How do Creationists explain vestigal organs?

[SkyWriting]

Vestigial does not mean "without function". Vestigial organs can still have function just as a broken typewriter can be used to pound in nails. Vestigial organs are those who only have a secondary or rudimentary function compared to the same organ in other species. In this case, ligaments attaching to the human coccyx is a very rudimentary and secondary function. The primary function of the coccyx is to support a tail.......<snip>

Clearly, you are in error. The primary function is the main use.
If there was a better design, doctors would have created one and
sports doctors would be modifying Olympians or football players
for increased abilities.

 

[Loudmouth]

Clearly, you are in error. The primary function is the main use.

Yes, as determined by looking at many different species. The main function of the coccyx is to support a tail.

If there was a better design, doctors would have created one and
sports doctors would be modifying Olympians or football players
for increased abilities.

If doctors got to start from scratch they certainly would not use a coccyx. They certainly would not create a muscle that spans a fused joint.

 

[Smidlee]

If doctors got to start from scratch they certainly would not use a coccyx. They certainly would not create a muscle that spans a fused joint.

Doctors can't start life from scratch nor can doctor actually heal you. The thing is the back bone got to end somewhere and we don't enough yet to determine if there is a better way. Remember we all started with a single cell.

 

[mzungu]

Doctors can't start life from scratch nor can doctor actually heal you. The thing is the back bone got to end somewhere and we don't enough yet to determine if there is a better way. Remember we all started with a single cell.

Actually you started as chemicals which are not alive! Did you know that you are basically made up of 99% empty space?
Check out Atomic Theory!

 

[SkyWriting]

Yes, as determined by looking at many different species. The main function of the coccyx is to support a tail.

Clearly that's a secondary function.

 

[Tiberius]

Clearly the universe is filled with poppadoms.

Just saying something is clear doesn't make it so. You can't just say that the tail-supporting function of the coccyx is secondary without providing evidence to support that claim.

 

[SkyWriting]

Yes, as determined by looking at many different species. The main function of the coccyx is to support a tail.

Assuming that you have been trained to identify "primary" and "secondary" functions of biological structures, that still is not useful except in memorizing a list of functions. If a structure has multiple uses, then it has multiple uses. Ordering them is simply a way of remembering what all the uses for something is. In biology, all such uses are interdependent and have no "order" such as primary and secondary. That's purely a human knowledge construct.

 

[Tiberius]

In biology, all such uses are interdependent and have no "order" such as primary and secondary.

Says the guy who, just an hour ago, claimed that the tail-support function was a SECONDARY function.

 

[SkyWriting]

Clearly the universe is filled with poppadoms.

I disagree. My wife and I have looked and can't find a good source ever since our honeymoon in Ireland.

And none have been discovered on Mars yet.

Just saying something is clear doesn't make it so. You can't just say that the tail-supporting function of the coccyx is secondary without providing evidence to support that claim.

I thought it was obvious. Humans don't have have tails.

In those cases where "tail" structures are found at birth, they have not been functional tails. If that was a normal variation of humans, functional tails would occur now and then by chance.

 

[SkyWriting]

Says the guy who, just an hour ago, claimed that the tail-support function was a SECONDARY function.

As I said, it's a purely human construct used for MEMORIZING lists.
I qualify for my own classification system. I'll message you a picture of myself if need be.
Actually, I look a bit like the guy on the right, below. Grayer though. And white is not my first choice for tee shirts.

 

[SkyWriting]

I'll be happy to remove them for you! You seem determined to learn things the hard way. It should be fun for you. So your little toe happens to be tiny. My cousin could cross his toes just like most "normal" people cross their fingers. The design may be good, but your foot, a sad variant of what it should be.


" EFFECT OF GROUND FORCES UPON THE NAIL AND RELATED STRUCTURES
Static When a toe pulp is loaded in standing, the pulp of the toe will transmit pressure to the underside of
the nail plate. This feeds back proprioceptive information to the brain upon attitude of stance in order to
maintain balance and stand erect. The correctly trimmed nail will resist that pressure and control the
position of the pulp. If the nail were to be trimmed too short the pulp and sulci would rise vertically
upwards in front of the distal cut edge and medial and lateral corners of the nail, presenting an ill-deined
sot tissue mound through which the nail plate will inexorably attempt to advance.
Motive When the foot functions normally in gait with propulsive toes the distal end of the digits will be
rolled against the ground so as to sequentially load the toe pulp. Pressure will noimally be transmitted
through the pulp to the underside of the nail plate. As toe of approaches the pulp pressure will lastly be
distally applied beneath the hyponychium and nail free edge. If the free edge is positioned correctly, the
compressive pressure upon the pulp will fall away as the load finally transfers to the apical aspect and toe
off occurs. But, if the free edge is cut too far back there will be no control of the pulp at this late stage.
The pulp will be expressed vertically beyond the plane in which the nail would have exerted control, thus
effectively rising up in front of the nail plate. Now, at the distal end of the nail plate are the medial and
lateral comers of the nail plate lying within the nail sulci. Gait dynamics force the uncontrolled, too-
flexible pulp and sulci onto the short nail plate edge and corners, which must take the pulp pressure. This
pressure is sometimes the origin of the onychocryptotic nail. Note that the pulp and sulci are pressed onto
the nail edge and corners, not the innocent nail through the pulp."

Let me guess......your sources told you that toe nails had no function and you believed them without checking first.
You act just like those you condemn.

 

[And-U-Say]

Exactly, you must be delusional to believe everything came from a single cell that magicked itself into existence from a chemical soup billions of years ago with no direct proof and plenty against it.

To someone like you, I am sure Chemistry seems like magic. But it is not magic, it follows, for the most part, well understood rules. The formation of life is just Chemistry. Get used to it.

 

[Loudmouth]

Assuming that you have been trained to identify "primary" and "secondary" functions of biological structures, that still is not useful except in memorizing a list of functions. If a structure has multiple uses, then it has multiple uses. Ordering them is simply a way of remembering what all the uses for something is. In biology, all such uses are interdependent and have no "order" such as primary and secondary. That's purely a human knowledge construct.

If you saw someone using a typewriter to pound in nails at a construction site, what would you think? Would you think that this person is not using the typewriter for it's primary function?

 

[Loudmouth]

As I said, it's a purely human construct used for MEMORIZING lists.

No, it is a process of understanding why an organ evolved and what it evolved for. The coccyx evolved as part of a tail. It no longer serves that function in humans because humans do not have a tail. It is an evolutionary leftover. The extensor coccygis muscle is proof of that.

 

[Loudmouth]

Clearly that's a secondary function.

Clearly it is not. You should take a class on vertebrate anatomy some time. The primary function of the coccyx is to support a tail. That is why they call it a tailbone.

What is even more interesting is that vestigial organs are consistent with the predictions made by the theory of evolution. You never see mammals with vestigial feathers, or birds with vestigial teats. Instead, you see vestigial features from the ancestors that evolution predicts.

 

[Loudmouth]

Doctors can't start life from scratch nor can doctor actually heal you.

But if they could they would not give humans a vestigial tailbone, nor would they give you a vestigial caecum in the form of the appendix. There are a ton of different things that any good designer would do, such as moving the air hole away from the food hole.

The thing is the back bone got to end somewhere and we don't enough yet to determine if there is a better way.

When we build jet airplanes do we feel the need to attach functionless propellers to the front of the plane just because other planes have them?

 

[Smidlee]

But if they could they would not give humans a vestigial tailbone, nor would they give you a vestigial caecum in the form of the appendix. There are a ton of different things that any good designer would do, such as moving the air hole away from the food hole.

Since they can't then we don't know what they would do. This enters into science fiction.

When we build jet airplanes do we feel the need to attach functionless propellers to the front of the plane just because other planes have them?

Airplanes are not compressed into a single cell.

 

[Loudmouth]

Since they can't then we don't know what they would do. This enters in science fiction.

Yes we do know what they would do since doctors are already fixing the flaws in our bodies. What do you think Lasik eye surgery is? Did you know that doctors are now giving athletes eye sight that is better than 20/20?

Airplanes are not compressed into a single cell.

I guess you fail to understand what an analogy is?

 

[Smidlee]

Yes we do know what they would do since doctors are already fixing the flaws in our bodies. What do you think Lasik eye surgery is? Did you know that doctors are now giving athletes eye sight that is better than 20/20?

Lasik eye surgery will not give back your eye sight that you were born with. Often one eye is for seeing near and the other far.
When I was younger I could read the 20/10 line with ease. Now I can read 20/5 line with ease only with glasses. This doesn't have anything to do with given your eye higher resolution.

I guess you fail to understand what an analogy is?

We don't know enough about body plans yet to know what we would do or what is possible.

 

[Loudmouth]

We don't know enough about body plans yet to know what we would do or what is possible.

Yes, we do. Do you really think it makes sense to put the amusement park so close to the sewage plant, if you know what I mean?