Carnivores and the Fall

[Jig]

So as a YEC, you have to either admit that God did a poor job of designing the snake as a plant eater (or any other zyphodont animal, for that matter), or that all these animals underwent radical evolution post-Fall to adapt to their new carnivorous lifestyle. Either way, it's just ad hoc arm waving.

Why are you looking for a natural explanation?

What God did to create the universe was not natural. How sin effected creation (and humans) can not be explained by natural processes. How the serpent in Eden lost its limbs instantly was not natural. How the woman's child birthing pain greatly increased instantly was not natural. How the fields spring forth thorns and thistles because of sin was not natural.

If you believe in a supernatural God, how hard is it to believe that He does things supernaturally? God can change creation, however He wishes, at any moment, without notice, and without leaving traces.

He did this to the serpent. He did this to the fields. He did this with the womans womb. He did this with the Flood waters. He did it in Egypt. He did it when He split the Red Sea. He did it with manna. He did it with Balaam and his talking donkey. He did this when Jesus rose form the dead. He'll do it again when He judges the world in the Tribulation period. He'll do it again when we rise from the dead. He'll do it again when He instantly replaces this Earth with a New Earth.

Hello! Naturalism is not a good philosophy to plant your world view in when there is a supernatural agent at work!

 

[shernren]

So as a YEC, you have to either admit that God did a poor job of designing the snake as a plant eater (or any other zyphodont animal, for that matter), or that all these animals underwent radical evolution post-Fall to adapt to their new carnivorous lifestyle. Either way, it's just ad hoc arm waving.

Or God deliberately designed all those malicious, dark adaptations for a predatory lifestyle, which raises as many theodicial issues as YECism attempts to solve;

or Satan designed all those malicious, dark adaptations, which raises the question of what else in nature is designed by Satan instead of God, and thus to what extent nature could possibly praise God.

Thorny stuff, YECism.

 

[juvenissun]

Ahhh teeth. A favourite subject of mine.
Jig's right. Many frugivores (fruit eaters) have conical canine teeth. They're useful for puncturing and holding fruit, but that's about it. They're not used in food processing.
In mammals, the food processing is done at the back of the mouth, by the molars. Fruit and seed eaters tend to have blunt, rounded cusps used for crushing food items, much like a mortar and pestle.
Grass and leaf eaters, on the other hand, tend to have sharp cusps used to shear past one another, since shearing is the best way to process tough, fibrous plant matter.
Snakes, however, have molars of no kind. They have blade-like (zyphodont) teeth that did not even come into occlusion. They were useful only for slicing through meat. There is just no way a skull like this could be used to process plant matter (the extreme kinesis of the snake skull is also terribly designed for plant mastication because it provides no resistance for pulping):

So as a YEC, you have to either admit that God did a poor job of designing the snake as a plant eater (or any other zyphodont animal, for that matter), or that all these animals underwent radical evolution post-Fall to adapt to their new carnivorous lifestyle. Either way, it's just ad hoc arm waving.

While I think your (traditional) explanation on the functional relationship between the shape of tooth and the diet is reasonable, but that does not say the explanation is a complete one. There are several other factors could be involved so that the interpretation could be very different.

For example: Different animals digest their food to a different degree. Cows virtually let straw pass through their guts with minimum degree of digestion. We digested our food to a greater degree (not sure how much). So, even the teeth of snake can be "interpreted" as awkward in eating plants, it does not say it can not be used for such a purpose. And it does not say that snake has to digest plants efficiently. It still could be efficient, but only takes a longer time or needs to pick special type of plants. The function of teeth is not an isolated function to determine the quality of life. It combined with many other body functions to make the life work the best in its unique way. So, while snake did not know that it can eat mouse, it would be happy to chew grass for living even its teeth is not the best tool for that purpose.

 

[Mallon]

Thorny stuff, YECism.

Only if you stop to think about it.

 

[Mallon]

For example: Different animals digest their food to a different degree. Cows virtually let straw pass through their guts with minimum degree of digestion. We digested our food to a greater degree (not sure how much).

You couldn't be further from the truth! Cows are among the most efficient digesters of our day! They're ruminants. Their stomachs are specially designed to digest the toughest greens: grass. We could never live on grass alone because we're not able to break it down properly. Cows, with their high-crowned teeth and rumen are perfectly adapted for efficient grass processing.
Humans are much worse at digestion. That's why we still incorporate meat into our diet, because it's much easier to digest.

So, even the teeth of snake can be "interpreted" as awkward in eating plants, it does not say it can not be used for such a purpose. And it does not say that snake has to digest plants efficiently. It still could be efficient, but only takes a longer time or needs to pick special type of plants. The function of teeth is not an isolated function to determine the quality of life. It combined with many other body functions to make the life work the best in its unique way. So, while snake did not know that it can eat mouse, it would be happy to chew grass for living even its teeth is not the best tool for that purpose.

The bull puckey just keeps piling higher.

 

[juvenissun]

You couldn't be further from the truth! Cows are among the most efficient digesters of our day! They're ruminants. Their stomachs are specially designed to digest the toughest greens: grass. We could never live on grass alone because we're not able to break it down properly. Cows, with their high-crowned teeth and rumen are perfectly adapted for efficient grass processing.
Humans are much worse at digestion. That's why we still incorporate meat into our diet, because it's much easier to digest.

What you said reflected my point very well. The good digestion of cows does NOT depend on their teeth only, even their teeth are good to chew grass. Our teeth are not that bad. They cut and they also chew. But, as you said, our digestion is not that effective. So my point is that the shape of teeth does not have to be closely related to the diet.

Suggested experiment: pull some teeth out of a cow, and see how would that affect the digestion of the cow. Or, has an animal dentist reshape the teeth of a cow and observe the effect. People may have done these. What were the results?

The bull puckey just keeps piling higher.

You may turn this insult into a praise, the content of "your" argument would be the same: zero.

 

[Mallon]

The things needed to make a fossil are rapid death, rapid burial, and rapid pressure. A global catastrophic fast formed flood would cause rapid death, rapid burial, and rapid pressure on many things in its path. The uniformitarian model is very weak when explaining fossils, the Noahic Flood is a much better model.

I beg to differ. The currently accepted scientific model explains the distribution of fossil life in the rock record. How does the Flood model explain, say, the distribution of pollen vs. spores?
Sure, the Flood model predicts a gamut of fossils buried in fluvial sediments, I'll give you that. But the world's strata do not consist solely of fluvial sediments. Many of them were deposited in aeolian conditions, at time recorded throughout the rock record. Moreover, the Flood model does not explain the distribution of fossils in the fossil record. Appeals to hydrodynamics, escape speed, and differential ecology have not worked.
So no, the Noahic is NOT a better model because it explains none of the data. If it were, the money-hungry oil and gas industry would be using that model to make a buck and not the traditional evolutionary model.
(I'm surprised you're still debating the ability of the Flood model to explain the rock record. After all, you just poo-pooed the use of natural explanations in accounting for the state of the earth earlier. If the world were made of rainbows and candy floss, you would still hold that the Flood was responsible for it.)

 

[Mallon]

So my point is that the shape of teeth does not have to be closely related to the diet.

But it is. Denying it doesn't change that fact. All meat eaters have sharp, recurved, and high-cusped teeth. All grass eaters have high-crowned, low-relief teeth. And omnivores have something in between. Nowhere on earth today do we see something with a strict carnivore's dentition munching on grass. But don't let reality stop you.

Suggested experiment: pull some teeth out of a cow, and see how would that affect the digestion of the cow. Or, has an animal dentist reshape the teeth of a cow and observe the effect. People may have done these. What were the results?

If you were to pull the teeth from a cow, it wouldn't survive. Grass eaters especially need teeth in order to break the plant cell walls to release the nutrients. If the cow couldn't do that, it would likely die.
Besides, I hardly think that's a good Christian approach to experimentation.

 

[OldWiseGuy]

I beg to differ. The currently accepted scientific model explains the distribution of fossil life in the rock record. How does the Flood model explain, say, the distribution of pollen vs. spores?
Sure, the Flood model predicts a gamut of fossils buried in fluvial sediments, I'll give you that. But the world's strata do not consist solely of fluvial sediments. Many of them were deposited in aeolian conditions, at time recorded throughout the rock record. Moreover, the Flood model does not explain the distribution of fossils in the fossil record. Appeals to hydrodynamics, escape speed, and differential ecology have not worked.
So no, the Noahic is NOT a better model because it explains none of the data. If it were, the money-hungry oil and gas industry would be using that model to make a buck and not the traditional evolutionary model.

Wouldn't Noah's flood have uprooted, mixed up, and redeposited lots of stuff layed down by previous floods and other geological events, making it difficult to precisely date things?

Mallon, about your avatar (or what is in place of it next to your username.

Aren't you confusing the legend of Tiktaliktak, a young Inuit hunter who gets standed on an ice flow, with Sedna, whose body parts were changed into sea creatures and who became the mythical "mistress of sea creatures"?

I have an interest in another Inuit legend and came across these stories recently, thus the question.

owg

 

[Mallon]

Wouldn't Noah's flood have uprooted, mixed up, and redeposited lots of stuff layed down by previous floods and other geological events, making it difficult to precisely date things?

You'd think so. You'd expect such a destructive Flood to mix things up so bad that there would be no order to the fossil record whatsoever. That's what we see in floods today, after all. And yet there is a distinctive order to the fossil record.

Aren't you confusing the legend of Tiktaliktak, a young Inuit hunter who gets standed on an ice flow, with Sedna, whose body parts were changed into sea creatures and who became the mythical "mistress of sea creatures"?

I don't think so, Tim.

 

[OldWiseGuy]

You'd think so. You'd expect such a destructive Flood to mix things up so bad that there would be no order to the fossil record whatsoever. That's what we see in floods today, after all. And yet there is a distinctive order to the fossil record.

I don't think so, Tim.

I would guess that even a large flood would not move stuff around uniformly. Some areas would be devastated while others hardly touched. It all depends on how fast the water is moving. Sorting and deposition also depend on water speed. Also I don't think Noah's flood uprooted ancient deposits, just layers near the surface. Ancient fossils are (or were) pretty deeply buried by the time of Noah's flood. Of course I believe in an old age earth that suffered many cataclysmic events including huge floods. Noah's flood just added one more to the mix (pun intended).

Tim?

owg

 

[Mallon]

I would guess that even a large flood would not move stuff around uniformly. Some areas would be devastated while others hardly touched.

But neocreationists argue that all the mountains in the world were covered by water. There is not an inch that would have been left untouched. It's just fallacious to say that the same flood that carved the Grand Canyon and moved giant boulders also gently deposited the fine sediments that preserved the Messel Laggerstatten. A scenario invoked to explain anything explains nothing.
One thing the Flood doesn't explain the distribution of fossils in the rock record. Yes, it explains the presence of fossils (as do uniformitarian arguments), but it does not explain the distribution of fossils. (Not that any of this matters when one is prone to invoking miracles to explain just about anything. You can just say God magically made the fossils sort that way for no apparent reason.)

It all depends on how fast the water is moving. Sorting and deposition also depend on water speed.

Even water speed cannot be invoked to explain the distribution of fossils.

Tim?

Home Improvement.

 

[gluadys]

Also I don't think Noah's flood uprooted ancient deposits, just layers near the surface. Ancient fossils are (or were) pretty deeply buried by the time of Noah's flood. Of course I believe in an old age earth that suffered many cataclysmic events including huge floods. Noah's flood just added one more to the mix (pun intended).


owg

In effect, you are following in the foot steps of the 19th century geologists who eventually concluded there had been no global flood. The idea that earth has suffered several cataclysmic events of which Noah's flood was the most recent was also held by Cuvier--the great French anatomist and paleontologist. This was how he interpreted the geology of the Paris basin with its alternations of fossil-bearing rock strata.

As geologists pieced together the information on different strata, they first assumed that the Precambrian rocks were the fundamental rock formations of creation and the fossil-bearing rocks (all of them) were flood deposits. Eventually they sorted the strata into primary (Precabmbrian), secondary (Paleozoic & Mesozoic), tertiary (Cenozoic--up to the Pleistocene) and quaternary (Pleistocene to present) divisions. They came quickly to a realization that no global flood could explain the primary or secondary formations, and later came to the realization that neither tertiary or quaternary formations could be explained in that way either.

This left only surface gravels and moraines as possible remnants of the flood and the explanation of these by "diluvianism" was the position held and defended by geologists like the Rev. Adam Sedgwick.


Ironically, it was a creationist (Louis Agassiz, a student of Cuvier) who showed that glaciation was a better explanation of these deposits--a view Sedgwick eventually accepted in his famous renunciation of a global flood scenario in 1835.

(Note that all of this history occurred well before the publication of Origin of Species and owes nothing to any dependence on the concept of evolution.)

 

[OldWiseGuy]

In effect, you are following in the foot steps of the 19th century geologists who eventually concluded there had been no global flood. The idea that earth has suffered several cataclysmic events of which Noah's flood was the most recent was also held by Cuvier--the great French anatomist and paleontologist. This was how he interpreted the geology of the Paris basin with its alternations of fossil-bearing rock strata.

As geologists pieced together the information on different strata, they first assumed that the Precambrian rocks were the fundamental rock formations of creation and the fossil-bearing rocks (all of them) were flood deposits. Eventually they sorted the strata into primary (Precabmbrian), secondary (Paleozoic & Mesozoic), tertiary (Cenozoic--up to the Pleistocene) and quaternary (Pleistocene to present) divisions. They came quickly to a realization that no global flood could explain the primary or secondary formations, and later came to the realization that neither tertiary or quaternary formations could be explained in that way either.

This left only surface gravels and moraines as possible remnants of the flood and the explanation of these by "diluvianism" was the position held and defended by geologists like the Rev. Adam Sedgwick.


Ironically, it was a creationist (Louis Agassiz, a student of Cuvier) who showed that glaciation was a better explanation of these deposits--a view Sedgwick eventually accepted in his famous renunciation of a global flood scenario in 1835.

(Note that all of this history occurred well before the publication of Origin of Species and owes nothing to any dependence on the concept of evolution.)

I agree, up to the point of declaring the flood story false. I would look for flood evidence on or just below the surface, based on the rather recent date of the flood. I also wouldn't expect any conclusive uniformity of evidence as too much has happened on the surface of the earth since that event. Deeper deposits belong to the ancient past.

One of the problems is that we cannot know just what that flood actually did. Geologists stubbonly insist on uniform evidence. Evidence that I don't believe is even possible. That's a conundrum for both sides.

I think floodnuts dig too deeply, looking for evidence that just isn't there. They should be more shallow in their thinking.

owg

 

[juvenissun]

But it is. Denying it doesn't change that fact. All meat eaters have sharp, recurved, and high-cusped teeth.

I am not saying what you said is not true (with exceptions). I am saying they don't "have to" be carnivores before the Fall (just like Adam does not have to eat meat before the Fall). And their teeth don't have to become any different in the Millennium.

In all, the shape of teeth is not a convincing subject used to argue about the death of animal before the Fall.

 

[Mallon]

In all, the shape of teeth is not a convincing subject used to argue about the death of animal before the Fall.

I don't think you've made a convincing case for saying that tooth morphology can't be used convincingly to argue for diet. With all due respect, juvie, you've only asserted yourself rather than supporting your case with evidence. Again, I guess I shouldn't expect otherwise. Evidence means nothing when conclusions are sought first.

 

[gluadys]

I agree, up to the point of declaring the flood story false.

Well, no one is actually saying the flood story is false. Just that it was not a global event.

I think floodnuts dig too deeply, looking for evidence that just isn't there. They should be more shallow in their thinking.

owg

LOL. Agreed.

 

[OldWiseGuy]

But neocreationists argue that all the mountains in the world were covered by water. There is not an inch that would have been left untouched. It's just fallacious to say that the same flood that carved the Grand Canyon and moved giant boulders also gently deposited the fine sediments that preserved the Messel Laggerstatten. A scenario invoked to explain anything explains nothing.
One thing the Flood doesn't explain the distribution of fossils in the rock record. Yes, it explains the presence of fossils (as do uniformitarian arguments), but it does not explain the distribution of fossils. (Not that any of this matters when one is prone to invoking miracles to explain just about anything. You can just say God magically made the fossils sort that way for no apparent reason.)

Even water speed cannot be invoked to explain the distribution of fossils.

Home Improvement.

I don't believe that Noah's flood is responsible for distributing fossils except some buried near the surface. The ancient fossils in the rock layers were too deep for that flood to reach (with maybe some exceptions) or were in layers that withstood the flood.

Thank for clearing up my other question so thoroughly. I can sleep now.

owg

 

[Jig]

If the world were made of rainbows and candy floss, you would still hold that the Flood was responsible for it.)

Again, I'll ask. Why are you supposing and seeking for natural explanations when we are dealing with a supernatural agent who does supernatural things?

Let me guess, you believe the plagues of Egypt have a natural explanation, that the spliting of the Red Sea has a natural explanation, that the manna given to the Hebrews has a natural explaination, that Jonah and the giant fish is a made up story, that Jesus' healings had natural explanations, that Jesus didn't die and that the coolness of the tomb revived him?

Come on! We are talking about God!

Uniformatianism and naturalism can be safely said to be terrible philosophies to cling to when we are dealing with a supernatural being. Did the universe take billions of years to mature, or did God create it mature from the get go? Did all aniaml and plant life evolve from one cell or did God create each kind of animal and plant?

If I am guilty of anything here...it is giving God too much credit. I'd rather do that then not give Him enough.

 

[Mallon]

If I am guilty of anything here...it is giving God too much credit. I'd rather do that then not give Him enough.

I see. You equate miraculous events with God's action (thereby giving Him credit), and non-miraculous events as happening apart from God (thereby not giving Him credit). Sometimes God has a hand in things, sometimes he doesn't. How very deistic.

Just because a perfectly natural explanation for some phenomenon exists, doesn't mean it happens apart from God or that I don't give Him credit for it, Jig. I think you should watch the following videos:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M7L50r8j0Lg
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w6JS4V0pSEw&feature=channel_page