A discussion on Evolution, The Big Bang and Theology.

[Naraoia]

If falsification were part of that I would agree, but you didn't seem to know if that had been done.

"That" being? Both examples I gave you involve testing palaeontological hypotheses. What do you want me to do, find every single hypothesis-testing palaeontological study I've ever seen?

The second one, the one with the link, is the idea that different varieties of fossil feathers represent successive stages of feather evolution (conclusion: not necessarily, many of the more primitive-looking specimens could be preservational artefacts). The first one I'd have to dig for citations, but I'm fairly sure that the vicinity of the K-T impact layer and the last non-avian dinosaur remains have been dated to death and beyond, and I've definitely heard of studies of pre-impact dinosaurian diversity and trends thereof even if I don't know the citations by heart.

That would lead us into a discussion of confidence level. What is the confidence level for the roundness of the earth? Can we compare that to a confidence level in palaeontology?

The confidence level of what? "Palaeontology" includes a lot of things...

If not, this isn't a valid comparison.

If I recall correctly, the matter of contention was whether or not experts ought to keep questioning certain issues. Whatever you or I think of confidence levels, the field of palaeontology has collectively concluded long ago that fossil succession is the footprint of evolution. Ergo, from their perspective, there is no reason they should keep publishing on that. Hence, no reason for us to find recent studies on the subject.

It can. Is there a study on when palaeoglogical data becomes too noisy (or the variables are confounded, if you prefer)? Being aware of it is irrelevant if they are drawing conclusions from one environmental condition about what life was like across the whole earth.

That depends on what differs between the environmental conditions. Of course jungles, rivers on the savannah and shallow seas have very different floras and faunas. That's a no-brainer. But do these floras and faunas differ in ways that would skew our answers to certain questions?

Today, only the most extreme habitats lack mammals and birds, for example. Although bird bones can be quite fragile and difficult to preserve, mammalian teeth if nothing else are among the most fossilisable objects. Given this, their complete absence from any known Palaeozoic or earlier community is suggestive to say the least.

In contrast, it would be utterly stupid to take the absence of evidence for fossil deep-sea anglerfish as evidence of absence, because deep sea creatures very rarely leave fossils we can easily find.

A few of your replies are becoming a bit ad hominem without really addressing the issue.

Well, your argument consisted of the description of one guy on TV drawing completely random conclusions out of thin air. How is it an ad hominem to point out that this demonstrates only the quality of TV programmes? (Which, I might add, I've watched enough of to have an informedly low opinion of them...)

(FWIW, archaeology =/= palaeontology, so I could even question the relevance of the example.)

Did I miss something here? Why is there little doubt if it can't be tested? Earlier you were emphasizing the role of testing.

But these are artificial (human created) classifications. Unless you're going to argue a platonist philosophy it is a problem to assume an artificial category means real genetic similarity.

I haven't been here for a while, and I'm feeling lazy, so I'll just throw the relevant sections of that gem of a TalkOrigins FAQ at you.

In short, no, they aren't just artificial classifications. Or if they are, they conform eerily to the one possible kind of pattern that treelike evolution could produce.

Your link didn't work for me, so I don't know which book you mean. But, yes, that could be the case.

The book is Life on a Young Planet by Andrew Knoll, and it's well worth a read in general. I did give you a JSTOR link as well, though... (Here we go)

If you answer my question, I'll answer yours. Plus, I'll need a definition of "nested hierarchy" to be sure I understand you.

Here you go. No, there is nothing about creation that necessitates genetic differences. There is nothing about it that necessitates genetic similarities either. (I hope you see why that's a problem...)

In any case, an important point about ancient DNA is that whenever we had the chance to look, it confirmed the pattern we observe in living organisms (i.e. that genetic and phenotypic traits by and large define the same classifications). Thus, if you want to argue that a fossil that looks exactly like X could be genetically totally different, well, you'd better start providing positive evidence or you are basically pulling a dad.

Evolution is an event.

Evolution is a ton of events.

I'm sure there are parts of palaeontology of which I'm unaware. I'm not an expert in that area. And it's a difficult discipline to define. There is a contiuum from geology to palaeontology to archaeology to anthropology, and setting a definite line to separate them is tough. Regardless, I can't speak to what I don't know. I'm not trying to discount the entirety of it.

No, but I'm not sure you have a good grasp on your own argument/understand what I'm saying. And the above ("evolution is an event") just confirms my suspicion.

To clarify, here are some examples I would consider "events" (in a broad sense) that palaeontology tries to reconstruct:

- the preservation of particular fossils
- extinctions
- evolutionary transitions on various levels
- ecological interactions between fossil species
- other instances of behaviour, e.g. reproduction

... etc.

 

[Resha Caner]

I haven't been here for a while, and I'm feeling lazy, so I'll just throw the relevant sections of that gem of a TalkOrigins FAQ at you.

Yeah, I didn't even realize you had replied. I've completely lost the flow of the thread, and I don't know that I have the energy to recover it. Too bad. It was a good discussion.

Here you go. No, there is nothing about creation that necessitates genetic differences. There is nothing about it that necessitates genetic similarities either. (I hope you see why that's a problem...)

In any case, an important point about ancient DNA is that whenever we had the chance to look, it confirmed the pattern we observe in living organisms (i.e. that genetic and phenotypic traits by and large define the same classifications). Thus, if you want to argue that a fossil that looks exactly like X could be genetically totally different, well, you'd better start providing positive evidence or you are basically pulling a dad.

I guess I'll try to answer this, though, since you answered me - despite the muddiness of my memories regarding what we were talking about ... and even though I may not be well-versed on what you mean by a nested hierarchy.

You appear to take creationism as a formless thing. I suppose it might appear that way to you, but it's not ... or, at least I am willing to submit myself to some rules if we could articulate them. For example, C.S. Lewis argued an important distinction from Hume regarding miracles, i.e. that they are an "interference" with nature, not a "violation" of natural laws.

So, nested hierarchies do fit within creationism. There needs to be a certain amount of similarity in order for life to work. If beef was poisonous to humans, then cows wouldn't work as food. Dogs are man's best friend and fish aren't because of the compatibility between our species. Other bipedal species are similar to us in form because we live in a world where we are subject to the same physics. I don't have the background to quote details, but I imagine there might be a physical problem with a bipedal animal the size of an elephant. I've known several very tall, very large people and they all seem to have suffered from gigantism early in life (growing too fast) and back problems late in life. So, knowing this, God simply wouldn't have created such an animal.

Actually, with respect to nested hierarchies, I would argue that evolution and creationism are similar. Evolution didn't start out with a blank slate and predict nested hierarchies. Rather, they were observed first, and then incorporated into the theory.

 

[Naraoia]

Yeah, I didn't even realize you had replied. I've completely lost the flow of the thread, and I don't know that I have the energy to recover it. Too bad. It was a good discussion.

That's OK, I had to reread stuff several times to write the previous reply myself

I guess I'll try to answer this, though, since you answered me - despite the muddiness of my memories regarding what we were talking about ... and even though I may not be well-versed on what you mean by a nested hierarchy.

Imagine a nested hierarchy as Matryoshka dolls. You can have sets of organisms and their subsets, and there is a single best way of arranging organisms in such sets. Sets can contain other sets but can't overlap. The whole arrangement can be represented by a tree, and this is the only pattern of similarity that branching evolution can produce. (That's an important part of the argument for common descent. Out of all the possible ways in which organisms could resemble one another, they just so happen to be similar in a way that matches the predictions of evolution.)

Of course, the tree is a simplification of the real picture, just like any model is a simplification of reality. In the real world, horizontal gene transfer, hybridisation and endosymbiosis happen, allowing branches to join as well as part. The fact that a tree-like structure can still be inferred for many groups despite all that is a testament to the strength of the evolutionary signal.

You appear to take creationism as a formless thing. I suppose it might appear that way to you, but it's not ... or, at least I am willing to submit myself to some rules if we could articulate them. For example, C.S. Lewis argued an important distinction from Hume regarding miracles, i.e. that they are an "interference" with nature, not a "violation" of natural laws.

If it is within natural laws, why would you call it a miracle?

So, nested hierarchies do fit within creationism. There needs to be a certain amount of similarity in order for life to work. If beef was poisonous to humans, then cows wouldn't work as food. Dogs are man's best friend and fish aren't because of the compatibility between our species.

Nested hierarchies aren't just about similarity. They are a specific pattern of similarity and difference in which, say, arthropods with wings on their second and third thoracic segments always have six walking legs, feathered vertebrates always lack mammary glands, and you never find a Post2 type Hox gene in an animal that also has a zen type Hox gene.

Other bipedal species are similar to us in form because we live in a world where we are subject to the same physics.

This is actually a very interesting point, along with the problem of convergent evolution. Of course physics will shape organisms as much as their biological heritage. The question is is physics strong enough to override an evolutionary signal? Not in the case of bipedality, or animals with wings, or many other well-known convergent features. Other cases might be more ambiguous.

By the way, it's funny that you picked bipedality, because it's a great example of a trait that evolved in several markedly different ways in different groups. Humans have vertical spines and no tails, kangaroos use their massive tails for support when standing, and hop instead of walking or running, dinosaurs/birds have permanently horizontal spines and relatively stiff tails (bony or feathery) held clear off the ground when standing...

I don't have the background to quote details, but I imagine there might be a physical problem with a bipedal animal the size of an elephant.

T. rex would disagree

Actually, with respect to nested hierarchies, I would argue that evolution and creationism are similar. Evolution didn't start out with a blank slate and predict nested hierarchies. Rather, they were observed first, and then incorporated into the theory.

That much is true. However, there is absolutely nothing that binds creation to a nested hierarchy. Similarity, you can make an argument for, but why would you expect a tree-like pattern of similarity?

Designed objects can certainly mix and match traits pretty freely - some people stick Canon lenses on their Canon cameras, others use cheaper alternatives, different people install different software on the same type of computer, different makes of computer may use the same CPU or operating system, some planes are half boat, etc.

 

[Resha Caner]

T. rex would disagree

Shrug. It was something off the top of my head. I'm not the one to develop a full-blown theory for biology. But even with T Rex one can easily spot differences between their structure and ours. So, maybe I would just need to further specify ... bi-peds without tails or something like that.

The point was about compatibility. Of course a creator could create beings that are not compatible (SF is full of stories of alternate universes). But if such a thing exists, it's likely we'll never know it. The only creations we would be aware of are those that are compatible. And so, further, as you said it, if we've all been made to be compatible, it makes further sense that we would be created with some mix-and-match parts.

If it is within natural laws, why would you call it a miracle?

Why not? I think all you're noting here is that you're used to working with a different idea of "miracle" than what I proposed. A god with no "laws", so to speak, is a god of chaos. In my view, it is the absence of God that allows chaos to errupt, and his presence is what brings order.

"Miracle" is a spectrum, not a binary thing. There is a sense in which I see anything that happens which is beyond my ability as a miracle.