Creationism 101

[Naraoia]

The Mt. St. Helens thing is a cannard. Dr. Kevin Henke has a good examination of the subject HERE

Thanks.

the only problem i see with this is that the only example they gave were all birds, even all gulls that is not a different sepcies.

A "species" in that context is a bunch of creatures that can interbreed with each other but not with other creatures.

they may have differentiated themselves enough that they can't interbreed,

So they are different (biological) species.

but you can't cross a bald eagle and a hummingbird either, (as far as i know) but regardless they are still birds one didn't become a fish

Technically, they are both fish Weird cladistic issues aside, evolution most emphatically does NOT require that an organism suddenly "evolves" into a completely different organism. Apparently, there are good examples of working "hopeful monsters" in plants (unfortunately, the lecturer who mentioned them isn't a plant person and he couldn't remember any papers, but I've found one in shepherd's purse; this open-access paper, AFAICT, discusses the same thing and has pictures), but most change seems to consist of small steps, and even a hopeful monster isn't completely different from its parents.

Fish and birds just differ in such an insanely large number of traits that an equally insanely large number of "monstrous" mutations would be required to quickly transform one into the other, and the chance that that would (a) happen at all and (b) produce something viable and able to reproduce is negligible.

Not quite hopeful monsters, but here are a couple of examples of morphological differences between different groups where there are good suspects for a genetic mechanism (did I mention that Hox genes rock? ):

o Ultrabithorax (Ubx) and Abdominal-A (AbdA) are Hox genes in arthropods. (In case you didn't know, Hox genes control other genes and tell cells what organs to make where) If you look at where they're expressed in different crustaceans during early development, it closely correlates with the type of appendages they have (schematic diagram from the same paper). Specifically, in groups that have walking/swimming legs all the way to the front of the thorax, the two genes are similarly expressed very anteriorly. In crustaceans where some of the front appendages are maxillipeds (smaller limbs devoted to feeding), Ubx/AbdA expression is shifted backwards to where the walking legs develop.

o Similarly, the expression of various Hox genes in vertebrates matches the boundaries between different types of vertebrae. For example, birds tend to have many more neck vertebrae than mammals - and accordingly, the expression of the HoxC6 gene starts much further back in birds, matching the boundary between neck and thoracic (rib-bearing) vertebrae. Snakes are the most extreme example, where it's thoracic vertebrae (and HoxC6 and 8) from just behind the head almost all the way down the very long body.

The kinds of genes that produce hopeful monsters can also act in small, gradual ways. The same Ubx that tinkers with crustacean legs can also be responsible for such subtle differences as the distribution of hairs on the legs of different fly species.

So it's not like there are no mechanisms that could gradually transform a fish into a bird - but even with major mutations, it would take a large number of changes and consequently, a lot of time (as it did based on the fossil record).

(BTW, these Hox gene examples [and more] can also be found in Carroll et al.'s From DNA to Diversity. It isn't a long book but it makes up in textbookish boringness. Their examples are cool, however.)

yes i do, i also know it only takes a couple of years for fosilization to occur, but that is beside the point. if every thing was ever evolving wouldn't most of the fossils found be intermediary? have there been any found?

Well, what Wiccan_Child said.

The "reptile"-mammal transition is particularly neat, if you ask me. Even if you only look at the jaws, it's a spectacular series with plenty of great transitional forms (BTW, Split Rock, I didn't read most of the text at your link, but the picture captions seem to mix up the ages quite seriously. To my knowledge, Dimetrodon is Early Permian, Tetraceratops is also Permian, and I'm not aware that Euparkeria was found outside the Triassic. Just nit-picking.).

Birds have the misfortune that dinosaurs began to get seriously birdlike somewhere in the Middle Jurassic, which isn't exactly rich in dinosaur fossils (we have Pedopenna, though), so the chronological order is a bit messed up; but the Cretaceous has a rich record of species representing most stages of the transition (these are only the non-bird dinosaur genera with preserved feathers, and here is a big list of fossil birds - they are all Cretaceous transitionals down to Neornithes).

i was just making a point that this conversation never leads anywhere, and no one ever changes their mind. nothing is ever brought up that can't be argued as false evidence

RichardT, are you here?

 

[RichardT]

RichardT, are you here?

It's been a while, how are you doing?

i was just making a point that this conversation never leads anywhere, and no one ever changes their mind. nothing is ever brought up that can't be argued as false evidence

I disagree. The evidence is there for evolution. The Creationist who is truly looking for what the truth is will come to this conclusion.

Creationism is based on falsehoods and so called professional creationists don't publish their findings in any peer reviewed scientific literature, they publish it to themselves and either make amateur mistakes in their "research" or their case is built on a completely false understanding of what evolution actually is.

I was one of the most outspoken Creationists on this forum at one point and so you're wrong when you say that no one ever changes their minds. What you're doing here, and what I was doing in the past was spouting out any Creationist argument I could find, and like yourself, I could have fooled myself into believing that the arguments that I was spouting had validity to them.

To give you credit, you can still be an honest Creationist if you concede that all of the evidence in the world demonstrates that evolution has taken place on a 4.6 billion year old earth but that God decided to create it this way 6000 years ago, since your definition of God can do this.

 

[Naraoia]

It's been a while, how are you doing?

Fine, cheers

I was one of the most outspoken Creationists on this forum at one point and so you're wrong when you say that no one ever changes their minds. What you're doing here, and what I was doing in the past was spouting out any Creationist argument I could find, and like yourself, I could have fooled myself into believing that the arguments that I was spouting had validity to them.

Precisely why I hoped you'd speak up

 

[LifeToTheFullest!]

Thanks for taking the time to take notes and make commentary Naraoia.