Creationism will only destroy science

[Shane Roach]

Did you not read what I wrote, or did you just ignore it? The "main thing that predicted those similarities" was the hypothesis of common descent for the two species. The predictions were not based on previous DNA studies, or on known genetic similarities. These were new kinds of comparisons that had not been done before, not similarities that had already been measured. (The predictions were also not based on similarity in function between the two organisms' DNA, because I assumed that the bulk of the differences would have no functional effect.)

One hypothesis, common descent, permitted numerous quantitative predictions about observations that had not been made yet. No other hypothesis offered any predictive ability. The predictions were confirmed by the genetic data, which had not been collected at the time the predictions were made. Therefore the data provide strong evidence that the hypothesis is correct. That's how science works.

I have a serious question for you. Did you actually know anything about human/chimpanzee genetic comparisons, and about the specific predictions I listed, when you made this reply? Because it sure looks to me like you're simply making stuff up here.


Since you seem to be completely confused about what the insight was, perhaps you should reconsider your assessment of difficulty.

Here I find a fairly typical tactic as well. Basically, "are you a biologist? No, well shut up then."

I was a little sloppy with my language though, so let me rephrase. The specifics of plant 'speciation' are not common to all creatures, and the sort of "common ancenstry" that one can demonstrate with plants is not indicative of universal common ancestry, or in short, evolution as the origin of species.

As for the chimps, well... You feel free to tell me where I went wrong on that one, because I do believe there are reems of books written about how it came to be that humans were said to be descended from apes.

 

[Shane Roach]

Therefore the data provide strong evidence that the hypothesis is correct. That's how science works.

So you're saying if over the course of the years, speciation turns out not to be the origin of species, that that would not be how science works?

You're denying that speciation observed over time would actually be more convincing than finding "common ancenstry" in a plant?

 

[random_guy]

Just wondering, does anyone have a timeline of the human ape chromosome prediction? From what I understand, we first discovered chromosomes, and then we checked the chromosome count of humans and apes and found out apes had an extra pair. This lead to a prediction that we contain a chromosome that fused together. It wasn't until we had DNA sequencing technology that we were able to confirm the results. Is this the correct timeline?

 

[rmwilliamsll]

Just wondering, does anyone have a timeline of the human ape chromosome prediction? From what I understand, we first discovered chromosomes, and then we checked the chromosome count of humans and apes and found out apes had an extra pair. This lead to a prediction that we contain a chromosome that fused together. It wasn't until we had DNA sequencing technology that we were able to confirm the results. Is this the correct timeline?

the most accessible essay on chimp 2p+2q=human 2 is at:
http://www.gate.net/~rwms/hum_ape_chrom.html

i have seen predictions on when since LCA between chimps and humans that this might have occurred, but a quick pass googling doesn't yield them yet.

the confirmation was the banding you will see in the essay linked to, long before DNA sequencing. plus the knowledge of the teleomers inserted and 2nd centrosome predates DNA sequencing data.


btw, post edit.
there is a lot of new information coming out about the human -chimp connection. especially as more people see that we are closer to bonobos, in particular, in social organization than the dominant species of chimp. if anyone finds good reviews articles comparing genetic information between chimps-bonobos-humans it would be nice to see it here. tia

 

[random_guy]

the most accessible essay on chimp 2p+2q=human 2 is at:
http://www.gate.net/~rwms/hum_ape_chrom.html

i have seen predictions on when since LCA between chimps and humans that this might have occurred, but a quick pass googling doesn't yield them yet.

the confirmation was the banding you will see in the essay linked to, long before DNA sequencing. plus the knowledge of the teleomers inserted and 2nd centrosome predates DNA sequencing data.


btw, post edit.
there is a lot of new information coming out about the human -chimp connection. especially as more people see that we are closer to bonobos, in particular, in social organization than the dominant species of chimp. if anyone finds good reviews articles comparing genetic information between chimps-bonobos-humans it would be nice to see it here. tia

Thank you for the link and the source. From the references on the page, it becomes pretty clear that the prediction was made long before we had the technology to check if it was true. I believe this is a perfect example of using the common descent model for the prediction of chromosome fusion in humans.

 

[sfs]

Here I find a fairly typical tactic as well. Basically, "are you a biologist? No, well shut up then."

Huh? I'm not trying to get you to shut up; I'm trying to get you to engage with real data, rather than just repeating the same generalizations, especially since the generalizations strike me as false.

(You might note, by the way, that telling biologists that they don't know what they're talking about could be considered rather insulting. Would you tell a plumber that he didn't know anything about pipes if you'd never seen him work, and had never picked up a wrench yourself in your life? If you do say something like that to a plumber, expect him to ask you how much you know about plumbing. Ditto for biologists.)

I was a little sloppy with my language though, so let me rephrase. The specifics of plant 'speciation' are not common to all creatures, and the sort of "common ancenstry" that one can demonstrate with plants is not indicative of universal common ancestry, or in short, evolution as the origin of species.

As I said once before (was it in this thread?), different parts of evolution have different levels of support. Universal common ancestry has much less support than local common ancestry, e.g. common ancestry of all primates. As far as I know, however, there aren't many creationists about proposing that God created, say, the first mammal or the first vertebrate, and that everything else has been evolution since.

As for the chimps, well... You feel free to tell me where I went wrong on that one, because I do believe there are reems of books written about how it came to be that humans were said to be descended from apes.

Here's where you went wrong: genetic similarity has indeed been used to determine that humans and chimpanzees are closely related. What I'm talking about in these predictions, however, is the detailed nature of the differences between humans and chimps, not the overall similarity. The predictions are all based on the assumption that the differences are the result of accumulated mutation over millions of years, based on what we know about mutation from studying it in humans.

 

[Shane Roach]

Huh? I'm not trying to get you to shut up; I'm trying to get you to engage with real data, rather than just repeating the same generalizations, especially since the generalizations strike me as false.

(You might note, by the way, that telling biologists that they don't know what they're talking about could be considered rather insulting. Would you tell a plumber that he didn't know anything about pipes if you'd never seen him work, and had never picked up a wrench yourself in your life? If you do say something like that to a plumber, expect him to ask you how much you know about plumbing. Ditto for biologists.)

As best as I can, I try not to argue that way, but it comes back to me when I begin to get frustrated over how basic points I repeat over and over again somehow get left out of the explanations. Still, if I give you the impression I think you don't know what you're doing as a biologist, I am sorry. On the other hand, if you are trying to guilt me into agreeing with you... that's not gonna work.

As I said once before (was it in this thread?), different parts of evolution have different levels of support. Universal common ancestry has much less support than local common ancestry, e.g. common ancestry of all primates. As far as I know, however, there aren't many creationists about proposing that God created, say, the first mammal or the first vertebrate, and that everything else has been evolution since.

This view at the least would have the benefit of not contradicting scripture directly. I was under the impression it was frowned on more by the scientific community though than the religious.

Here's where you went wrong: genetic similarity has indeed been used to determine that humans and chimpanzees are closely related. What I'm talking about in these predictions, however, is the detailed nature of the differences between humans and chimps, not the overall similarity. The predictions are all based on the assumption that the differences are the result of accumulated mutation over millions of years, based on what we know about mutation from studying it in humans.

I bolded the part that struck me as having something to do with what I was trying to say. You didn't make a prediction based on evolution as the origin of species. You made a prediction based on what you knew about mutation in humans and the similarities and dissimilarities in the genetics of two species. I suspect when you get down to dissecting that one fused chromosome for what it does, it is not going to make a lot of sense that it fused and then somehow magically worked out to be beneficial to the emerging species. The way it looks is, to my mind, doubtlessly a result of form following function. One thing is certain, it doesn't do a thing to confirm or deny that they both came from a common ancestor that observing that they look similar didn't already do.


Now if you'd care to go into detail rather than spattering references all over the place and then sitting back and, in my view, chuckling while you wait for people who do not have Phd's to admit they do not understand the depths of all this, that might be helpful. Alternatively, you could discuss the issues I brought up originally that no one has really answered to any great degree. You could even take the tack of starting from the things I asked to begin with and walking the conversation upwards. You can't sit here and tell me it takes too much time and effort because you've already SPENT all sorts of time and effort on this already, so why not do it right? You know? I mean, this stuff doesn't even appear to require all the darned calculus I had to take in college and never got a chance to use... seems you ought to be able to do better than take someone's Phd level article and just splash it across the screen and expect anyone to have any faith in you concerning what it actually means.

 

[Assyrian]

I and thousands of other people do not have some desperate misunderstanding of what science is. That is a canard. Anyone capable of reading a sentence knows what science is. The fact that you so often return to what is basically nothing more than a personal attack in the face of your inability to answer a simple and straightforward question is eventually going to catch up to you. Your movement is lucky the vast majority of people do not consider it all that important to their lives.

You are the one who wants to limit reliable science to the type of demonstration done by Davy 200 years ago. Real science goes a bit beyond that.

Thank you... so, if you move from a test to the hypothesis that the origin of species is through evolution, then you turn around and do a test on a type of wheat, and it has nothing to do with the origin of species, but rather to do with the origin of a specific type of wheat coming from another type of wheat...? How is that verifying the concept of origin of species? it is verifying the original experiments, many of which indicate that there is adaptation in living things, but none of which verify the origin of species. You then misrepresent that experiement as having VERIFIED the HYPOTHESIS. But it has not. It is consistent with the hypothesis, indeed is the very reason FOR the hypothesis of the origin of species, but it does not verify the hypothesis.

I don't think Darwin knew much about wheat, he certainly didn't know about their chromosomes. Yet his Origin of Species showed how these wheat species could have formed and tests based on an evolutionary explanation of how they might have formed was able to reproduce the formation of the wheat species.

Anything you discover is going to be consistent with the hypothesis. Why? Because it is simply not possible to verify or eliminate something that happened in the past. Period. Does that mean give up the hypothesis? As I have already said, no. A large enough cloud of various evidence could concievable be convincing. It would not be AS convincing as being able to demonstrate it over and over in a lab, but there are degrees of certainty to be had, and it is in those degrees of certainty that evolution loses its luster in comparison to established and repeateably demonstrable concepets such as electricity.

The fact that your movement so desperately attempts to deny THAT foundational fact of epistemology is the evidence that you all know good and well the theory is actually weak. If you had the sort of evidence to truly support it, you would trot it out rather than insisting without any real evidence that it is a strong theory with lots of support, and constantly bullying and insulting people with nonsense allegations like, "you don't know what science is," who question it.

That is how science work, including sciences that investigate past events, forensic science, volcanology, seismology, air crash investigation. You find a hypothesis that explains the data and you test it. If repeated tests fit, and evolution has been repeatedly tested, and no other explanation come close to explaining the data, then the hypothesis is accepted.

It doesn't apply to the sciences. It applies to the mathematical models used for advanced sciences which can't be confirmed through external verification. In short, you can't simply keep trotting out mathematical models that indicate something works as evidence that something actually works. At some point you have to externally verify.

Mathematical modeling has been used throughout the sciences from the days of Newton's laws of motion. F=ma is a mathematical model. Not only are the mathematical models used in science regularly confirmed by external testing as you ask for, but you simply showed another way evolution is in the same category as other sciences.

 

[Shane Roach]

You are the one who wants to limit reliable science to the type of demonstration done by Davy 200 years ago. Real science goes a bit beyond that.


I don't think Darwin knew much about wheat, he certainly didn't know about their chromosomes. Yet his Origin of Species showed how these wheat species could have formed and tests based on an evolutionary explanation of how they might have formed was able to reproduce the formation of the wheat species.


That is how science work, including sciences that investigate past events, forensic science, volcanology, seismology, air crash investigation. You find a hypothesis that explains the data and you test it. If repeated tests fit, and evolution has been repeatedly tested, and no other explanation come close to explaining the data, then the hypothesis is accepted.


Mathematical modeling has been used throughout the sciences from the days of Newton's laws of motion. F=ma is a mathematical model. Not only are the mathematical models used in science regularly confirmed by external testing as you ask for, but you simply showed another way evolution is in the same category as other sciences.

I'm just going to let your words speak for themselves. As many pages as have gone by and you have refused to acknowledge the actual points I raise...? The most fundamental, I repeat, is that there are degrees of certainty, and that those things which can be directly demonstrated are always going to be more reliable than those which can not.

 

[Assyrian]

You know, the biblical test of a prophet was the ability to make accurate predictions. The prophet was rejected forcefully if his predictions did not come true. It seems science has adopted that biblical principle to test hypotheses.

What is odd is that the theory of evolution is able to make successful predictions, while the supposedly biblical Holy Spirit inspired creation science can't. So who isn't singing from the right hymn book?

 

[Shane Roach]

Then I will explain further for you.
Firstly, it's worth pointing out that Tiktaalik is an extinct amphibious creature. It was found in the rock; not in shallow water.

Yes, I know............

Given one of the goals of evolutionary science is to explain the diversity of life through the framework of descent with modification, scientists have managed to develop a phylogeny (i.e. "tree of life") that depicts the relation of all the earth's species to one another. Such phylogenies are developed through appeal to various lines of evidence, such as comparative anatomy, biogeography, genetics, biostratigraphy, etc. These lines of evidence can be mapped onto phylogenies in order to make predictions about where in the world as-yet-undiscovered fossil ancestors might be found. Palaeontologists predicted that they might find the fish-amphibian transition to have occurred in Late Devonian-aged rocks as latitudonally high as Ellesmere Island (which was much more temperate then than now, having been located at the equator some 375 mya). And lo and behold, Ted Daeschler et al. have recently come to support their prediction, based on the evolutionary framework, with this spectacular find:

Imagine, an amphibious creature found where amphibious creatures would be wont to live.......

I have yet to see the creationist model reveal any such tangible results.

And you're probably not ever going to, because finding fish fossils where other fish fossils have been found, or mammal fossils where other mammal fossils would be found, or amphibian fossils where other amphibian fossils would be found is not much of a predictor of anything.

In addition, I rather suspect that "Creation Science" will never "predict" anything since it is largely pointed towards disproving something. It is interesting to me that science, which used to be all for people trying to poke holes in theories, now has declared "Creation Science" not science because it doesn't "predict" anything. Creation science wouldn't even be under any sort of demand if our educational system weren't busily trying to undermine basic facts about epistemology and the process of coming to "know" things.

"Well accepted" by whom? Not biologists. Creationists. For what it's worth, most creationists are NOT biologists. And most biologists are NOT creationists. If you believe otherwise, then I please support yourself with some sources or statistics.

Punctuated equilibrium was the brain child of an avowed atheistic supporter of evolution as the origin of species.

It's probably worth pointing out that the dichotomy of anagenesis vs. "punk eek" that you're subscribing to is most likely a false one (as most dichotomies are). Punctuated equilibrium and anagenetic evolution are not mutually exclusive, and in fact, there is evidence that both modes of evolution can operate given different selective scenarios and environments.

In other words, there's really no way to poke a hole in this theory. It is fully and completely non-falsifiable -- thus the need to gather more evidence before passing it off as the most relaible model for someone to base their entire belief system about life, the universe, and everything on.

 

[Shane Roach]

You know, the biblical test of a prophet was the ability to make accurate predictions. The prophet was rejected forcefully if his predictions did not come true. It seems science has adopted that biblical principle to test hypotheses.

What is odd is that the theory of evolution is able to make successful predictions, while the supposedly biblical Holy Spirit inspired creation science can't. So who isn't singing from the right hymn book?

The Biblical test was that the prophet never, ever prophesy falsely.

Luckily, most scientists do not profess to be prophets of God. Prophets of Godlessness, many, yes... Not all, but many...

But not prophets of God.

 

[rmwilliamsll]

and that those things which can be directly demonstrated are always going to be more reliable than those which can not


i don't believe this is strictly true.

for instance, optical illusions, magic tricks are both classes of items that are directly observed that are in fact wrong.

likewise there are lots of things, especially in physics that aren't directly observable, or are so difficult to understand (the observation itself) that even trained and competent observers are mistaken, let alone a neophyite who will greatly misinterpret what he sees.

it is not strictly sight or participatory sensing that gives or makes reliability. reliability relies on expert testimony, analysis, explanation, consilience to the framework or matrix of the science, etc etc.

for an example, i am ignorant of geology, say i go on a field trip with an expert geologist. We literally are seeing different things even though we are physically looking at the same thing. His education and experience ties what he sees into this scientific matrix, it is the matrix itself that builds or assigns reliablity, not the fact that i can look and see something that i really don't understand. the mere fact of experiencing it does not give it reliability, magic and illusion teach that much.

 

[Shane Roach]

You said evolution doesn't make predictions. The botanists made a prediction based on evolutionary theory (plant xxx is an ancestor of wheat, based on the chromosome count, polyploid had to occur) and then did an experiment to confirm the prediction. This used the evolutionary model, whether you liked it or not. Just because it did go far back in the tree of life doesn't mean that evolution wasn't used.

As for the second example, the scientists at Berkeley used the common ancestory model built from the idea of evolution to figure out where to search to find the ancestorial enzyme. I'm not sure if you're aware, but according to evolution, all life share a common ancestor, and using this, they built a tree of life. Now, for some crazy reason, we can use this tree of life in comparative genomics and it's quite accurate. How would the Creationist model come up with something similar? They wouldn't because kinds don't cross lines.

Here's an example:



So why is it that life falls so neatly into this tree? Why is it that Creationists still haven't been able to come up with a more accurate model if there are only "kinds"? I think it's pretty obvious you don't think evolution is a science anymore since you think it's based on faith and makes no predictions.

The confusion here is that you have completely dropped the distinction between evolution and origin of species.

It occurs to me that I may have dropped that distinction in my own post, so if I did I appologize.

The tree illustrated that kinds all cross? I thought the concept of branches meant that they did not all cross. *sigh* You were my best hope for a sensible discussion here. It is probably time for me to take a break from here for today. Suffice it to say I find the tree convenient but it also has a lot to do with form following function. That tree gets re-assessed from time to time, but it is largely as much an illustration of similar animals as it is anything to do with ancestry.

 

[Shane Roach]

and that those things which can be directly demonstrated are always going to be more reliable than those which can not


i don't believe this is strictly true.

for instance, optical illusions, magic tricks are both classes of items that are directly observed that are in fact wrong.

likewise there are lots of things, especially in physics that aren't directly observable, or are so difficult to understand (the observation itself) that even trained and competent observers are mistaken, let alone a neophyite who will greatly misinterpret what he sees.

it is not strictly sight or participatory sensing that gives or makes reliability. reliability relies on expert testimony, analysis, explanation, consilience to the framework or matrix of the science, etc etc.

for an example, i am ignorant of geology, say i go on a field trip with an expert geologist. We literally are seeing different things even though we are physically looking at the same thing. His education and experience ties what he sees into this scientific matrix, it is the matrix itself that builds or assigns reliablity, not the fact that i can look and see something that i really don't understand. the mere fact of experiencing it does not give it reliability, magic and illusion teach that much.

Illusions, misconceptions, and mistakes are not examples of things that have been repeatedly demonstrated as reliable.

 

[rmwilliamsll]

Punctuated equilibrium was the brain child of an avowed atheistic supporter of evolution as the origin of species.

Richard Goldschmidt was Jewish, which i believe is not the same thing as being an atheist.

 

[rmwilliamsll]

and that those things which can be directly demonstrated are always going to be more reliable than those which can not

Illusions, misconceptions, and mistakes are not examples of things that have been repeatedly demonstrated as reliable.

you are moving the goalposts.
first, you say things demonstrated are going to be more reliable.
now you say things demonstrated as being reliable.

very different items.
the first says that sensing(direct demonstration) is a criteria for reliability.(more reliable)
the second says that reliability is demonstrated by XXX(i'm not sure what you have in mind here, perhaps repeatability, perhaps something else)*.


but the situation is unchanged, even if your statements change in mid conversation.

for magic is demonstrated over and over, showing the same tricks and most people will see the illusion. The only way to demonstrate that the illusion is not reliable is to go beneath your observations. Your eyes are playing tricks on you, you are deceived, to be undeceived, to demonstrate that your eyes are wrong requires more than mere observation, it requires an understanding of how the illusion is performed.


*post edit, it is not obvious what the criteria for reliability is in this statement.
why aren't illusions reliable? they are demonstrable, they are repeatable. Almost all person agree as to what they saw. these are the criteria you have used to show reliability in previous postings.

i think illusion and magic is an adequate defeater for your first contention:
and that those things which can be directly demonstrated are always going to be more reliable than those which can not

 

[sfs]

the most accessible essay on chimp 2p+2q=human 2 is at:
http://www.gate.net/~rwms/hum_ape_chrom.html

Very nice page.

btw, post edit.
there is a lot of new information coming out about the human -chimp connection. especially as more people see that we are closer to bonobos, in particular, in social organization than the dominant species of chimp. if anyone finds good reviews articles comparing genetic information between chimps-bonobos-humans it would be nice to see it here. tia

Bonobos are unlikely to look genetically closer to humans than chimpanzees do, since bonobos and chimpanzees are much more closely related genetically than either is to humans. So whatever the morphological or behavioral similarities, humans should be equally distant from both species. (That, by the way, is another evolutionary prediction.) This assumes nothing really funky was going on, like long-running hybridization and gene flow between humans and a subpopulation of chimp/bonobo ancestors, a subpopulation that fed more into bonobos than into chimps.

 

[Shane Roach]

Punctuated equilibrium was the brain child of an avowed atheistic supporter of evolution as the origin of species.

Richard Goldschmidt was Jewish, which i believe is not the same thing as being an atheist.

Steven Gould, on the other hand, was, and is the author of the theory of punctuated equilibrium.

 

[Shane Roach]

you are moving the goalposts.
first, you say things demonstrated are going to be more reliable.
now you say things demonstrated as being reliable.

very different items.
the first says that sensing(direct demonstration) is a criteria for reliability.(more reliable)
the second says that reliability is demonstrated by repetition.


but the situation is unchanged, even if your statements change in mid conversation.

for magic is demonstrated over and over, showing the same tricks and most people will see the illusion. The only way to demonstrate that the illusion is not reliable is to go beneath your observations. Your eyes are playing tricks on you, you are deceived, to be undeceived, to demonstrate that your eyes are wrong requires more than mere observation, it requires an understanding of how the illusion is performed.

I didn't move the goalposts, sir. You simply have continually refuses to acknowledge what I have repeatedly said. If I used more specific language in order to cut off one of your retreats into the absurd, I am not feeling generally apologetic about it this minute.