A challenge has been issued

[Loudmouth]

Are you aware that there are Christians who do understand that?
They may not understand all the science behind some theory, but they do understand what science is and what it is not...

In my time here, I have repeatedly seen creationists try to lecture people on how science is done, and then watch them get the basics completely wrong.

For example, we often hear creationists claim that science needs to be repeatable. However, what does that really mean? What needs to be repeatable? Time and again, I see creationists claim that hypotheses need to be repeatable. They claim that the theory of evolution needs to be repeatable. THIS IS WRONG. It is the observations that need to be repeatable, not the theory/hypothesis. Confusing the hypothesis and observations seems to be a very common problem among those who criticize science.

So I would actually disagree with you. They don't understand what is and isn't science. They can't even get the scientific method right.

 

[Loudmouth]

I think the only way the public would get anything out of this would be if they were the ones to pose the questions, e.g., a studio audience in a live debate.

Written debates are much, much better for this topic. What you will find is that creationists usually refuse to do a written debate for the simple reason that it allows people to check their references. Debaters like Kent Hovind purposefully lie about the results in scientific papers, but they know they can get away with it in an oral debate, so they keep doing it. For example, Kent Hovind was famous for claiming that two parts of the same mammoth had wildly different carbon-14 dates, which he used to insinuate that carbon dating is not reliable. When you check his references, you come to find out that the two dates came from two different mammoths found hundreds of miles apart.

http://www.angelfire.com/alt2/digicam/mammoth.html

How do you think the public would be helped by this sort of thing, by creationists who tell flat out lies? You would probably come away from a Kent Hovind debate thinking that there was serious doubt about carbon dating, but that would be based on a lie that a real scientific written debate would uncover.

This also relates to what is called the "Gish Gallop". This is where the creationists makes many, many different claims in quick succession knowing that his opponent can not counter all of them in the allotted time. This, again, allows lies to keep their veneer of truth because no one had the time to show how they are lies.

Here are some examples of questions that such an audience might want to pose:-

• Where did all the space and matter come from to form the universe and what was before that?

Right away, we find the problem with the public posing questions. That has nothing to do with evolution.

• How could life get started from lifeless chemicals?
• Why is the sun misaligned by about 7 degrees to all the planets that orbit it?
• What about the unusual rotation of Uranus - how can that be explained?
• How could the first stars form just from gas?
• Why are there fully-formed galaxies right at the edge of the known universe, where even stars should barely be forming?
• What do you think is beyond the known universe?
• Given that comets have a relatively very short life span, is there any hard evidence to show where they are being formed or is it just speculation?
  
• How do you overcome the problem of chirality in amino acids and proteins?

None of these have anything to do with evolution.

Where did all the vast amounts of information in our cells come from?

This is in the ballpark of evolution, but it begs the question. You first need to establish that there is information in the cell before you can ask how it got there.

• Define evolution and then provide some examples of it occurring in the world around us.

That is better. Darwin still has one of the better definitions which is "descent with modification". More modern descriptions include genetics, such as "changes in allele frequencies within populations". Above all, evolution has to do with how biological species change. That's it. It doesn't deal with where matter came from, or even how the first life forms came about. It doesn't deal with the orbit of the Moon, angle of tilt for planets, etc.

• Give some examples of definite transitional creatures in the fossil record, given that most of what we know about a creature is apparently only contained in its soft tissues, long since lost.

The transitional hominids are great examples. Wiki has a nice list:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_transitional_fossils


The problem is that creationists use a different definition for transitional than what real scientists use. Real scientists define a transitional species by it's morphology. Creationists try to redefine transitionals so that you are required to have a time machine in order to see if a fossil has living descendants.

A source of confusion is the notion that a transitional form between two different taxonomic groups must be a direct ancestor of one or both groups. The difficulty is exacerbated by the fact that one of the goals of evolutionary taxonomy is to identify taxa that were ancestors of other taxa. However, it is almost impossible to be sure that any form represented in the fossil record is a direct ancestor of any other. In fact, because evolution is a branching process that produces a complex bush pattern of related species rather than a linear process producing a ladder-like progression, and because of the incompleteness of the fossil record, it is unlikely that any particular form represented in the fossil record is a direct ancestor of any other. Cladistics deemphasizes the concept of one taxonomic group being an ancestor of another, and instead emphasizes the identification of sister taxa that share a more recent common ancestor with one another than they do with other groups. There are a few exceptional cases, such as some marine plankton microfossils, where the fossil record is complete enough to suggest with confidence that certain fossils represent a population that was actually ancestral to a later population of a different species.[10] But, in general, transitional fossils are considered to have features that illustrate the transitional anatomical features of actual common ancestors of different taxa, rather than to be actual ancestors.[11]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transitional_fossil#Transitional_versus_ancestral​

But the real question is "Why can't you use Google?". A strange thing that I have noticed is that creationists don't like to use Google. I think it is because they are afraid of finding the answer to these questions. A simple Google search for "transitional fossil" turns up tons of great websites aimed at the general public.

• What would it take to convince you of the possibility that the universe was supernaturally created? If you already accept that as being the most likely cause of all reality, explain why you believe that to be the best explanation.

Why couldn't life evolve in a universe that was started by a deity with the Big Bang? Again, what you are asking does not involve evolution.

• Do you accept that life appears to be designed and if so, who do you think is/was the designer?

That assumes that the appearance of design requires a designer.

• How do you account for the anthropic principle?

Human ego.

 

[Davian]

...
Or, as one of Dawkins's colleagues put it when challenged by a creationist:

"That would look great on your CV, not so good on mine!"

This exactly.

Next, the Flat Earthers and Pastafarians will be demanding equal time.

While there are evangelical Christians, such as Francis Collins, that wholly accept modern cosmology and evolutionary theory, I do not give this Christianity-or-evolution dichotomy any credence.

 

[Astrophile]

I've just watched a debate between a creation-believing scientist and an evolution beleiving scientist, but I didn't get much out of it, partly but not totally due to the sometimes poor sound quality.

I think the only way the public would get anything out of this would be if they were the ones to pose the questions, e.g., a studio audience in a live debate. Otherwise, the scientists on both sides would just pick their own particular topics that they think supported their ideas and the persons watching the exchanges would learn very little. The subject matter could be widened to include all things relating to our existence, so would take in astrophysics as well. Here are some examples of questions that such an audience might want to pose:-

• Where did all the space and matter come from to form the universe and what was before that?

I don't really know; cosmology isn't my subject. However, so far as I understand it, the universe didn't have a beginning in the conventional sense. There wasn't a time when the universe didn't exist and a later time when the universe did exist. You might learn something from 'The Grand Design' by Stephen Hawking and from 'A Universe from Nothing' by Lawrence Krauss.

• How could life get started from lifeless chemicals?

Biology is definitely not my subject, but you seem to have fallen into the error of vitalism, the idea that 'life' is an external 'element' that has to be added to 'lifeless chemicals' to animate them. As I understand it, life is an emergent property of complex chemical systems. You will have to ask a professional biologist or biochemist if you want to learn more

Why is the sun misaligned by about 7 degrees to all the planets that orbit it?

I take it that you are asking why the Sun's equator is inclined by 7° to the plane of the ecliptic. I don't know; it's an interesting question. Have you got a hypothesis that can explain it, preferably one that makes testable predictions?

• What about the unusual rotation of Uranus - how can that be explained?

The current explanation is that during its accretion Uranus collided with a protoplanet one or two times the mass of the Earth, and that this collision caused the large axial inclination.

• How could the first stars form just from gas?

Gravitational collapse of large gas clouds.

• Why are there fully-formed galaxies right at the edge of the known universe, where even stars should barely be forming?

I don't know. The fact that we can observe galaxies whose light has taken nearly 13 billion years to reach us is extraordinary enough.

• What do you think is beyond the known universe?

I don't know. If it is beyond the known universe, it must, by definition, be the unknown universe.

I will try later to deal with your question about comets. At the moment I have other things to do. I can't answer your biological questions, but no doubt other scientists on the forum will do that.

 

[Crowns&Laurels]

Evolutionists have a way of presuming assumptions as facts, trivializing, mocking, and then riding off into the sunset in their own proclaimed victory.

That's generally how public debates go, and not just with evolutionists, but anti-theists as well. People in the crowds even join in with some lopsided thing to say- when you are the minority, you're not right even when you are.

 

[Shemjaza]

Evolutionists have a way of presuming assumptions as facts, trivializing, mocking, and then riding off into the sunset in their own proclaimed victory.

That's generally how public debates go, and not just with evolutionists, but anti-theists as well. People in the crowds even join in with some lopsided thing to say- when you are the minority, you're not right even when you are.

Do you have any actual examples? Because the science of evolution has been presenting facts, figures and predictions for over a century, and when an error occurs it is fixed.

Creationism seems to have vague hand waves and conspiracy theories.

ERVs, mutations and transitional fossils in the correct age ranges are not assumptions... evolution is the only scientific explanation we have. Please feel free to present a testable alternative.

 

[Crowns&Laurels]

Do you have any actual examples? Because the science of evolution has been presenting facts, figures and predictions for over a century, and when an error occurs it is fixed.

Creationism seems to have vague hand waves and conspiracy theories.

ERVs, mutations and transitional fossils in the correct age ranges are not assumptions... evolution is the only scientific explanation we have. Please feel free to present a testable alternative.

Evolution is built on presupposition. This is the cornerstone of creationist argument which evolutionists just can't seem to acknowledge.
What you call 'fixed errors' are like crutches. Evolution can basically pull anything out of it's hat to fix any of these 'errors'. That is why it is so successful, because it is utterly infallible to itself just as you suppose religion is.

 

[bhsmte]

Evolution is built on presupposition. This is the cornerstone of creationist argument which evolutionists just can't seem to acknowledge.
What you call 'fixed errors' are like crutches. Evolution can basically pull anything out of it's hat to fix any of these 'errors'. That is why it is so successful, because it is utterly infallible to itself just as you suppose religion is.

What exactly is the "cornerstone" of the creationist argument?

 

[Crowns&Laurels]

What exactly is the "cornerstone" of the creationist argument?

Evolutionists and creationists all have the same facts and evidence. The difference is that they each interpret differently, due to their presupposition. Evolutionists often get away by saying they didn't presuppose anything, the evidence simply points to their interpretation.
But that is complete nonsense, because it's against human nature itself. Evolutionists, in other words, try to make themselves Science Incarnate- you have a bias, and so what you see points to what you want to be real.

 

[bhsmte]

Evolutionists and creationists all have the same facts and evidence. The difference is that they each interpret differently, due to their presupposition. Evolutionists often get away by saying they didn't presuppose anything, the evidence simply points to their interpretation.
But that is complete nonsense, because it's against human nature itself. Evolutionists, in other words, try to make themselves Science Incarnate- you have a bias, and so what you see points to what you want to be real.

Ok, make your case for how the facts and evidence support creationism.

 

[Crowns&Laurels]

Ok, make your case for how the facts and evidence support creationism.

You want Christians to keep their Bibles out of it. In that way, they are left without their presuppositions while you still have yours.
Therefore, arguing is fruitless right from the start. You can just masquerade your presuppositions as fact by simply waving away any notion of God and trumping your victory with the stacked deck you've made.

It's a textbook display of brute force and deniability. It's why the Bible simply states that the world just sits in darkness- because it's not just with this debate, but also with every other subject between secularism and religion.

 

[bhsmte]

You want Christians to keep their Bibles out of it. In that way, they are left without their presuppositions while you still have yours.
Therefore, arguing is fruitless right from the start. You can just masquerade your presuppositions as fact by simply waving away any notion of God and trumping your victory with the stacked deck you've made.

It's a textbook display of brute force and deniability. It's why the Bible simply states that the world just sits in darkness- because it's not just with this debate, but also with every other subject between secularism and religion.

Well, you said you have facts and evidence and both of those things should be able to be verified as reliable, so those were your words, not mine.

 

[The Cadet]

You want Christians to keep their Bibles out of it. In that way, they are left without their presuppositions while you still have yours.

What presuppositions to people who accept evolution hold?

 

[Loudmouth]

Evolutionists have a way of presuming assumptions as facts, trivializing, mocking, and then riding off into the sunset in their own proclaimed victory.

Examples?

 

[Loudmouth]

You want Christians to keep their Bibles out of it.

As bhstme states, we want verifiable observations. It isn't our problem if Bible claims do not have the verifiable observations to back them.

In that way, they are left without their presuppositions while you still have yours.

We have verifiable observations, not presuppositions.

You can just masquerade your presuppositions as fact by simply waving away any notion of God and trumping your victory with the stacked deck you've made.

Which presuppositions are being masqueraded as facts?

 

[Loudmouth]

Evolutionists and creationists all have the same facts and evidence. The difference is that they each interpret differently, due to their presupposition.

What presuppositions do evolutionists use, and how is their interpretation wrong?

Evolutionists often get away by saying they didn't presuppose anything, the evidence simply points to their interpretation.
But that is complete nonsense, because it's against human nature itself. Evolutionists, in other words, try to make themselves Science Incarnate- you have a bias, and so what you see points to what you want to be real.

What are these presuppositions you keep speaking of?

 

[RickG]

Another great point.

This is not some new debate. CMI is bringing nothing new or spectacular to the table. Indeed, their resources have been plundered for debate across the internet for decades now, and you know what? It fails. Every time. I mean, if these guys are legitimately interested in honest scientific debate, what in the world is this doing on their web page?

http://creation.com/the-lost-squadron

We know that this is nonsense. It's very well-understood exactly how ice cores form, and we know how to measure their thickness. We've known that this is nonsense pretty much since they brought it up! And yet, for some reason, it's still on their webpage. Why? The debate on the "lost squadron" is one that ended over a decade and a half ago, and CMI was wrong. There's no reason to debate PRATT. If something has already been debunked and refuted, it does not need to be gone over again in a formal debate.

Personally, I'd demand that before CMI makes any claims to a frank and open debate, they first purge their website of all information which is known to be scientifically inaccurate, and debate on the basis of what is left. Of course, once you do that, you're left with very little beyond the statement of faith, but at least it's a better representation of the evidence for creationism.

I would love to debate the Lost Squadron with CMI or anyone.

 

[Shemjaza]

Evolution is built on presupposition. This is the cornerstone of creationist argument which evolutionists just can't seem to acknowledge.
What you call 'fixed errors' are like crutches. Evolution can basically pull anything out of it's hat to fix any of these 'errors'. That is why it is so successful, because it is utterly infallible to itself just as you suppose religion is.

So, you accuse people who accept evolution of presenting assumptions as facts.
I ask you for any examples of this.
You respond by accusing people who accept evolution of presenting assumptions as facts.

Not a convincing debate technique.

 

[Loudmouth]

For the record, I would be happy to debate any creationist in an open written debate on genetics with limited but pragmatic rules (e.g. must use references that are accessible online). There is even a formal debate section. I will give full copyright privileges to the creationist organization for anything I write in the debate.

Do you think my offer will be taken up?

 

[RickG]

For the record, I would be happy to debate any creationist in an open written debate on genetics with limited but pragmatic rules (e.g. must use references that are accessible online). There is even a formal debate section. I will give full copyright privileges to the creationist organization for anything I write in the debate.

Do you think my offer will be taken up?

Of course not. All such debates must be under their debate rules, which would keep you from getting an answer from any direct question you pose. If they can't do a Gish Gallop, they won't debate.