MOVED FROM OUTREACH: Scary Evolution O.O

[Loudmouth]

Evolution in the context of Darwin states that all came from a single cell organism, ameba.

No it doesn't. The evidence indicates that all eukaryotes share a common ancestor, most likely a single celled eukaryote. We are not descended from amoebas.

Also, you actually started out your life as a single cell. Just food for thought.

The Bible says that all came from certain kinds of living beings that were created - animals and man.

And if the evidence says differently why should we listen to the Bible?

Animals further evolved into various types of animals dependant on the environment and other elements - bear, polar bear, Grizzly bear.

And yet you don't allow chimps and humans to adapt to different environments. Strange that.

Since Evolutionism (as per Darwin) cannot cannot see how ameba came to be and to contain all that what is necessary for all other life to develop from it, development from various kinds of animals within it's owm kind, makes more sense, covers the evidences of evolution.

Since creationists are incapable of understanding that beneficial mutations occur they will continue to be wrong.

Evolutionism betrayed itself with one mistake.

It wanted to disprove God by removing creation from being created, yet could not account for a creation of an ameba.

Have you ever read Darwin?

"There is grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed into a few forms or into one; and that, whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being, evolved."--Chapter XIV, Origin of Species.

It seems that even Darwin thought the first life forms were "breathed into". Sound familiar?

Evolution exists within the species.

Evolution produces new species, otherwise known as macroevolution.

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/faq-speciation.html

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/speciation.html

Evolution does not exist spanning the "kind" of animals.

Good thing that chimps and humans are both in the Hominidae kind. Guess you can't deny human evolution anymore.

Creationism does not reject ONE FACT.

Except for the age of the Earth, the nested hierarchy, the age of the Universe, etc.

Creationism is NOT YEC that many believe represent Creationist Christians.

Then what is it?

It points to evolution within a kind of an animal, not the interspecies.

Speciation has been observed. So much for "creationism does not deny one fact."

 

[Edial]

Correct in part. However, if the will of the people was that gravity was caused by angels pushing down on you, this would not be acceptable as a valid addition to curriculum.

The people believe in a lot of things that aren't based in reality. Such can have a place, but it must be in the proper place. You don't teach Shakespeare in a Cheimstry class, and you don't teach Theology in a Biology class.

Evolution is science, Creationism is not. Evolution belongs in science class, Creationism does not.

If we could not disprove that angels are not doing that yet people believed that overwhelmingly - teach that angels are doing that.

But since we know and can measure gravity and have formulas - teach gravity.

We are saying that there is God, a Being that is outside of time.

And we are presenting the Bible that was never proven to be wrong in all that it states.

And we are presenting Jesus Christ and his miracles of incredible magnitude, quality and scope who supported the Bible to the utmost.

And these point towards the Supernatural.

What we are presenting is not superstitions, as angels creating gravity (although theoretically speaking, it is possible ), but a historical accounts of what happened in Natural history, not Supernatural history.
The Supernatural events we are discussing among ourselves.

And since the Natural believes in other lifeforms, it cannot logically speaking confine them to our limits of understanding.

Natural cannot disbelief in Supernatural if it believes that there might be other life forms that it has no idea about.

And concerning the Creation being taught in a science class.
Teach it in the Literature class.

Thanks,
Ed

 

[michabo]

Evolution in the context of Darwin states that all came from a single cell organism, ameba.

Evolution is about the change of living organisms, so the ultimate origins of life itself are outside of the theory. Hardly a probl.m

It wanted to disprove God by removing creation from being created, yet could not account for a creation of an ameba.

Evolution is a theory, it has no desires. Proponents of evolution have been atheists and theists. It's ridiculous to attack a theory because you don't like what some proponents wish, even if you correctly judge their desires, which you don't.

This is just you projecting your fears and insecurity when evolution is discussed onto evolution. It isn't threatening and it isn't trying to undermine God, that's just you feeling the gaps shrinking.

Evolution does not exist spanning the "kind" of animals.

If you had the ability/courage/imagination/intellectual honesty to define "kind", then we can talk. Until then, your ironic quotes around kind do perfect justice to a pittiable proposition.

Creationism does not reject ONE FACT.

It can't exist without rejecting one hundred years of geology, biology, genetics, bioregionalism, anthropology, and paleontology.

 

[Baggins]

I was born in the Soviet Union, was am atheist, Darwin "Origin of Species" was a must-read for older kids.

Darwin is the Father of Evolution.

And I pressented evolution as per Darwin.

Thanks,
Ed

Why would someone allow themselves to be caught out with such a bare faced lie?

You are either very angry or very delusional

The bit I highlighted being the easily disprovalble lie.

It is laughable that someone thinks they can post that Darwin suggested that all life evolved from amoeba, which aren't even prokaryotes, on a board stuffed with scientists.

 

[Edial]

No it doesn't. The evidence indicates that all eukaryotes share a common ancestor, most likely a single celled eukaryote. We are not descended from amoebas.

Where did eukaryote come from?

Also, one does not need to be a "rocket scientist" to see that all flesh has certain common consistency within it's context.

If things are built, a common material is used to build them.

Also, you actually started out your life as a single cell. Just food for thought.

Nothing to think about.

Just place that one cell into a void of emptiness and watch it "evolve".

And if the evidence says differently why should we listen to the Bible?

Evidence says nothing except that all "flesh" sharea a common denominator, ... as if we do not see that at the Supermarket meat section ... or under a microscope.

And yet you don't allow chimps and humans to adapt to different environments. Strange that.

I do not because the Bible stated that that animals and humans are two different creatures that were created.
If you prove that it is not so, then you can have a point of argument.
Yet you do not allow for the Bible, since you believe in the evolution - a matter of faith.

Since creationists are incapable of understanding that beneficial mutations occur they will continue to be wrong.

Have you ever read Darwin?

"There is grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed into a few forms or into one; and that, whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being, evolved."--Chapter XIV, Origin of Species..

.
That is what I read, it is at home though, and I have bookmark in the book.
But I'll paraphrase.
You want quotes, ask for them.

Charles Darwin wrote that he had significant difficulties explaining the following 3 problems that curbed his theory of evolution.
1. How did eye evolve? It is so complex that even of on nerve is out of whack, the whole eyes is defective.
2. Why can't mules procreate? The offspring of a horse and a donkey cannot procreate. Why?
3. I forgot the 3rd one.

It seems that even Darwin thought the first life forms were "breathed into". Sound familiar?..

So? Go on.

Evolution produces new species, otherwise known as macroevolution.

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/faq-speciation.html

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/speciation.html.

I'll read about this.

So far I have not heard of a creature that evolved from one kind into another.

You have any fossils to see that?

Good thing that chimps and humans are both in the Hominidae kind. Guess you can't deny human evolution anymore.

Well. I am certain that this falls within one of the types of fallacies that some love to point out, since you defined "a kind" and concluded with it.

Except for the age of the Earth, the nested hierarchy, the age of the Universe, etc.

You mightb have missed it.

I do not believe that Earth is young at all.

Speciation has been observed. So much for "creationism does not deny one fact."

Good.

Show me fossils of "half" this and "half" that.

Thanks,
Ed

 

[Nathan Poe]

No.

The poster equated his disbelief in God to that of the Pink Unicorn.

My response was appropriate.

Ed

So why shouldn't the Invisible Pink Unicorn, Flying Spaghetti Monster, or Iggy the Magic Elf be taught as "alternative" theories to evolution, but Creationism should, if not an appeal to popularity, and nothing more?

 

[Baggins]

That is what I read, it is at home though, and I have bookmark in the book.
But I'll paraphrase.
You want quotes, ask for them.

Charles Darwin wrote that he had significant difficulties explaining the following 3 problems that curbed his theory of evolution.
1. How did eye evolve? It is so complex that even of on nerve is out of whack, the whole eyes is defective.
2. Why can't mules procreate? The offspring of a horse and a donkey cannot procreate. Why?
3. I forgot the 3rd one.



So far I have not heard of a creature that evolved from one kind into another.

You have any fossils to see that?



Show me fossils of "half" this and "half" that.

Thanks,
Ed

How can someone so scientifically illiterate be so convinced that they know all the answers?


Answer: The spirit of the lard

 

[Skaloop]

Charles Darwin wrote that he had significant difficulties explaining the following 3 problems that curbed his theory of evolution.
1. How did eye evolve? It is so complex that even of on nerve is out of whack, the whole eyes is defective.

Darwin had no such concerns about the eye. At first, it was hard for him to contemplate how it might have happened. It was a sort of argument from incredulity. He said:

"To suppose that the eye with all its inimitable contrivances for adjusting the focus to different distances, for admitting different amounts of light, and for the correction of Spherical and chromatic aberration, could have been formed by natural selection, seems, I freely confess, absurd in the highest degree."

But once he thought about it some more, he realized that his inability to comprehend it did not mean that natural selection could not achieve it. He followed the above paragraph by stating:

"When it was first said that the sun stood still and the world turned round, the common sense of mankind declared the doctrine false; but the old saying of Vox populi, vox Dei ["the voice of the people = the voice of God "], as every philosopher knows, cannot be trusted in science. Reason tells me, that if numerous gradations from a simple and imperfect eye to one complex and perfect can be shown to exist, each grade being useful to its possessor, as is certain the case; if further, the eye ever varies and the variations be inherited, as is likewise certainly the case; and if such variations should be useful to any animal under changing conditions of life, then the difficulty of believing that a perfect and complex eye could be formed by natural selection, should not be considered as subversive of the theory."

Darwin had no problems with the evolution of the eye, and the idea that the eye is too complex to have evolved is a PRATT.

Show me fossils of "half" this and "half" that.

This again shows your misunderstanding of what evolution says. If you are looking for a transitional form, then all living organisms are transitional forms, midway between ancestors of 200 million years ago and ancestors of 200 million years from now. The ToE never suggests that there are "half-and-halfs."

 

[Split Rock]

Where did eukaryote come from?

From a prokaryote.

Also, one does not need to be a "rocket scientist" to see that all flesh has certain common consistency within it's context.

Evolution explains this.

If things are built, a common material is used to build them.

No. Is a brick house made of the same materials as a bar of soap?

Just place that one cell into a void of emptiness and watch it "evolve".

Why would anything "evolve" in a void of emptiness??

Evidence says nothing except that all "flesh" sharea a common denominator, ... as if we do not see that at the Supermarket meat section ... or under a microscope.

Again, evolution explains this.

Yet you do not allow for the Bible, since you believe in the evolution - a matter of faith.

You are mixing up different definitions of "faith." In religion, Faith means belief that is not based on physical evidence. In science, nothing is accepted without physical evidence. If I say I have "faith" that the sun will rise in the morning, this is belief based on the fact that it has risen every morning since I was born. It is not the same as ""faith" in a supernatural being that I cannot see, touch, hear, or smell, and cannot examine.

Charles Darwin wrote that he had significant difficulties explaining the following 3 problems that curbed his theory of evolution.
1. How did eye evolve? It is so complex that even of on nerve is out of whack, the whole eyes is defective.
2. Why can't mules procreate? The offspring of a horse and a donkey cannot procreate. Why?
3. I forgot the 3rd one.

There is nothing he wrote about that "curbed" his theory. How can you claim you have read his writings and make such a claim? How does the inability of mules to procreate falsify evolution?

So far I have not heard of a creature that evolved from one kind into another.

You have any fossils to see that?

Explain to us what a "Kind" is, and how you can tell two "kinds" apart. You win a cigar if you can do this, because professional creationists cannot.

I do not believe that Earth is young at all.

But if you add up all the begats in the bible, that is what you come up with. Is the bible wrong?

Show me fossils of "half" this and "half" that.

Give us an example. Half what?

 

[Edx]

to Edx ...
You are an atheist, you believe in evolution in the Darwinian context, while NO ONE can prove where the ameba came from.

Stop calling it an ameba, as others have said we did not decend from amebas.

You believe that abiogenesis will resolve these things.
OK.

Are you certain you do not use faith in all this?

I think we have a lot of reasons to think abiogenesis happened, its still needs a lot of work but like I already told you before Im not an atheist because of what I think I know. So this is irrelevant. (btw abiogeneisis isnt evolution )

I dont have faith in anything, abiogenesis and evolution included. To have faith means never to question yourself, to never doubt that you could be wrong. Faith means to block out any reason that shows your belief may be wrong. That is why I dont have faith.

And if you do believe that our science is quite advanced that one can have faith in it, would you explain me this?

I already said I dont have faith in science. Would you explain why you dont seem to understand that?

Jesus said some 2000 years ago that we could not even turn one hair from white to black ...
MT 5:36 And do not swear by your head, for you cannot make even one hair white or black.
... and 2000 years later our science developed hair dye.

Are you certain that putting faith in science is a reliable thing to do?

I see what you've written here, and presumably you think this is a good point but I really cant even understand what that is.

We cannot even predict weather.

Not with absolute certianty, no.

We do not know what life is.
Our answer to life is 75 years.

Maybe the answer to what life is is that this is really all there is.

We sense eternity in our beings, just to be assured (quite sternly, I should add) that eternity is impossible, because we do not know it.

What are you trying to say? Instead of talking in apologetic riddles you should try and be more straight forward.

We spin around the orbit of the Earth and the Sun with a breakneck speed and say - we are in control of our destiny.

I never said anything about destiny, whats relevant about that?

Why not put faith in Jesus Christ, who delivered all that he promised?

Why do you say I should have faith again? You have yet to give me any reason to think faith is a good thing. I will believe anything if I have reason and evidence to, and if I have reason and evidence to show my beliefs are incorrect I will discard or modify them. All beliefs are tentative for me.

If you put faith in science - one would need a lot more faith than to becaome a follower of Christ.

What part of "I have no faith in anything", do you not understand?

Much, much easier than you think.

1. Ask a non-partial source whether these trhings happened.
In Christianity we ask the arch-enemies of the Christ at the times, who recorded that these miracles indeed happened.
2. Look at the main source of these revelations and see whether they have prophecies (futuristic events) recorded that would be fulfilled perfectly in the future and recorded in that same book.

Ive already looked into all this. Any errors in the Bible are just explained away, badly, by apologists and I dont want to get into their silly arguments and double-think logic again (at least not in this regard anyway).

The Pharisees definitely DID NOT want to see these, yet they were interviewing the ones that were born infirm and healed, the former dead, shriveled hands made whole, 5000 fed, and then 4000 fed.

What source are you talking about?

A dead man walking is not an illusion.

A person born blind and seeing cannot be an illusion.

Faith healing scams are done all the time, I dare say some of them really believe they are healing people. But I suppose you think faith healers are actually legitimate.

I use the testimony of Pharisees (not from the Bible) that Jesus performed Supernatural miracles.

And, although one cannot use the Bible to prove the Bible, one can use the Biblical prophecies and their perfect fulfillment as an establishment of the authority of the Bible and it's reliability.

So where does faith come into this then? Where must I put my faith? If there is evidence there is no need for faith, yet the Bible and Christianity says faith is required to believe when their is no evidence.

Bible is reliable, because it proved to be reliable by stating concerning things to come and historically proving these things as come to past.

This isnt true at all. And Ive argued about this too many times to want to get into it again. Creationists have to rewrite history as well as science in order to get their Bible to be inerrant.

Oh, this is definitely the question that I meant to ask.

I am a "Creationist" in the context that God created all during an unknown period of time.

Also, nowhere in the Bible it is stated that we are alone.

Some "Christians" as well as some evolutionists like to invent things to push their point.

So, if you believe that there is other life in the Universe that is unknown to us, why do you say God does not exist?

...Why do you think the belief that there is other life in the universe necessitate also a belief in god?

...Mass faith in something doesnt impress me, evidence does.

So because people believe in something, it therefore exists? What kind of screwed up logic is that?..

No.
It means that there something to it.

This is illogical! Just because many people believe something doesnt mean its true. Only if it it is supported by facts and evidence, not faith, can we really determine its accuracy.

And do you really believe that we and what we see are the only life in Universe?

I just said I think there is other life in the universe, so what did you really want to ask me?

And if we are not alone, how can you say that God does not exist while there are miracles of Jesus Christ and billions of Christians and reasonably speaking life outside of what we see?

What about the miracles of Kirshna as written in the Bhagavad Gita, and the billions of Hindus? Oh thats right, their religion isnt the one true religion they have it wrong and you have it right. Their faith is misplaced, but yours isnt. To all the outsiders you both are as illogical as each other.

No, it is logical.
And it is based on evidences that I presented, since it is impossible to prove Supernatural in a Natural lab, since there are no "tools" to do so.

So far you have made claims not presented any evidence and I would love for you to show us how to prove the supernatural in a natural lab! If that were true why are the ID guys messing about with micro-biological structures and failing to show ID is scientific in a court to a Christian bush appointed judge?

 

[Edial]

So why shouldn't the Invisible Pink Unicorn, Flying Spaghetti Monster, or Iggy the Magic Elf be taught as "alternative" theories to evolution, but Creationism should, if not an appeal to popularity, and nothing more?

Primarily because you appear to drop the continuity of this thought without completing it.

You presented that you do not believe in Pink Unicorns as much as you do not believe in God.

I stated that NO ONE believes in Pink Unicorns, yet BILLIONS believe in God.

You say - Popularity argument.

I say - a comparison of something that NO ONE believes in (Pink Unicorns) with that to God, in whom BILLIONS believe in, disqualifies your suggestion not due to fallcious argument on my part, but to that that you have NO argument, since "NO ONE" as compared to "BILLIONS" is not a popularity advantage, since there is NO ONE that believes in Pink Unicorns in order to challenge.

Ed

 

[Edx]

I say - a comparison of something that NO ONE believes in (Pink Unicorns) with that to God, in whom BILLIONS believe in, disqualifies your suggestion not due to fallcious argument on my part, but to that that you have NO argument, since "NO ONE" as compared to "BILLIONS" is not a popularity advantage, since there is NO ONE that believes in Pink Unicorns in order to challenge.

But which Creation story from these billions of God believers should we teach? I assume you only want yours taught.

 

[Edial]

...

...Why do you think the belief that there is other life in the universe necessitate also a belief in god?

Who do you think God is?

He is the creator of life itself.

Ed

 

[Nathan Poe]

Primarily because you appear to drop the continuity of this thought without completing it.

You presented that you do not believe in Pink Unicorns as much as you do not believe in God.

I stated that NO ONE believes in Pink Unicorns, yet BILLIONS believe in God.

You say - Popularity argument.

I say - a comparison of something that NO ONE believes in (Pink Unicorns) with that to God, in whom BILLIONS believe in, disqualifies your suggestion not due to fallcious argument on my part, but to that that you have NO argument, since "NO ONE" as compared to "BILLIONS" is not a popularity advantage, since there is NO ONE that believes in Pink Unicorns in order to challenge.

Ed

So since "BILLIONS" of people believe in something, it becomes a scientific theory?

How about we compare them in the labs, based on the facts, the evidence, and the predictive vaule, like we're supposed to do with potential scientific theories?

Because Creationism/ID has already failed these tests. It doesn't fly in the scientific community, so why turn it loose in the classroom?

Face it -- aside from popularity, you have nothing.

 

[steen]

Evolutionism does deal with origins. [./quote]Ah, so we are dealing with newly invented and misleading creationist wordplay. OK, whatever.

Evolution might not, but it does lead to the arguement of "where did the first form of life come from". There is no distinct break between abiogenesis and evolution, because then you have to take a position on when life begins (self-repication?).

An outright false claim.

“Few paleontologists have, I think, ever supposed that fossils, by themselves, provide grounds for the conclusion that evolution has occurred. The fossil record doesn’t even provide any evidence in support of Darwinian theory except in the weak sense that the fossil record is compatible with it, just as it is compatible with other evolutionary theories, and revolutionary theories, and special creationist theories, and even ahistorical theories.” - David B. Kitts, "Search for the Holy Transformation," Paleobiology

Hmm, this doesn't seem accurate. Could you please provide a more detailed reference so we can check it out a bit closer?

Personal bias will color any view of the data, especially data that we didn't observe

Which is why we have the Scientific Method. You know what that is, right?

You think all the trials in the court system make the correct call based on evidence. Both sides of the argument use the data peices of evidence, and both sides see opposite stories. When a person is on trial, few people know the truth, and it is up to the rest of the people in the jury to weigh the evidence and find the truth.

But then, the legal system doesn't operate like the Scientific Method does, so that's just a silly and utterly irrelevant strawman.

“Contrary to what most scientists write, the fossil record does not support the Darwinian theory of evolution because it is this theory (there are several) which we use to interpret the fossil record.

There are several false claims in this, including a display of incredible ignorance even of the most basic aspects of science.

By doing so, we are guilty of circular reasoning if we then say the fossil record supports this theory.” - Ronald R. West, “Paleontology and Uniformitariansim.”

Untrue.

The problem is, public schools are teaching abiogenesis along with evolution.

Are they? Would you mind giving an example of a lesson plan that shows Abiogenesis on the schedule? No? Uhum, exactly as I thought. I have NEVER heard of any public school teaching about Abiogenesis.

They do this because any discussion of life will involve the question of "where did life come from?"

And?

I have no problem with them teaching micro-evolution in school, teaching how a species can adapt to the environment by changing or dropping peices of data.

This seems a rather bizarre and incorrect description of Natural Selection. Do you even KNOW what the scientific evidence shows here? It sounds like you are making things up here. How do you measure "information" so you can tell if it is "changing or dropping"? This seems outright bogus. It seems like something you got off a creationist, science-ignorant creationist website.

I dont even mind if they show that mutations can change the DNA and cause peices of existing data to be copied.

Ah, we are very grateful that you don't mind science class teaching actual, documented science. </sarcasm>

But I do mind when they start claiming that new information is added to DNA, resulting in beneficial mutations and macroevolution. This has not been seen.

Your claim is false.

Beaks change size, irradiated flies develope extra wings, but that proves nothing.

And so what? You obviously are ignorant of the actual evidence that exists for evolution. That is not our fault. But could you at least show us the courtesy of having actually looked at the evidence for what you claim has never been seen or observed?

Anything else is extrapolation of data outside the given evidence and based on personal bias and speculation.

Which is why science actually HAVE evidence for the things you claim don't exist.

In the same manner that I speculate we came from God, abiogenesists speculate we came from a chemical bath. If God has no place in the classroom, then abiogenesis has no place in teh classroom.

But then, I must have missed where there is a push to include Abiogenesis into the lesson plans of public schools. So as I asked up above,. why don't you show us and provide the evidence of this push, this occurrence?

Regardless, students are going to ask the question of "where did we come from".

And?

If a teacher isn't allowed to answer "from God", then they shouldn't be able to answer "from a pool of chemicals". Again, this goes back to point of origins.

And thus is utterly irrelevant to the issue of Evolution. That you can't grasp this is not the fault of science. At most, it is the failure of the school that originally provided you the education in this matter.

 

[steen]

One "sees" gravity and measures gravity.

One does not see how ameba came to be.

But one can certainly see and measure Evolution.

 

[steen]

I was born in the Soviet Union, was am atheist, Darwin "Origin of Species" was a must-read for older kids.

Darwin is the Father of Evolution.

And I pressented evolution as per Darwin.

No, you didn't, not at all. Perhaps you need to actually study up on the Scientific Theory of Evolution before making any more erroneous claims about this.

 

[Paulos23]

You say - Popularity argument.

I say - a comparison of something that NO ONE believes in (Pink Unicorns) with that to God, in whom BILLIONS believe in, disqualifies your suggestion not due to fallcious argument on my part, but to that that you have NO argument, since "NO ONE" as compared to "BILLIONS" is not a popularity advantage, since there is NO ONE that believes in Pink Unicorns in order to challenge.

Ed

Yes but out of those BILLIONS who believe that Genesis is correct? How many believe in a God, but not yours?

The arguement you are putting forth is a popularity arguemnet since you are pointing out numbers. This is not about the number of people that believe in it (in reference to teaching it in public school) but in the first admendment. If you start teaching biblical creationism you would have to include the other religions creation myths/theories/stories so the government doen't show a bias to one religion per the first admendment.

However, it is nigh imposible to fit all these in a single class and be able to teach anything else worth while. Which is why public schools don't even try and don't teach any theories that reference religious belief. Which was the point of Nathan Poe's post. If you teach one of them you have to teach them all.

Evolution theory just happens to be the only one that doesn't reference a religion and it is only based in facts, which is why it taught today.

 

[Edx]

Who do you think God is?

He is the creator of life itself.

Ed

All theists think that, not all of them believe in your god much less your creation story.

Wheres the rest of my post, eh?

 

[MewtwoX]

Realize the word I am using is "evolutionism", which encompases the whole philosophical standpoint that the universe and life came into existence without any intervention from a creator. ToE is contained within "evolutionism" or "naturalism", along with abiogenesis, the big bang, singularity, etc. I realize the difference between all these processes, and what each one entails, but I know very FEW people that believe in evolution and reject abiogenesis (along with seeding, implantation, and any other theory that avoids the question at hand and shifts the discussion to a different world, literally).

There is no official term within the Scientific community that denotes a whole set of Theories and hypotheses into one universal origins question. From all the discussions I've had on Creationism and Evolution, "Evolutionism" has always been used to refer to Evolutionary Theory alone.

So this is a new one to me.

[wiki]Evolutionism[/wiki]

Evolutionism does deal with origins. Evolution might not, but it does lead to the arguement of "where did the first form of life come from". There is no distinct break between abiogenesis and evolution, because then you have to take a position on when life begins (self-repication?).

Yes, there is. Just because one can also question the origin of life after questioning the origin of species doesn't mean the Models proposed are connected together. Evolutionary Theory is Evolutionary Theory and Abiogenesis is Abiogenesis.

Also, what is taught in Schools is each separate model addressed as what their current form is (IE. ToE as the predominant Theory and Abiogenesis as a modern hypothesis).

“Few paleontologists have, I think, ever supposed that fossils, by themselves, provide grounds for the conclusion that evolution has occurred. The fossil record doesn’t even provide any evidence in support of Darwinian theory except in the weak sense that the fossil record is compatible with it, just as it is compatible with other evolutionary theories, and revolutionary theories, and special creationist theories, and even ahistorical theories.” - David B. Kitts, "Search for the Holy Transformation," Paleobiology

This is standard Appeal to Authority and a quote mine:

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/quotes/mine/part1-1.html

Kitts is showing that the fossil record, taken alone without a theory to test it against, is inadequate to support Darwinism, which is exactly what Gould argues in his punctuated equilibrium theory, and evolutionists know quite well. Kitts goes on for quite a while longer explaining Grassé's conception that natural selection is not enough to explain the fossil record in opposition to Darwinian theory. However, this last bit, which is not taken out of context of the above paragraphs, will show you what Kitt's final point was:

"If a theory leads us to conclude that events of a certain kind are to be expected, then we may suppose that they have occurred even though direct historical evidence for their occurrence is unconvincing. The Darwinians will, quite rightly, never be led by the fossil record to abandon their theory nor even to suppose that it is in need of alteration or emendation. But if a well supported biological theory requires them to conclude that evolution is "guided" by some previously unrecognized factor, then they should be prepared to introduce that factor into their interpretation of the fossil record. Grassé finds in contemporary molecular genetics at least the hope that the additional directing factor may be found." Kitts, David B., "Search for the Holy Transformation," review of Evolution of Living Organisms, by Pierre-P. Grassé, Paleobiology, vol. 5, 1979, p. 354)


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So far, no well-supported biological theory refuting the current progression of the fossil record has been found, yet Darwinists do indeed these days use biological data to help interpret the fossil record, just as Kitts noted.

Personal bias will color any view of the data, especially data that we didn't observe. You think all the trials in the court system make the correct call based on evidence. Both sides of the argument use the data peices of evidence, and both sides see opposite stories. When a person is on trial, few people know the truth, and it is up to the rest of the people in the jury to weigh the evidence and find the truth.

That's why systems are made in Science that eliminate bias as much as possible, such as Double Blind systems of experimentation and Peer Review.

Creationst literature very rarely makes use of these bias eliminating features, however...

Just because the evidence is presented in the most logiacl fasion doesn't mean it's correct 100% of the time.

Personal bias colors your view of the facts, plain and simple.

“Contrary to what most scientists write, the fossil record does not support the Darwinian theory of evolution because it is this theory (there are several) which we use to interpret the fossil record. By doing so, we are guilty of circular reasoning if we then say the fossil record supports this theory.” - Ronald R. West, “Paleontology and Uniformitariansim.”

This is another appeal to authority. At the moment, I cannot see any evidence of this being quote mined, however I would disagree with it's main point. The fossil record is found and the data is compared to predictions made by the ToE. If they fit then we can say it supports the theory. There is no application of Evolutionary theory to understand the fossil record, but a mere comparison of what we should find if the ToE is ture with how we find the fossils.

Perhaps this is some connection to dating the rocks? If it is then it is most definitely wrong:

http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CC/CC310.html

The problem is, public schools are teaching abiogenesis along with evolution.

They teach it as a modern hypothesis.

They do this because any discussion of life will involve the question of "where did life come from?"

More like an elaboration of the scientific investigations into the questions of life. In a science class, the Scientific theories, laws and hypotheses are presented for people to learn.

I have no problem with them teaching micro-evolution in school, teaching how a species can adapt to the environment by changing or dropping peices of data. I dont even mind if they show that mutations can change the DNA and cause peices of existing data to be copied.

But I do mind when they start claiming that new information is added to DNA, resulting in beneficial mutations and macroevolution. This has not been seen. Beaks change size, irradiated flies develope extra wings, but that proves nothing.

Let's not forget the neomorphic (gain or new function) mutation that lead to nylon eating bacteria, eh?

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/mutations.html

1. Bacteria that eat nylon
   Well, no, they don't actually eat nylon; they eat short molecules (nylon oligomers) found in the waste waters of plants that produce nylon. They metabolize short nylon oligomers, breaking the nylon linkages with a couple of related enzymes. Since the bonds involved aren't found in natural products, the enzymes must have arisen since the time nylon was invented (around the 1940s). It would appear this happened by new mutations in that time period.
   These enzymes which break down the nylon oligomers appear to have arisen by frameshift mutation from some other gene which codes for a functionally unrelated enzyme. This adaptation has been experimentally duplicated. In the experiments, non-nylon-metabolizing strains of Pseudomonas were grown in media with nylon oligomers available as the primary food source. Within a relatively small number of generations, they developed these enzyme activities. This would appear to be an example of documented occurrence of beneficial mutations in the lab.

Anything else is extrapolation of data outside the given evidence and based on personal bias and speculation. In the same manner that I speculate we came from God, abiogenesists speculate we came from a chemical bath. If God has no place in the classroom, then abiogenesis has no place in teh classroom.

No, Abiogenesis is not mere speculation. The evidence in support of it is not complete (hence its remainder as a hypothesis), but it is present. Studies of protocells and development of macromolecules have yielded promising results so far:

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/abioprob/abioprob.html

Regardless, students are going to ask the question of "where did we come from". If a teacher isn't allowed to answer "from God", then they shouldn't be able to answer "from a pool of chemicals". Again, this goes back to point of origins.

They don't answer questions with certainty in Science. They answer with the movement of evidence.

"The evidence suggests..."