Challenging Evolution

[Jet Black]

my only duty is to pass on those warnings

well pass them to my ignore list.

 

[lucaspa]

That is what you are talking about. What I am talking about and have been trying to get people to understand is that if even one "new" species is not a viable breeder, it is an assumption to claim that species evolve. There is question. That question means that the evidence is not overwhelming.

You are saying that even one species that is not a viable breeder then evolution is wrong. WHAT?? First, you haven't produced such a species. Second, we have produced dozens of examples where the new species are viable and breed within the new species. Therefore, even if there is one, it doesn't threaten evolution. That population would become extinct and the populations that can interbreed would continue.

However, for you to have this feeling means that you are still considering that new species form by interbreeding between 2 existing species to form hybrids. But that is not how new species form. You have to get that wrong idea out of your head.

Now I was told that there were no unanswered questions which is why the TOE is said to have overwhelming evidence. Now I am being told that we don't have all the answers to the questions. This is why I am saying that there is not overwhelming evidence, because there are too many unanswered questions. So which is it, no unanswered questions, or still unanswered questions? That should clear up this entire thread with one simple answer.

Every major theory as unanswered minor questions. Razzel, knowledge works in layers. Every time you get an answer to a question, 3 or 4 new questions pop up out of the answer. So, let's take the layers in evolution:
1. Are species specially created or do they arise by changes in existing species? New species arise by changes in existing species. Overwhelming evidence for common ancestry. Now that we know that:
2. What is the major way of change? Answer: natural selection. Overwhelming evidence. But now comes a new question: \
3. What is the major mode of speciation? Answer: there are 3 major modes: phyletic gradualism, allopatric, speciation. Overwhelming evidence for all 3. BUT, which one of those happened the most in the past? We don't know. Unanswered question. However, notice that this does not affect the answers to 1, 2, and 3.

You assume because I tell you what we were taught, that that is what I believe, heck you people even believe that I lean towards C because of what I have been taught. I assure you, I was taught E, not C.

We conclude, based on the evidence in your posts, that you believe TOC. You keep mixing up "conclude" and "assume".

Secondly, if there is overwhelming evidence to convince us of all the above and more, where then are the unanswered questions you spoke of? Why do the people here accept there are unanswered questions then assert that we have overwhelming evidence to answer those questions? Where is the logic in this?

The logic is that there are different questions. For instance, did birds evolve from a previous group? Overwhelming evidence that birds evolved from reptiles. But, which reptiles? Was it the theropod dinosaurs or some earlier group of reptiles (as Feduccia claims)?

There is overwhelming evidence -- observations today -- that life arises from non-living chemicals via chemistry. In fact, it happens by several different chemical pathways. But, which way did it actually happen on the early earth? We don't have evidence from that time that can answer that question.

BUT, if the claim is: life cannot arise from non-life, then there is overwhelming evidence to refute that.

 

[lucaspa]

I havent got time to read all this post or all the threads on this topic at the moment but considering the argument is that TE's also believe in God, stating that Genesis is to be read allegorical isnt good enough. Please can a TE explain how Genesis fits in with Evolution? Why was it even written and in the Bible if it doesnt have a reason to be there?

Andy D, I gave you the answer to both these questions on the COF on Creation Science and Theistic Evolution. Why don't you tell us, instead, why you find those answers inadequate.

I dont see the point in God putting some myth in the Bible that has no point at all to anyone. In fact I prefer to rip that part out of my Bible if it has no reason to be there.

It had a very important purpose to the people of the time. Several purposes, in fact.
1. It retrodicted the God that the Hebrews knew by experience in the Exodus to Creator of the universe.
2. In the Exodus and writings immediately afterward, Yahweh is just one of many gods. In Exodus, for instance, it is clear that it is beleived that the gods of the Egyptians exist. Yahweh is just more powerful. Genesis 1 changes all that. Its purpose is to destroy the Babylonian gods and establish Yahweh as the only god that has ever existed.
3. It reaffirms the independence of people that the Hebrews experienced at the Exodus. By the Babylonian creation stories, humans are created to be the workers and playthings of the gods. But in the Exodus, Yahweh liberates the Hebrews from such slavery. In Genesis 1, the authors affirm that Yahweh originally created humans to be free and not servants.

I dont find any arguments for why the creation account couldnt have at least been written in the right order to match evolution.

Because the Babylonian gods in the Enuma Elish don't appear in the order to match evolution! Genesis 1 is destroying the Babylonian gods in order. Marduk is the chief god of the present generation of Babylonian gods. He is the god of agricultural plants. His younger sister is goddess of the sun. So ... Yahweh creates plants (particularly "herbs") first and then creates the sun. The people at the time couldn't have cared less about historical accuracy or evolution. What they cared about was the threat of conversion of the Hebrews to worship of the Babylonian gods. So Genesis 1 was written to prevent that from happening.

On another thread I am waiting for an answer regarding where Man's soul came from too. When we became man and in the image of God?

Darwin answered that: we don't know. The soul comes from God, right? It's a gift from God. When during your development in your mother's womb did God imbue you with a soul? How do you know? You can't measure for a soul. So, when in hominid evolution did God decide to put souls in the individuals of the time. We don't know. God's decision.

 

[lucaspa]

Me agreeing is the only way to end or slow down this discussion so why not agree. If you want the references, go back to the beginning of the thread and follow them through.

You didn't answer my question. You just asked one of your own. Not fair. Here's my question again. Please answer it.
How is this permitted in the original TOC? I've looked where you told me to look: Genesis 1 and other cross-references to "kinds" in the Bible, and they all say a kind can only breed with its own kind. Where do you get the idea that making new species/kinds is permitted in TOC?

You still didn't answer this question! How is speciation permitted in TOC?

How many times are you going to duck this?

Yep, of course you are right, facts are rarely wrong. So what is your point exactly?

To answer your questions.

All of this was weighed in my questions that you have failed to understand and answer so as to lecture me. Bravo, good answer to my questions. I am totally satisfied now. Move on.

Razzel, you got answers that you wanted. But you have found a way to say the answers are wrong because I "have failed ot understand and answer" your questions.

Now, do you want complete answers? If so, I am going to end up "lecturing". You say you are interested in truth. Why try to be snippy to the person who is trying to discuss truth with you?

 

[Andy D]

Andy D, I gave you the answer to both these questions on the COF on Creation Science and Theistic Evolution. Why don't you tell us, instead, why you find those answers inadequate.

It had a very important purpose to the people of the time. Several purposes, in fact.
1. It retrodicted the God that the Hebrews knew by experience in the Exodus to Creator of the universe.
2. In the Exodus and writings immediately afterward, Yahweh is just one of many gods. In Exodus, for instance, it is clear that it is beleived that the gods of the Egyptians exist. Yahweh is just more powerful. Genesis 1 changes all that. Its purpose is to destroy the Babylonian gods and establish Yahweh as the only god that has ever existed.
3. It reaffirms the independence of people that the Hebrews experienced at the Exodus. By the Babylonian creation stories, humans are created to be the workers and playthings of the gods. But in the Exodus, Yahweh liberates the Hebrews from such slavery. In Genesis 1, the authors affirm that Yahweh originally created humans to be free and not servants.

Because the Babylonian gods in the Enuma Elish don't appear in the order to match evolution! Genesis 1 is destroying the Babylonian gods in order. Marduk is the chief god of the present generation of Babylonian gods. He is the god of agricultural plants. His younger sister is goddess of the sun. So ... Yahweh creates plants (particularly "herbs") first and then creates the sun. The people at the time couldn't have cared less about historical accuracy or evolution. What they cared about was the threat of conversion of the Hebrews to worship of the Babylonian gods. So Genesis 1 was written to prevent that from happening.

Darwin answered that: we don't know. The soul comes from God, right? It's a gift from God. When during your development in your mother's womb did God imbue you with a soul? How do you know? You can't measure for a soul. So, when in hominid evolution did God decide to put souls in the individuals of the time. We don't know. God's decision.

THank you, I will definately go back to that thread and re-read. I will post my comments. Of to bed now for me. God bless all.

 

[lucaspa]

Is the earth round? Most likly, we have photos, mathamatics, and can fly around it. Very small margin or error. overwhelming evidence. The sun at the center of the solar system? maybe, maybe not, we can't even be sure we know what the entire solar system is. Reasonal margin of error. NOt overwhelming.

Do we really need to know the entire solar system to know that the sun is in the center and that the objects of the solar system orbit the sun? NO! All the observations of the motions of planets from the earth -- the positions they have in the sky from night to night -- fits only with the sun at the center of the solar system and the planets orbiting the sun. We have just seen the arrival of the Cassini spacecraft at Saturn. It's path was calculated based on the fact that the sun is the center of the solar system and the planets orbit it. If that theory was wrong, Cassini never would have arrived at Saturn.

Object attract? Are we talking about gravity? We see it every day, but new evidence suggests, there is much about gravity that we do not know. questionable evidence.

But does the evidence question that objects attract? NO! You don't go jumping off buildings thinking you and the earth will not attract each other because we don't know everything about gravity, do you?

Evolution is like which one?

All of them. Despite your attempts to call gravity and heliocentrism into doubt, you know that they are not. All are theories that are also fact. That we don't know the exact mechanisms of how objects attract has nothing to do with the theory/fact that they do attract, does it?

As I've said, evoluton -- descent with modification (that's the short definition, BTW) -- is as much fact as round earth or gravity. Like gravity, there is some argument about the minor details of the "modification". There are some questions about the exact lineage of some species or groups. But none of these question descent with modification.

We don't lack overwhelming evidence since your admission that speciation is a fact. That's it. That's evolution! Game, set, and match!

So you are telling me that the entire TOE is speciation? What does all this single celled population stuff have to do with the theory then? Comon ancestor, etc?

What was the title of Darwin's book? Origin of the Species. Species arise from existing species by descent with modification. That "descent with modification" means common ancestors. If all life is traced back, then there will be one common ancestral species to all life on earth. Evidence supports that. One being the common genetic code or DNA code. The bases in DNA specify which amino acids will be in proteins. Adenine-adenine-adenine, for instance, means "lysine" in all species. There is no reason all species must have the same genetic code. For instance, suppose corn had Thymine-Thymine-Thymine mean "lysine". It has lysine in its proteins. We eat the corn but digest the proteins and break them up into single amino acids. So we have free lysine from the corn proteins. Then our cells use adenine-adenine-adenine to specify lysine in our proteins.

Now, if each "kind" had its own genetic code, I would accept that as strong evidence for TOC. But, since that isn't the way it is, it is common ancestry, meaning a single common ancestral species to all species living on the planet today.

Yeah, we'll go with all that so we can move on. I understand what you are saying, but it isn't about a belief system, quote]Razzel, I wasn't talking about a belief system. I was talking 1) about evidence against your alien gene engineering theory. Phylogenetic analysis falsifies that. Just as it falsifies TOC and for the same reasons: no discontinuity between DNA sequences. I am showing you that humans now are creating such discontinuities. The alien genetic engineers would have done the same. If we look everywhere the discontinuities can be and don't find the discontinuities, then they aren't there. you were talking about the "scientists" that say evolution is wrong.

it is about what is not there. That being answers to all the questions. See the above.

You don't need the answers to all questions. Let's try this in Christianity. Do we know exactly how God conceived Jesus in Mary? Whose DNA did Jesus have? Half Mary's and half God's? Or all Mary's? Or all God's? Does God even have DNA? Is it works or faith that give salvation? Christians have been arguing that one for centuries and can't agree on the answers. Do you know what God plans for your entire life? If you don't, then you have unanswered questions about God's plan for you, don't you?

See? Lots of unanswered questions but none of them cast doubt on God's existence or that Jesus is God's son.

So, you can have overwhelming evidence and unanswered questions at the same time.

 

[lucaspa]

But being crated to adapt to ones environment could also address the issue of why there was not mass extinction.

Well, you've just falsified TOC. Because, as Gluadys pointed out, there have been 5 previous mass extinctions! In the Permian-Triassic mass extinction, 90% of all species went extinct!

This, Razzel, leads you into a theological problem with the TOC. If God directly created all those species, created them both adapted to their current environment and created them to adapt, then the Permian-Triassic extinction shows that God is incompetent! After all, how good a job could He have done if 1) He didn't anticipate such a major extinction (so much for being very wise and knowing) and 2) He didn't give the species the ability to adapt quickly enough to the changed environment?

This is one of the reasons Christians so quickly dropped TOC when evolution was discovered. TOC actually creates a LOT of problems for God. If God really created by a literal reading of Genesis 1 (which is where you told me to look for TOC, remember?), then God is really stupic, sadistic, and also suffering from Alzheimers! Since God is none of those, Christians in the second half of the 1800s were delighted with evolution and letting God create second-hand using common ancestry and natural selection.

 

[lucaspa]

Your going to have to explain that one better, I don't understand how, speciation is the TOE. There is more to the theory than observed speciation. For example, if I introduced you to my children, you could easily believe they are my children. But how can you assume that I did not adopt them? That is an assumption that the evidence does not predict.

Razzel, remember that observed speciation. This is equivalent to watching you give birth to your children. I would know, then, wouldn't I, that they are not adpoted?

Or, after the fact, I could do a DNA test on you and your children and compare the DNA. That would also tell me they weren't adopted, right? That is what phylogenetic analysis did, essentially. Did the DNA tests.

One more time: what is the name of Darwin's famous book on evolution?

The short definition of TOE is "descent with modification". That means speciation -- how present species are descended from previous species with modification.

So yes, speciation is a consequence of evolution. If existing species transform to new species, then that is the Origin of the Species. So, as soon as you observe one species transforming to a new species, then evolution is fact.

 

[lucaspa]

My last post asked you a question first, how about you answer it first and maybe we can move on faster.

But I asked you several pages ago about your definition of "overwhelming". You never answered.

Razzel, you have a great talent for deflecting questions you either don't want to or can't answer. You don't change your mind, which is what should happen, you just continue to duck the question. It causes a lot of frustration in us and causes us to doubt your sincerity.

So, please, tell us what you consider "overwhelming" evidence. Thank you.

 

[lucaspa]

Rule number one, admit to nothing.

John, are you caring about truth here are giving debating advice? If something is true, why not admit to it? After all, you admitted to evolution!
http://www.christianforums.com/showthread.php?p=8512716#post8512716post8512716

Jesus did not always answer questions. He would usually ask a question of His own, and then answer His own question. Or if they refused to answer His question, then He would refuse to answer theirs.

However, it is Razzel refusing to answer questions. We are answering all of hers.

Asking questions, John, is a proven teaching technique. It's called the Socratic method. Ask your father and brothers about its use in teaching in the medical profession.

 

[lucaspa]

I've often recommended Job 38/41, where God asks the questions & demands answers

Obviously, I don't have time to type 4 chapters out, but it makes great reading, so I'll just flip thru & put a few highlights...

"Then God answered Job from the storm..

"Who is this that makes my purpose unclear by saying things that are not true?...

"Where were you when I made the Earth's foundation?..

"Who marked off how big it should be?...

"What were the Earth's foundations set on?..

"Who did all this while the morning stars sang together? Who did this while the angels shouted with joy? ..

"Who shut the doors to keep the sea in when it broke thru & was born?..

It was I who said to the sea, 'You may come this far but no further ...

"Have you ever given orders for the morning to begin?...

"Have you shown the dawn where its place was?...

"Have you ever gone to where the sea begins?..

"Have the gates of death been open to you? ...

"Do you understand the great width of the Earth?...

"Surely you know, if you were already born when all this happened!

"Have you lived that many years?"

I'll leave it there, but can any reader imagine facing 4 chapters of questions like that, eyeball to eyeball with the Almighty?

I'm not trying to be rude to Jet, Ra or the others

Just to wake you up to the urgent reality

The verses don't mean what you say they mean. Remember the context. First God blessed Job, then ruined him as a test of his faithfulness. When Job complains at this unjust treatment, this is when the questions come forth. The gist is that Job has no basis to complain about what God does or doesn't do. It has nothing to do with firguring out how God created the universe. If you look at detail of the verses, God is saying things that are not true. For instance, a verse you didn't quote says "who laid its cornerstone" or "have you entered the storehouses of the snow, or have you seen the storehouses of the hail, which I have reserved for the time of trouble"

God also asks "Do you know when the mountain goats bring forth?" Well, Job may not have known, but we do, don't we?

Job is another part of the OT trying to understand the catastrophe of the Babylonian conquest. Job stands for Israel. It has been blessed by Yahweh in having Yahweh create Israel, the defeat of the Philistines, and the general prosperity. Israel seemed truly to be favored of God. And then disaster strikes. Babylon conqueors Israel. Israel goes thru a lot of soul searching and comes up with lots of explanations: the prophets says Israel was unfaithful to God and this caused the disaster; Job offers a different view that God is testing the faithfulness of Israel. It's easy to be faithful when things are going well, but can Israel/Job remain faithful when things go badly? Can Israel still trust God. Or more importantly, can faith be individual rather than to the nation. Job represents an advance of theology. Up until now gods are worshipped only so long as things go well for the country. But Job says that fortunes have nothing to do with being loyal to God.

my only duty is to pass on those warnings

As must any true servant of Christ

And my duty is to rebuke anyone who spouts nonsense about science and tries to use Bible verses to justify it. St. Augustine says so. Such individuals bring untold harm on Christianity.

Consider yourself warned.

 

[doubtingmerle]

And my duty is to rebuke anyone who spouts nonsense about science and tries to use Bible verses to justify it. St. Augustine says so. Such individuals bring untold harm on Christianity.

You have performed that duty well. This thread has been a long struggle--too long--and it has required immense patience on the part of those involved. But in the end science won and nonsense lost, and that is a good thing.

Cheers!

 

[mrversatile48]

well pass them to my ignore list.

No knowledge is more certain & sure than God's

Many prophecies are even written in the past tense - not just to describe a vision but to express absolute certainty of its fulfilment

"Let God be true & all men liars" says the Bible

Finite man makes many mistakes too

Yet, as 1 of the best loved/known prophecies of Christ says, @ 800BC..

"Who has believed our report & to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed?...He was despised & rejected...like 1 from whom men hide their faces" - Isaiah 53

Must go!

Ian