases. The modern ToE owes a lot to Darwin, but it also owes an awful lot to people other than Darwin, both earlier than him and later. He is possibly the most important link in the chain, but far from the only one. E.g. the modern definition of evolution talks about gene frequencies, and Darwin didn't even know that genes existed.

Philosophical Darwinism is based on the requisite naturalistic assumptions of universal common ancestry. That's a presuppositional view, anyone who believes in and argues for universal common ancestry in my view is Darwinian. I don't necessarily think it's a bad thing, just a thing. A unified theory in science is a very big deal, all the time spent on String theory and they still can't get it done. During the scientific revolution they worked tirelessly on the principles of motion, it took nearly a hundred years to get it done and modern physics was born.

The only reason I got into this was because being a Creationist I was alarmed that they were trying to introduce Creationism into the public schools. That is going to do nothing but cause mindless conflict over religious doctrine. Other then that it's an intellectual exercise in evidencial apologetics for me. Charles Darwin was a good natured guy, who was known for being kind and inquisitive. I don't consider his theory of natural selection to be any more a threat to my religious convictions then I think religion is a threat to science.

I think the subject matter is largely philosophical and that, at least for me, is the most interesting part of Darwinism.

Grace and peace,
Mark

 

[Speedwell]

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Philosophical Darwinism is based on the requisite naturalistic assumptions of universal common ancestry. That's a presuppositional view, anyone who believes in and argues for universal common ancestry in my view is Darwinian.

Common ancestry is not a "presupposition." It is a reasonable post hoc inference from the evidence. As such it is based on the assumption of methodological naturalism, the same methodological naturalism which underlies all of science.

 

[pitabread]

Common ancestry is not a "presupposition." It is a reasonable post hoc inference from the evidence. As such it is based on the assumption of methodological naturalism, the same methodological naturalism which underlies all of science.

I wonder if mark also takes issue with the naturalistic assumptions of oceanography, climatology, seismology, and so on.

Then again, I guess if it doesn't infringe on one's faith, no sense in worrying about it.

 

[AnotherAtheist]

But living those don't evolve in the manner you describe. Sure living things adapt in order to survive. But they don't evolve like described from common ancestry.

So you say. But the evidence we have from genetics, molecular biology, fossils, modern biogeography, etc. etc., etc. is that they do.

Living things also show similarities and commonalities. Just like buildings. But you would never look at a building and assume it has a common ancestor.

As I already said and you just ignored, buildings don't have ancestors or descent as they don't reproduce. Living things do have ancestors or descent as they do reproduce. Hence, your argument simply doesn't work. So, why do you just repeat it without addressing this point?

Yet without a common ancestor and without any observable evolution as prescribed by evolutionists you assume common ancestry. Dogs and cats came from a common ancestor is the claim.

Evolution is entirely observable through the evidence. Probably the best evidence for evolution is the genetic record for evolution as preserved in the genomes of currently living things. These genomes can be independently observed and checked. Hence evolution is entirely testable and falsifiable as if the genetic record did not show evidence of evolution, then evolution would have been disproved.

Yet any observable, verifiable, testable evidence has never shown that it happened.

Except of course that we have plenty of observable verifiable testable evidence for evolution. As in the 29+ Evidences for Macroevolution which you just hand-wave away without even demonstrating that you understand the evidence.

They have similarities in design and function such as eyes and ears and a mouth and digestive tract etc. But that's all you have.

No it isn't. We have fossil evidence showing that living things appeared over time from simple to complex. We have biochemical evidence. We have biogeographical evidence. We have evidence from things such as ring species. We have the genetic evidence. All of this can be observed, tested, put through the ringer, and comes up with one answer: evolution and common descent.

You're just trying the old trick of simply ignoring all evidence put to you, and then come back and say that there is none. This is easily shown to be wrong, so I don't know what you expect to gain from it apart from being able to continue posting even though arguments have been put to you that you simply have absolutely no comeback for.

No evidence of where each creature came from and where they split off and how it happened. It's all guess work and assumption.
It's illogical. It's not based on verifiable science. We do not accept that from anything else except evolution.

There is plenty of evidence where creatures came from and where they split off. The genetic evidence is the best for this, but the fossil evidence, the morphological evidence, the biochemical evidence, all of this adds to the humongous evidence we have for evolution and common descent. This evidence is verifiable and testable. As anyone with the facilities can sequence the genomes and check the official version. The genomes for many creatures including human beings can be downloaded from the net, and checked. I've got it on my hard drive. The software we use to check for relationships between organisms can be downloaded anyone can check the published results to see if they are correct. The amount of verifiable testable evidence just goes on and on.

BTW: You mentioned the common ancestor of dogs and cats. This is an excellent way of showing how evolution is testable. The genomes of cats and dogs allow us to estimate the time that the common ancestor of dogs and cats lived. Therefore, we know when to look for that ancestor. And, there are quite a few examples of these ancestors being found at the predicted time. And, they found it: Dormaalocyon. Evolution: tested and yet again it passes the test.

Now that I've given you all this objective verifiable testable evidence for common descent and evolution, perhaps you could give me some verifiable testable evidence for your religious worldview?

And here's my own prediction. Yet again you will simply ignore all of this, and come back pretending that there isn't any evidence for common descent. Oh, and you won't give any objective verifiable evidence for your own beliefs.

 

[AnotherAtheist]

Ok, Darwin was never a Christian in any sense I can recognize. He started studying Medicine at Cambridge but decided he couldn't stand to see children suffer. So he finished his undergraduate degree as a ministry degree. It was a popular undergraduate degree, the equivalent of a liberal arts degree now, so did Mendel by the way.

In Darwin's own words his beliefs fluctuated considerably. The general trend was from Anglican Christianity to agnosticism. But, there is evidence that he was a believer at some points in his life, even though agnosticism grew quickly. Hence, I don't think it's accurate to say that he was never a Christian.

Before he graduated he was already a naturalist and indicated no intention of going into ministry. One of his Professors was from Brazil who was a taxidermist and told him about the rain forests. Darwin had a large beetles collection, the bug not the band. He also had raised orchids and pigeons which he mentions in his writings. Charles Darwin was never really religious, his wife was, but he was an agnostic with no real animosity toward religion, he just accepted it as it was.

As above, there is evidence including Darwin's own words that he was not always agnostic and that he was a believer at some points in his life.

His work is profoundly philosophical, it became a unified theory of biology which was a big help when genetic was in it's infancy. Darwinism is into far more then a simple theory of adaptive evolution, it's also into legal and political theory. Now Darwin was kind of oblivious to this aspect, he wasn't a philosopher he was a naturalist. Asa Grey and Hebert Spencer were the ones to develop it along those lines. The Modern Synthesis was the final touches that makes Darwinism an integral part of Biology and natural history to this day.

Yes, the general concept of survival of the fittest and evolution can be applied to other domains. (E.g. genetic algorithms, evolutionary views of business marketplaces, etc.) Darwinism applied to other domains does not always work, in my opinion. E.g. I'm not sure that in businesses do survive or not based around survival of the fittest trends as clearly as living things.

This isn't me being critical, I've just studied it a lot and that's just what I have taken away from my studies. But we all do our own thinking on this and your certainly capable of making your own conclusions.

I accept that these are your conclusions. But, I've also looked into these things and revised them now to check, and I don't agree on Darwin never having been a Christian.

 

[rjs330]

Ah, what a brilliant armchair scientist you are. How wonderful it must be to know that all of the world's scientists are wrong and you and only you are correct.

I'm not the only one who believes like I do.

 

[Warden_of_the_Storm]

I'm not the only one who believes like I do.

My point still stands. You sitting on your chair, typing away on a forum, saying how scientists are just 'assuming' (since you people oh so love that word) about everything they say about theory of evolution, while you are doing... absolutely nothing to show that they're wrong.
You're an armchair scientist, nothing more. And a pretty bad one at that.

 

[rjs330]

Wrong. It shows commonalities that make no sense if we posit common design, but which make perfect sense if we posit naturalistic evolution.

Can you explain why a designer would put broken non-functional genes into organisms? And that some non-functional genes in very similar organisms are broken in the exact same way? But, where these genes are broken in very different organisms, they are broken in different ways?

Because the genes were not necessary. Common design does not mean exactness. Just like common design in buildings do not mean all buildings are exactly the same. It makes perfect sense for common design. Commonality and similarity of common design goes not mean everything is exactly the same.

 

[pitabread]

You're an arm chair scientist, nothing more.

That's an insult to armchair scientists.

 

[Speedwell]

Because the genes were not necessary. Common design does not mean exactness. Just like common design in buildings do not mean all buildings are exactly the same. It makes perfect sense for common design. Commonality and similarity of common design goes not mean everything is exactly the same.

We're not talking about common features of phenotype, but about damaged genes and their distribution.

 

[rjs330]

Pointing out that you have no idea what you are talking about in regards to those fossils isn't obfuscation of anything. It's simply pointing out that you have no idea what you are talking about. Especially given the context of your claim was an attempted counter-argument to what was presented.

On top of that it doesn't matter what you're presented, because you'll just deny its existence. That's all you do.

Which makes me again wonder why you're even here. I could see coming for the arguments, but endless denialism doesn't even make for an interesting argument. So why *are* you here?

And you still have no evidence of it ever occurring. Denialism isn't such a bad thing when one is denying something there really isn't any observable, verifiable, testable or reproducible evidence for.

It's obfuscation when you refuse to accept a misunderstanding rather than show evidence of something actually occurring.

 

[pitabread]

And you still have no evidence of it ever occurring. Denialism isn't such a bad thing when one is denying something there really isn't any observable, verifiable, testable or reproducible evidence for.

What if I told you there was no evidence for the Moon. Nothing observable, verifiable, testable or reproducible. Would you agree with me?

It's obfuscation when you refuse to accept a misunderstanding rather than show evidence of something actually occurring.

I accept that you have no idea what you are talking about when it comes to the subject at hand. And that evidence is completely irrelevant in this situation, since you'll just dismiss anything you're presented with. You're just stone-walling.