Evolution is just a theory!

[justlookinla]

Denial without evidence. Isn't that what you twitted Coulter about? So give us some evidence that natural selection is NOT a two-step process. In the meantime, I'm going to love you arguing with Ernst Mayr:
"The Two Steps of Natural Selection
Step One: The production of Variation. ...
Step Two: Non-random Aspects of Survival and Reproduction"
Ernst Mayr, What Evolution IS, page 119

That is another book you should add to your reading list.

Natural selection does not produce genetic variation, random mutation produces the variation.

"However, natural selection and genetic drift cannot operate unless there is genetic variation — that is, unless some individuals are genetically different from others. If the population of beetles were 100% green, selection and drift would not have any effect because their genetic make-up could not change."

http://evolution.berkeley.edu/evolibrary/article/evo_16

Natural selection transforms existing species into new species. Over the course of generations.

No it does not. Natural selection only populates, or de-populates existing life forms within a population.

And here you are trying to split the 2 parts of natural selection. You are using "natural selection" only for the selection part. However, even here, you are admitting that selection is going to change the population and produce something new.

Quite the opposite. Natural selection will not change the form of the population, it will only increase, or decrease, an existing life form.

You are good at debating tricks. Of course, you just ignore facts when you do. However, what you said is pretty much what I said. The variation is going to introduce novelty. (I can site a bunch of papers documenting where this has been observed, with new traits appearing.) However, not all variation is due to mutations. Recombination and random movement of homologous chromosomes actually provide most of the variation in sexually reproducing organisms. Which shows that there can be a lot of variation, considering that each human has about 20 mutations.

The mechanism of change is mutation, according to UC-Berkeley.....

"However, natural selection and genetic drift cannot operate unless there is genetic variation — that is, unless some individuals are genetically different from others. If the population of beetles were 100% green, selection and drift would not have any effect because their genetic make-up could not change."

http://evolution.berkeley.edu/evolibrary/article/evo_16

Which is why natural selection is a 2-step process.

It could be a ten step process, natural selection still acts only on existing life forms either populating, or de-populating, dependent on other factors.

Just because the term is "natural selection", doesn't mean it means only selection! Tell you what, since you have never read Origin of Species, let's see how Darwin put both steps together in natural selection from the conception of the term. I'll bold where each step is:

"If, during the long course of ages and under varying conditions of life, organic beings vary at all in the several parts of their organization, and I think this cannot be disputed; if there be, owing to the high geometric powers of increase of each species, at some age, season, or year, a severe struggle for life, and this certainly cannot be disputed; then, considering the infinite complexity of the relations of all organic beings to each other and to their conditions of existence, causing an infinite diversity in structure, constitution, and habits, to be advantageous to them, I think it would be a most extraordinary fact if no variation ever had occurred useful to each beings welfare, in the same way as so many variations have occurred useful to man. But if variations useful to any organic being do occur, assuredly individuals thus characterized will have the best chance of being preserved in the struggle for life; and from the strong principle of inheritance they will will tend to produce offspring similarly characterized. This principle of preservation, I have called, for the sake of brevity, Natural Selection." [Origin, p 103 6th ed.]

Look at the last sentence. Darwin did not call the struggle and preservation (selection) "natural selection". He called the whole thing, including variation, natural selection.

Don't forget this.....

"“I think that there can be little doubt that use in our domestic animals strengthens and enlarges certain parts, and disuse diminishes them; and that such modifications are inherited”

What I gave you were sources that have the studies using the scientific method.

You've only made general sweeping claims with absolutely no evidence, based on the scientific method, for the 'how' of Darwinist evolution.

Or, in the case of Google scholar, actually are the evidence based on the scientific method. What do you think scientific publications are, anyway? They are the "actual evidence". That you won't even try to read them, but post this denial, shows that you are not interested in reality. If you won't look at the evidence when people point you right at it, then you are trying to peddle false witness.

And yet another example of a wordy generalized claim....but totally empty of any evidence, based on the scientific method, for the 'how' of Darwinist evolution.

Did those links use the scientific method. The ones I gave did. Since I'm not arguing against God, your argument is irrelevant. You did notice my faith, right?

And yet another example of a wordy generalized claim. "The ones I gave did" is nothing more than an empty and baseless claim. Actually post content.

I will give you a few examples.

Sorry, had to snip the study because the post was over the character limit.

Are you suggesting that the study establishes an experiment with absolutely no mutation present and all change was from natural selection?

 

[justlookinla]

When I was doing the post above, justlookinla, I found another reason why your request is such a good debating trick but is a way to avoid the truth. Christian Forums has a character limitation on posts. So I literally cannot post all the evidence here. The site won't let me go into the detail on methodology and results you get if you go read those papers on Google Scholar.

Example 2:
D Dodd. Reproductive isolation as a consequence of adaptive divergence in Drosophila pseudoobscura. Evolution 43(6): 1308-1311, 1989. http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0014-3820(198909)43:6<1308:RIAACO>2.0.CO;2-K

Gee, you can actually read this one for yourself and see how they used the scientific method. Just click on the link. Ah, but you don't do that, do you? After all, that would really screw up your "there is no evidence" claim.

This experiment lasted a year, so there were 52 generations. Dodd separated the original population into 3. The controls were fed fruit. One was fed malt. The other was fed potatoes (starch). Actually, 4 populations were put on the malt diet, and 4 on the starch. Dodd wanted to see if the adaptations to the different diets were the same between populations. Initially, there was a huge die-off in the 2 experimental populations. It took months to establish healthy populations. Makes sense, since Drosophila does not eat those foods; so most of the flies starved to death.

At the end of the experiment Dodd had 2 new species. The 3 populations did not interbreed One common creationist trick is to say: "but they were still fruit flies". Ah, but NO! Now there are "malt" flies and "starch flies. Brand new abilities. By natural selection. What is more, there are changes in the morphology of the mouth as well as major changes in the digestive enzymes.

Let's take this one. Or any you choose.

You've only presented micro-evolution. This isn't about micro-evolution, it's about the Darwinist claim that ONLY natural mechanisms produced all life we observe today from an alleged single life form from long ago and giving evidence, based on the scientific method, for the claim.

And yes, flies were still flies, moths are still moths, finches are still finches.

 

[AV1611VET]

I have seen many threads before I joined where justlookinla has been given credible evidence in the form of internet links, videos and book recommendations, and then he goes "Those aren't evidence."

I can top that.

I've quoted from the book of Matthew to scientists here, only to have them tell me Matthew didn't write the book that bears his name.

 

[bhsmte]

You should be aware, but justlookinla suffers from a very severe form of cognitive dissonance in that he will not look at ANY form of evidence given to him, then he will claim that he has not been shown any evidence and declare that his strawman version of evolution is correct.

Well, he has developed his personal defense mechanism and he is sticking to it.

If you have read one of his posts, you have read them all.

 

[bhsmte]

I can top that.

I've quoted from the book of Matthew to scientists here, only to have them tell me Matthew didn't write the book that bears his name.

The vast majority of Christian NT scholars, also conclude the same.

 

[AV1611VET]

The vast majority of Christian NT scholars, also conclude the same.

Well ... then ... there you have it.

The vast majority of Christian NT scholars can top what Warden is harping about.

 

[bhsmte]

Well ... then ... there you have it.

The vast majority of Christian NT scholars can top what Warden is harping about.

What can I say, it is reality.

 

[AV1611VET]

What can I say, it is reality.

I'm just wondering how it feels to him?

Some people can't take what they (or their comrades) dish out.

Some can.

 

[mickiio]

Well, he has developed his personal defense mechanism and he is sticking to it.

If you have read one of his posts, you have read them all.

As have you.

What can I say, it is reality.

Your reality maybe. It always, always cracks me up when atheist claim they are experts on Christians. It would be like a Christian claiming they are an expert on atheism.....see how that works?

 

[bhsmte]

As have you.
Your reality maybe. It always, always cracks me up when atheist claim they are experts on Christians. It would be like a Christian claiming they are an expert on atheism.....see how that works?

Nope.

I can read the work of Christian NT scholars and historians.

 

[Colter]

I'm just wondering how it feels to him?

Some people can't take what they (or their comrades) dish out.

Some can.

LOL! Yea, look who's talking.

 

[mickiio]

Nope.

I can read the work of Christian NT scholars and historians.

I can read atheist/evolutionist writings as well, but my perspective on them will be different then yours will be, when you read them.

LOL! Yea, look who's talking.

Your point?

 

[Jimmy D]

Natural selection does not produce genetic variation, random mutation produces the variation.

"However, natural selection and genetic drift cannot operate unless there is genetic variation — that is, unless some individuals are genetically different from others. If the population of beetles were 100% green, selection and drift would not have any effect because their genetic make-up could not change."

http://evolution.berkeley.edu/evolibrary/article/evo_16




No it does not. Natural selection only populates, or de-populates existing life forms within a population.



Quite the opposite. Natural selection will not change the form of the population, it will only increase, or decrease, an existing life form.



The mechanism of change is mutation, according to UC-Berkeley.....

"However, natural selection and genetic drift cannot operate unless there is genetic variation — that is, unless some individuals are genetically different from others. If the population of beetles were 100% green, selection and drift would not have any effect because their genetic make-up could not change."

http://evolution.berkeley.edu/evolibrary/article/evo_16

Good grief, you might want to try reading that website instead of using it to try and back up your spurious arguments, you might learn something. Why are you quoting them anyway? A small percentage of what they've published is in agreement with your religious beliefs so it's ok, the majority of what they publish doesn't agree with your religious beliefs so it's wrong, as fine an example of cognitive dissonance as I've seen.

Here's a quote for you I saw on there:

Biological evolution is not simply a matter of change over time. Lots of things change over time: trees lose their leaves, mountain ranges rise and erode, but they aren't examples of biological evolution because they don't involve descent through genetic inheritance.

The central idea of biological evolution is that all life on Earth shares a common ancestor, just as you and your cousins share a common grandmother.

Through the process of descent with modification, the common ancestor of life on Earth gave rise to the fantastic diversity that we see documented in the fossil record and around us today. Evolution means that we're all distant cousins: humans and oak trees, hummingbirds and whales.

 

[AV1611VET]

LOL! Yea, look who's talking.

I reported you for that.

Spoiler: report

Just kidding.

 

[Colter]

Thoughts for the day:


102:6.7 "Belief may not be able to resist doubt and withstand fear, but faith is always triumphant over doubting, for faith is both positive and living. The positive always has the advantage over the negative, truth over error, experience over theory, spiritual realities over the isolated facts of time and space. The convincing evidence of this spiritual certainty consists in the social fruits of the spirit which such believers, faithers, yield as a result of this genuine spiritual experience. Said Jesus: “If you love your fellows as I have loved you, then shall all men know that you are my disciples.”

102:6.8 To science God is a possibility, to psychology a desirability, to philosophy a probability, to religion a certainty, an actuality of religious experience. Reason demands that a philosophy which cannot find the God of probability should be very respectful of that religious faith which can and does find the God of certitude. Neither should science discount religious experience on grounds of credulity, not so long as it persists in the assumption that man's intellectual and philosophic endowments emerged from increasingly lesser intelligences the further back they go, finally taking origin in primitive life which was utterly devoid of all thinking and feeling.


102:6.9 The facts of evolution must not be arrayed against the truth of the reality of the certainty of the spiritual experience of the religious living of the God-knowing mortal. Intelligent men should cease to reason like children and should attempt to use the consistent logic of adulthood, logic which tolerates the concept of truth alongside the observation of fact. Scientific materialism has gone bankrupt when it persists, in the face of each recurring universe phenomenon, in refunding its current objections by referring what is admittedly higher back into that which is admittedly lower. Consistency demands the recognition of the activities of a purposive Creator.

102:6.10 Organic evolution is a fact; purposive or progressive evolution is a truth which makes consistent the otherwise contradictory phenomena of the ever-ascending achievements of evolution. The higher any scientist progresses in his chosen science, the more will he abandon the theories of materialistic fact in favor of the cosmic truth of the dominance of the Supreme Mind. Materialism cheapens human life; the gospel of Jesus tremendously enhances and supernally exalts every mortal. Mortal existence must be visualized as consisting in the intriguing and fascinating experience of the realization of the reality of the meeting of the human upreach and the divine and saving downreach." UB 1955

 

[AV1611VET]

102:6.8 To science God is a possibility,

Oh ... wait!

1955

Nevermind!

 

[Colter]

Oh ... wait!Nevermind!

I recall that, in the petrified, stunted mind of the Bible fetish, truth and facts about God and his universe stopped at the end of REV 22.



88:2.7 "In olden times the fetish word of authority was a fear-inspiring doctrine, the most terrible of all tyrants which enslave men. A doctrinal fetish will lead mortal man to betray himself into the clutches of bigotry, fanaticism, superstition, intolerance, and the most atrocious of barbarous cruelties. Modern respect for wisdom and truth is but the recent escape from the fetish-making tendency up to the higher levels of thinking and reasoning. Concerning the accumulated fetish writings which various religionists hold as sacred books, it is not only believed that what is in the book is true, but also that every truth is contained in the book. If one of these sacred books happens to speak of the earth as being flat, then, for long generations, otherwise sane men and women will refuse to accept positive evidence that the planet is round." UB 1955

 

[DogmaHunter]

The earth is moving right now. Heck, its even accelerating. I thing what you mean to say is that if the earth STOPPED moving we'd all be dead.

That's demonstrably false, since in the bible it says that the sun stood still in the sky, which means the earth stopped moving back then and we are all still alive!
Checkmate, atheists!!

/end-sarcasm

 

[DogmaHunter]

Is the scientific method observable and repeatable?

That doesn't make any sense and would only be said by someone who either
- wants to badmouth the scientific process for some reason
or
- doesn't have a clue on how the scientific method works, or even what it really is.

Observability, repeatability, falsification, experimentation,.... It's all a part of the method. And how ideas are to be tested depends on the subject.

You can't for example approach history the same way you approach biology.
Phenomena that span eons of time (in geology or biology for example) will also be approached differently then models of physics for example.

Some things can be directly tested, others only indirectly, even others will only yield circumstantial evidence, etc...

To insinuate that every branch of science, every subject, can be approached, developed and tested in the exact same way is nothing short of ignorant (or dishonest).

 

[DogmaHunter]

The model should be about much more than common ancestry. In fact, common ancestry doesn't address the 'how' of Darwinist evolution. There's no observable and repeatable evidence for the 'how', thus no scientific method.

1. sounds like you concede that ancestral models are obserable and testable. Is that correct?

2. every aspect of the mechanism of the evolutionary process has been observed in nature as well as in the lab. Neutral as well as beneficial mutations, natural selection, etc.