Lesson in Cladistics: Playing Cards

Loudmouth said:

Creationists claim that they organize species according to their differences. I don't think it can be done, so I am asking creationists to organize cards based on differences since cards carry much less baggage than species with respect to groups.

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Differences of what?
Are you saying that there is no difference?

You want to classify something by difference, but there is no difference? Are you nuts?

OllieFranz said:

My theories? What theories would that be? I have espoused no theories, either in this thread or in the one that was recently closed.

I have compared Creationist theories with the Evolutionary Model, and pointed out that the Baraminology model of Special Creation, as you explain it, is not science. It could be science if more attention was given to providing evidence for its claims. It is possible that some Creationists have provided such evidence, but I have not found where they have. In this thread and in the previous thread we have mainly had your explanations, which are light on the evidence.

But even if baraminology is not science, I have not proved, or attempted to prove it false (though I may choose to attempt to do so once I have your evidence to examine). Simply showing that there are flaws in your explanations particularly explanations of minor details -- does not discredit the discipline as a whole.

Likewise, your whole approach to discrediting the Evolutionary Model can never discredit the EM as a whole, because you are exclusively focused on those same minor details.

But, while my criticism cannot on its own discredit baraminology, it still stands. I can find baraminologists who claim that Cats and Great Cats are two different kinds. I can find baraminologists who claim all felines, small, great, and sabre-toothed are a single kind, and you have claimed that there are (well, "were" because all sabre-tooths are extinct) two feline kinds. If the differences between kinds is fundamental can you point to what these fundamental differences are between a sabre-tooth and aq modern cat (or great cat), or explain why some baraminologists don't find these differences to be fundamental? Or can you tell me why the even greater differences between small cats and great cats are not fundamental, and why those baraminologists who believe they are two different kinds are wrong?

Arbitrarily choosing a point on a relativistic sliding scale for the purpose of making comparisons is not random, but calculated, and the comparisons made are (or can be) good science. Evolutionists have no need to apologize or feel shame for choosing the points they do. On the other hand, insisting, as baraminologists do, that those points are not arbitrary but absolutely fundamental requires evidence of their necessity. Evidence I have not seen and have not been able to turn up. Evidence promised by you, but never delivered.

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Here you go again. Your theories refers to evolutionists theories. You know...the ones you are trying to defend, but without sucess!

This is what you said

Evolutionists do not have this problem. They freely admit that the "root: of a clade is chosen relatively. Any clade can be broken into two clades by dropping the common ancestor. Any two neighboring clades can be combined into one clade by adding the common ancestor. There are no definitive, separate "kinds."


By 'chosen relatively' I suggest you are actually meaning 'have no idea'.




I don't really care what you say. You see this above. It demonstrates that even with biased and assumptive algorithmic magic these researchers are still as confused as they were 150 years ago. Imagine how much more confused they would be if their research was actually realistic.

Further to that all you have is fossil evidence. Morphologically a pig is closer to a hippo than a whale. Evos may like to mess around with this stuff. However, evolutionists should never present these nested hierarchies up as evidence of anything more than a game evolutionists play because they need to.

I gave an example for Loudmouths cards with my birds. Looks like it has been ignored. I wonder why.

Loudmouth said:

Creationists claim that they organize species according to their differences. I don't think it can be done, so I am asking creationists to organize cards based on differences since cards carry much less baggage than species with respect to groups.

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Apart from the ridiculousness of requiring a research length paper and presentation in a thread reply, I have presented a simple example in my response to OllieFranz. Here it is agian.


I will take a giant leap for a future prediction in a relatively new field. I will speculate that the differences between kinds is in gene expression. I will speculate that various kinds will be able to be separated by qualitative research into species comparison which is a new field. So far I have only seen such work on man and chimps. There is an 83% difference in expression. It won't be long and I will present a genomic differentiation between kinds. From this I'll throw out a hypothesis to be verified in time.

"A kind will be differentiated on the basis of comapartive genomic expressions. A kind will demonstrate a genomic expression range of 10%"


As for your card game….Lets remind ourselves first of the state of your nested hierarchies for Aves.

These results show that Theropoda as presently constituted may not be monophyletic and that the verificationist approach of the BMT literature may be producing misleading studies on the origin of birds.

http://www.bio.fsu.edu/James/Ornithological%20Monographs%202009.pdf

The weight of the evidence is now suggesting that not only did birds not descend from dinosaurs, Ruben said, but that some species now believed to be dinosaurs may have descended from birds.
Bird-from-dinosaur theory of evolution challenged: Was it the other way around?


So each kind is determined by the suite of traits applicable. After all your hierarchies are not going to help out where you cannot retrieve DNA. You are stuck with guesswork the same as me. How much effort is it worth spending time and money on vague single bones?

Birds have a reversed hallux and feathers for a simplified example and dinosaurs do not have both traits. Some say dinos had feathers others not now, but they do not have both therefore they are not of the bird kind either. Hence birds and dinos/theropods/whatever flavour of the month are 2 different kinds, birds and Archaeopteryx are also 2 different kinds.

Category:Subfamilies of birds - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

So your cards, however you wish to arrange them, would root/start in the Devonian with many varieties of the bird kind initially created. You could start with the 4 Aces as 4 of the first varieties of birds OR say the Ace clubs could represent all the varieties being the entire kind. The ‘10’s could be what is here today.

These would run through the birds that left the modern bird footprints 212mya. That would represent one of the variations then come down to the range we see today as basically classified into sub/family.

Arch did not have avian feet and therefore is not a bird. Arch is of a kind that went extinct. Theropods do not have a reversed hallux either so they are not of the bird kind.


So I have used your cards to give an example of the bird/aves kind and how it can be differentiated from any other kind.

Are you happy with that? I know that is a silly question to ask an evolutionist. Let's see what hoops will be put up to jump through now. I know ........Loudmouth will suggest that his card analogy is a scientific method!

Loudmouth....OK so I get it. You think your card analogy is a scientific method. I thought so.

This is the usual fluff thread constructed to demonstrate how intelligent evolutionists are. We get it!

This is why Loudmouth himself will never give a demo because he also cannot. It is a ridiculous ploy rooted in desperation.

Variaitions within the kind remain much the same. So whatever card/s you start with they should look much the same at the end. If an evo has not worked that out yet then that is their problem.

If you, Loudmouth, are seriously thinking that the complexity of determining differentiation between anything can be explicitly and precisely attuned to a deck of cards as you are irrationally demanding, then you are more disengaged with reality than I ever thought possible.

Astridhere said:

Here you go again. Your theories refers to evolutionists theories. You know...the ones you are trying to defend, but without sucess!

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I have not "defended" any theories in these two threads. You have been assuming that because I point out a weakness in your explanation, that I am attacking the theory (baraminology) that you are explaining. You give me too much credit. I am doing nothing more than I stated pointing out a problem with your explanation.

Furthermore you assume that I think that by attacking that theory I am promoting or "defending" an alternate theory, and you make assumptions about what that alternate theory is, as though there is only one possible alternative to baraminology. First, even if there were only two possibilities, pointing out a weakness of your explanation does nothing to discredit the theory of baraminology (though your failure to correct that weakness does not look good in terms of advocating the theory to the scientific community). Second, Baraminology is not the only version of Special Creation, so discrediting it would do nothing toward "defending" the Evolutionary Model against Creationism.

So none of my posts have "defended" the Evolutionary Model, nor did they atvempt to do so. The only way to defend a scientific theory is positively, not negatively. Pointing out the supposed flaws of the Evolutionary Model does not defend baraminology, and you are simply wasting your time and everyone else's trying to do so.

This is what you said

Evolutionists do not have this problem. They freely admit that the "root: of a clade is chosen relatively. Any clade can be broken into two clades by dropping the common ancestor. Any two neighboring clades can be combined into one clade by adding the common ancestor. There are no definitive, separate "kinds."


By 'chosen relatively' I suggest you are actually meaning 'have no idea'.

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Not at all. It means choosing the best point for the comparison that you are making, recognizing that 1) there is no "absolutely" best point, and 2) for a different comparison, a different point might be better. The point is chosen, and it is chosen for a reason. It is not random. It is not "have no idea."

I've done genealogical research on my family. When I print my family tree, I can list it starting with my grandparents, or I can start with my great-grandparents. It matters because on my mother's side I have the important information about all my great-grandparents. On my father's side, I'm still missing information on my great-grandmothers. If I am printing a tree for a cousin on my mother's side (just my mother's side information) I start with my great-grandparents. If I am printing for a cousin on my father's side (just my father's side information), I start with my grandparents. If I am printing the tree for my sister (both sides), I can choose whether to start both trees with my grandparents, or to start the one with the grandparents, and the other with the great-grands. In any case, the trees have complete information from the starting points to the present. There is nothing "I have no idea" about the information.

I don't really care what you say. You see this above. It demonstrates that even with biased and assumptive algorithmic magic these researchers are still as confused as they were 150 years ago. Imagine how much more confused they would be if their research was actually realistic.

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Actually, I don't see. That graphic is too small for my tired old eyes to be able to read. Plus you have posted the graphic without posting or linking to the paper it came from, so I have no idea if it is intended to illustrate the point you claim it does.

But apparently you are arguing a detail which is equivalent to asking of two contemporaneous fossils, which one belongs to the older species. If someone guessed wrong about something small like that it would not upset evolutionary theory as a whole. After all, according to that theory, sharks and cockroaches have existed mostly unchanged while other species came mutated, and mutated again. Not every species evolves at the same rate in the Evolutionary Model.

On the other hand, "Created Kinds" is at the heart of baraminology. And yet you have given no evidence why different kinds had to have been created separately. You have have given no criteria to evaluate the differences that may provide such evidence, and you and your colleagues do not agree on which kinds are, indeed, separate. If you want to convince me, or anyone, that baraminology is right, the first step is for you to provide that kind of evidence. That is all I ask. That is all I have ever asked of you.

I gave an example for Loudmouths cards with my birds. Looks like it has been ignored. I wonder why.

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And I said that I don't think Loudmouth's theory conserning classifying by differences is a profitable argument. I don't agree with him on that issue, so I don't care whether or not you can refute him.

Loudmouth said:

Morphology.

I never said that there are no differences between species or cards. What I am saying, and not for the first time, is that you can not organize things into meaningful groups based on differences. Creationists claim that you can. I am challenging that claim in this thread and using playing cards as an example.

It is creationists who want to organize things by differences, not I.

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Difference is not a criterion.

You can not classify by a non-criterion.

You started wrong right in the OP.

Loudmouth said:

I never stated that groups could be organized based on differences. I have said all along that they can't. The challenge was for creationists to prove me wrong. I am using playing cards as a simple model to show why one can not organize groups based on differences. In the case of the cards, you don't have any groups if you group based on differences. Instead, you have 52 separate cards. Only when you group by similarities do you have something meaningful. That is what cladistics is. It groups things by what they share, otherwise known as synapomorphies. The nodes of each branch are made up of what the rest of the branch shares.

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It is a simple logic. Why would a creationist want to say that he can?

Loudmouth said:

I don't know why they would . . . and yet they do.

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No they don't.

juvenissun said:

No they don't.

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1. I gave Loudmouth a prefectly good example in birds. It is his problem if he thinks his card analogy is a scientific method.

2. Loudmouth is unable to provide a demo himself and likely never will.

3. I've never had an evolutionist demonstate a clade using chop sticks either and I bet they can't. There must be something wrong with them.

Come on Loudmouth. Show us all how it is done. Show us all it can be done.

Just demonstrate any part of any of your clades for us with your cards.

Are there any betting creationists around?

What's the bet that Loudmouth has no idea what he is talking about.

Loudmouth said:

I never stated that groups could be organized based on differences. I have said all along that they can't. The challenge was for creationists to prove me wrong. I am using playing cards as a simple model to show why one can not organize groups based on differences. In the case of the cards, you don't have any groups if you group based on differences. Instead, you have 52 separate cards. Only when you group by similarities do you have something meaningful. That is what cladistics is. It groups things by what they share, otherwise known as synapomorphies. The nodes of each branch are made up of what the rest of the branch shares.

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But Loudmouth..It doesn't work for you. Look at the messes I have presented. You may want it to work, you may hope that these messes are based on science, but they are not.

You are forgetting that evolutionists have difficulty picking the human out of a bunch of apes. You will argue and go around and around. You evolutionists have turned everything into a nonsense. The thing is Loudmouth regardless of how difficult it is to articulate differentiation, quite clearly in reality a chimp is clearly not human, nor does a cat resemble a dog, nor a modern bird a dinosaur. It is evolutionists that go around in cirlces with this.

I'll make it easy for you. If the fossil, single bone to complete, resembles any living creature then that is likely what kind it is. If it doesn't, then it is a kind that is extinct. That is the assumption my view of creation is based on. I'll let others speak for themselves. You look for intermediates. I don't. It is simple.

However if you are telling me that zoologists cannot articulate why they can tell a cat, dog, horse etc, is what it is, then I think you are kidding yourself and intentionally being ignorant to not loose face here. Those same traits are the same ones that separates one kind from another. Fossils are either of the kinds here today or extinct.

I do not know why this is so darn hard for you to understand. I have said it many times, many ways and it just goes over the top of your head every time. What this relates to is a slippery attempt to request more than you are prepared to forrage for.

I gave you an example in birds. This is a simple example. As you should be aware proper analysis and articulation of why any organisms is what it is, is quite lengthy. Many of your reconstructions are nothing more than single or a few scattered bones. You can bet your researchers are not looking for what any ancient fossil resembles in life today.

Clearly, regardless of not applying it to cards, my bird example was an apt example of differentiation. The reversed hallux is the trait that differentiates a modern bird from any other kind. The other suits would be similarly grouped as per birds eg horses spades, Theropods diamonds and extinct, Hearts can be whales. I am not going to provide a plethora of research papers just because you do not believe your scientists have any morphological way to differentiate these species above.

So all the clubs could be the bird kind because they all have a reversed hallux.


It is done!