Natural selection v Intelligent design

[KCfromNC]

Forget it...no talking to a brick wall!

Why not answer those simple questions rather than changing the subject? It makes it look as if you have something to hide.

When Frederick Hoyle’s team did the math for a single protein based cell they used the most liberal definition of a living cell and assumed a Universe 20 billion years old. For this functional structure they only drew on a small number of related factors that would have to be in place and came to 1 in 10 to the 27th power chance for just the formation of ONE protein based cell to have arisen by naturalistic materialistic means in a 20 billion year old Universe.

Citation needed.

Scholars like Dr. James Bales, in his book, Evolution and the Scientific Method, have no problem honestly saying “I believe in attributing to nature whatever power is necessary for nature to do everything which is required to create...!”

Create what? We'll never know, since the creationist site you're taking this quote-mine from decided it wasn't part of the narrative they were trying to fabricate from this out of context quote.

Even taking it at face value, we now are supposed to think that someone believes something and they wrote it down therefore the entire body of evolutionary theory is wrong. I guess biologists can just pack up and go home now...

I guess this gets back to the idea that literalists deify the words in a book and project that failing onto others? I'm not sure what else we're supposed to draw from it.

Hoyle says, “…as biochemists discover more and more about the awesome complexity of life, it is apparent that its chances of originating by accident are so minute that they can be completely ruled out. Life cannot have arisen by chance” (pp. 11-12).

Who is saying that chemistry is random? No one that I know of.

So you see he agrees but knows full well this negates the Darwinian model

The quote was talking about the origin of life, not evolution.

The same conclusion was reached by Harvard University research physiologist Harold Blum years before.

Citation needed

How then did natural selection produce the first millions of different “function determined”proteins? Was it following chemical laws and principles and being guided at that time? Why are there not remnants of these first (or for that matter even new ever becoming ones) “functional” proteins found being formed in nature outside of living systems at this time?

These are all open questions. We don't have definitive answers yet to every single question. I don't think the fact that we're not omniscient is going to revolutionize biology and make everyone a creationist, but maybe you can explain how that's supposed to work.

 

[stevevw]

A joke that only makes sense if... go back, re-read.

I have re read it many times. You keep repeating that "The joke is only funny if you hold a mistaken view of hominid evolution, according to which human beings descended from monkeys". But your missing the whole point. The joke was funny because he was calling the atheist a monkey full stop. There could have been many associations he may have used because there is an association in one way or another. But that wasn't his intention. He wasn't going out of his way to make any clear statements about where we come from. He wanted to purposely link that atheist with a monkey to make his point that he was a bully full stop. You are reading more into than was there.

He wasn't making any statements about evolution in the first place. All the commentators and journalists as well as audience seen it that way and the headlines tell us what his intentions were. Your the only one trying to make it into something else for the sake of using it as some evidence against Dr Carson for your own reasons.

It was never the only piece of evidence. You've barely touched the others.

Yes it was. It was the only thing you based his knowledge on to begin with. I said he would know about evolution from his knowledge of the brain and his description of how it worked in the video I posted. You came back with the monkey comment and thats all It wasn't until I defended him that your started to come back with all these additional things. We debated the monkey comment on its own for sometime. You had already formulated your opinion based on that.

You do ignore them. That much is clear. I'm constantly having to address your misconceptions and misrepresentations. And I'm sick of it.

If you think so but I seem to know exactly what you are saying all the time. I just disagree and you interpret that as I'm ignoring you. You are not continually addressing my misconceptions. You interpret my so called misconceptions because I am not going along with you. But I understand exactly what you are saying. You reckon DR Carson doesn't know about evolution I happen to disagree. You say that there is evidence for evolution through random mutations and natural selection I happen to disagree. You post some evidence then I post some counter evidence. You say I dont understand this but you dont really look at my evidence or address the details of it. Others support what I say and have posted similar evidence so it is not just me. I just happen to disagree thats all.

First, the monkey comment hasn't been discredited as evidence.

It only stands in your own mind and opinion thats all. It would be thrown out in court as unsubstantiated. The witnesses for what you are inferring are a biased atheist site and yourself. Considering that Dr Carson was addressing an atheist then the atheist sites opinion doesn't stand as its a conflict of interest. It is in their interest to stick up for an atheist and see everything on the atheist side of things against a believer in God. It would be the same for you. But the independent journalists dont see it that way. It wasn't about evolution but was a joke and jibe against an atheists and that Dr Carson was standing up for himself against a bully atheist who was attacking him. So it was more about defending himself by giving some of what the atheists was doing to him.

It still stands. The joke only works if you assume a mistaken understanding of hominid evolution, which is precisely the point. Second, you have barely touched the other pieces of evidence.

No the joke can worked because Dr Carson called him a monkey full stop. Thats it. There was no intentions about explaining where we came from or about evolution. In other words he said OK you win your a monkey because there is some association anyway whether its to do with direct or indirect connections. But that is not why he said what he said about the monkey. It was purely about making out that the atheists attacking him was a monkey, a jack ass as someone else said for being such a bully.

He used the monkey because there is some association there regardless of what you believe evolution can do. His intention was to make an association regardless of his knowledge of where we come from because he wanted to call him a monkey in the first place. You obviously havnt seen the many jokes of cartoons characters of humans and apes/monkeys around even from evolution sites.

Any way it doesn't matter. You happen to think Dr Carson is dumb on evolution and I and others happen to think he does have some knowledge of evolution and the brain. It goes off the point of the OP in that we are trying to show that there is very little evidence for the evolution of complex new abilities through random mutations and natural selection.

 

[Archaeopteryx]

I have re read it many times. You keep repeating that "The joke is only funny if you hold a mistaken view of hominid evolution, according to which human beings descended from monkeys". But your missing the whole point. The joke was funny because he was calling the atheist a monkey full stop.

And why was he calling him a monkey, steve? Why didn't he call him an ape? You know the answer already: it goes back to a mistaken understanding of hominid evolution.

Yes it was. It was the only thing you based his knowledge on to begin with.

No, it wasn't. Go back, re-read. I'm sick of constantly having to correct your misconceptions and misrepresentations.

I said he would know about evolution from his knowledge of the brain and his description of how it worked in the video I posted. You came back with the monkey comment and thats all It wasn't until I defended him that your started to come back with all these additional things. We debated the monkey comment on its own for sometime. You had already formulated your opinion based on that.

This is clearly false. Carson's "joke" was first introduced on p.33. I began my critique earlier than that. This is from p.27:

According to his Wikipedia page, Carson said the following in a 2006 debate: "I don't believe in evolution...I simply don't have enough faith to believe that something as complex as our ability to rationalize, think, and plan, and have a moral sense of what's right and wrong, just appeared" (emphasis added). Based on that comment, Carson either doesn't understand evolution well enough or he is misrepresenting it.

If you think so but I seem to know exactly what you are saying all the time.

The contrary would be truer.

You are not continually addressing my misconceptions. You interpret my so called misconceptions because I am not going along with you. But I understand exactly what you are saying.

See above. I had to go back several pages to show you that you were wrong; that Carson's "joke" was introduced later (on p.33). This is precisely what I mean about having to continually address your misconceptions and misrepresentations.

It only stands in your own mind and opinion thats all. It would be thrown out in court as unsubstantiated. The witnesses for what you are inferring are a biased atheist site and yourself.

How many times did I emphasise that the original source was YouTube and not an atheist site? And yet you're still repeating this point as though it has some significance to the discussion.

Considering that Dr Carson was addressing an atheist then the atheist sites opinion doesn't stand as its a conflict of interest. It is in their interest to stick up for an atheist and see everything on the atheist side of things against a believer in God. It would be the same for you. But the independent journalists dont see it that way. It wasn't about evolution but was a joke and jibe against an atheists and that Dr Carson was standing up for himself against a bully atheist who was attacking him. So it was more about defending himself by giving some of what the atheists was doing to him.

I've already addressed this. Go back, re-read.

 

[stevevw]

True. And one of the journals referenced is an ID/creationist publication, despite the claims to the contrary.

Wow and one of them was a creationists journal, how awful. What about the rest. It seems that because there is one in amongst many somehow that one has grown tentacles and contaminated the rest so they are all thrown out. Even if one is a connected to a creationist site or a religious site shouldn't we base the evidence on the content and not who is behind it. Some of the best experts have connections to religion ie Max Planck, Albert Einstein, Kenneth R Miller to name a few.

Yet the hypocritical thing is that there is evidence that even peer reviewed science from secular sources can be suspect and false but people accept it as gospel.

 

[pshun2404]

KCofNC...I have answered so many of Arche's "simple questions" and it is a waste of time. The man simply answers "I do not understand" or to him "That makes no sense"....there seems to be an inability for the person to reason for his self, to think outside the box...anyone (even non-creationists) who have an insight from their own field of study if it disagrees with the indoctrinated mantra is automatically rejected void of consideration and declared to be "un-knowledgeable", "too old", "quote mined" and more, regardless of the fact that they are mostly Ph.D's in their fields (convenient blow offs)...and then there is the famous "that work is too old" and not "from a current" journal or study. and then not an "Evolutionary Biology Journal" so the sources of insight is purposely shrunk down further and further until all one is left with that he will accept are only current (and that is used only as convenient to his points) EBs who agree with his perspective (thus a stacked deck...a typical approach used by propagandists of all sorts). So there is NO reasoning, no original or new insight allowed, no creative or objective thought considered. Its sad really.

I believe in evolution but definitely know there is no evidence for abiogenesis OR cross genus or phyletic morphism....there is much evidence for information preceding aggregation (laws and guiding principles in nature that govern the formation of complex systems which YOU keep claiming IS there, and I agree). Things do not become complex forms by random coincidence or by many repeated mutations upon mutation...Proteins for example fold particular ways because they are following instructions to do so (that's my point exactly) not because nature did so by accident and it was successful because it worked so it stayed.

I believe in Natural Selection, AND that that was how it was meant to be, not that it just happened (by chance) to be that way...but I do not believe in the pseudo-lamarkian "giraffes got longer necks after 1000s of generation of reaching for the highest leaves" or "finches beaks got longer so they could get to the available food". There were many varieties of finches present (about 15 just on the Darwin's Islands...and they are not even actual finches but passerines of the Tanager family) and those that could get to the food on a given island survived, those that could not either died off or flew to other nearby islands where food they could get to was available. Then they mated reinforcing the varieties in their respective places.

And yes I believe there is intelligence behind much of what we see especially regarding living systems. I believe the evidence points to that as well. I believe "natural" means are because this is the process used to accomplish these goals. And I believe that plan and purpose are demonstrated in forms and functions. The forms and functions follow plan and purpose in their becoming. Not only originally but now. So if you or Arche want to go back and review many of the arguments I have given I am telling you they are invitations to think for yourself and consider the logic.

For one already given example, there are NO functional Proteins outside of living systems and no system can be a living system without functional Proteins being present. Therefore one did not precede the other while the other was evolving...they both came to be, simultaneously! Show me one example of DNA existing independent of a cell and thus making or becoming a living cell? Or show us a cell with no DNA suddenly or over time evolving it? And if so where did the functional Proteins the cell depended on for its existence come from in the first place when there was no transcription/translation taking place?

Now see, that is perfectly logical, and it generates a legitimate scientific question that EBs should consider, but the response from Arche would be "I do not understand your point" (DUH!) or "that makes no sense" (because it shakes up the accepted indoctrination), or "what are you trying to say (which already has been said but his indoctrinated logic loops will not allow such consideration to process...indoctrination always has these loops to guard against anything penetrating) or he would demand where have a whole slew of "current" "EB" scientists in "Current EB supportive Journals only" expressed the same thing (no room for original thought or insight allowed)? Don't forget I was you guys for about 30 years...thinking outside the box I was convinced of was not easy it took a decade...

 

[Archaeopteryx]

KCofNC...I have answered so many of Arche's "simple questions" and it is a waste of time. The man simply answers "I do not understand" or to him "That makes no sense"....there seems to be an inability for the person to reason for his self, to think outside the box...anyone (even non-creationists) who have an insight from their own field of study if it disagrees with the indoctrinated mantra is automatically rejected void of consideration and declared to be "un-knowledgeable", "too old", "quote mined" and more, regardless of the fact that they are mostly Ph.D's in their fields (convenient blow offs)...and then there is the famous "that work is too old" and not "from a current" journal or study.

I addressed your comments, noting that most of the research you linked to didn't appear to be relevant. Moreover, as with steve, your interpretation of the findings appears to be somewhat at odds with the authors, so there's that. You are quickly on your way to mastering the gish gallop, however.

 

[pshun2404]

Giddiyup pardner...

 

[masterp48hd]

Natural selection may be proven to a point but it hasn't been proven to be a driving force that can create new complex organisms or creatures. Tests and studies done indicate a fittest loss and deterioration overall over time so there is no real benefit in the long run. It is not just about natural selection but also beneficial mutations and they are very rare. Most mutations are neutral and there may be many that are harmful. Studies may indicate more slightly deleterious mutations that they thought. Certainly to so that all the amazing complexity and variety came from something that is mostly harmful/neutral and a copying mistake of something that was already good is yet to be proved and hard to believe.
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0022283604007624
http://bio-complexity.org/ojs/index.php/main/article/view/BIO-C.2010.4
http://bio-complexity.org/ojs/index.php/main/article/view/BIO-C.2014.4
http://bio-complexity.org/ojs/index.php/main/article/view/BIO-C.2012.4

Physical changes between generations are not THAT uncommon, look at dogs for instance, and.how they could become all kind of animals, from really little and fluffy to large and muscular. I know it's artificial selection as opposed to.natural selection that is way more gradual and takes a unbelievable amount of time, but it's the quickest thing we have to kind of see something similar to evolution in a reasonable period of time

 

[stevevw]

Physical changes between generations are not THAT uncommon, look at dogs for instance, and.how they could become all kind of animals, from really little and fluffy to large and muscular. I know it's artificial selection as opposed to.natural selection that is way more gradual and takes a unbelievable amount of time, but it's the quickest thing we have to kind of see something similar to evolution in a reasonable period of time

Yes but as they say they are all still dogs. Just looking at them you can see this. But the main thing is that as the breeds move further away from the natural original state they become less fit. They can inherit many problems like diseases ect. So rather than a better and fitter animal it is a weaker animal overall. This is the opposite of evolution and this is what tests are showing. Even the so called beneficial mutations are now being seen as having some cost of fitness to an animal. Even the neutral ones have a very small negative effect that is held over. A positive effect is so rare that given the amazing amount of species we see now and have ever been it would have taken 10 histories or more of earth to produce this through beneficial mutations.

The great variety we see is not from mutations and natural selection but for existing genetics which an animal can tap into. WE are only now discovering the vast majority of the genome has some function. This may be able to change the coding of genes to do all sorts of things in switching on and off different functions. There maybe more ability for an animal to change within their own genomes and gene pool that first thought. Add to this the underestimated ability of HGT and other things like epigentics and mutations via natural selection begin to wither into the background as the driving force for change.

Does evolutionary theory need a rethink?
Charles Darwin conceived of evolution by natural selection without knowing that genes exist. Now mainstream evolutionary theory has come to focus almost exclusively on genetic inheritance and processes that change gene frequencies.
Yet new data pouring out of adjacent fields are starting to undermine this narrow stance. An alternative vision of evolution is beginning to crystallize, in which the processes by which organisms grow and develop are recognized as causes of evolution.

We believe that the EES (extended evolutionary synthesis) will shed new light on how evolution works. We hold that organisms are constructed in development, not simply ‘programmed’ to develop by genes. Living things do not evolve to fit into pre-existing environments, but co-construct and coevolve with their environments, in the process changing the structure of ecosystems.

The number of biologists calling for change in how evolution is conceptualized is growing rapidly. Strong support comes from allied disciplines, particularly developmental biology, but also genomics, epigenetics, ecology and social science1, 2. We contend that evolutionary biology needs revision if it is to benefit fully from these other disciplines. The data supporting our position gets stronger every day.
http://www.nature.com/news/does-evolutionary-theory-need-a-rethink-1.16080
The frailty of adaptive hypotheses for the origins of organismal complexity
The vast majority of biologists engaged in evolutionary studies interpret virtually every aspect of biodiversity in adaptive terms. This narrow view of evolution has become untenable in light of recent observations from genomic sequencing and population-genetic theory.
http://www.pnas.org/content/104/suppl_1/8597.full

 

[masterp48hd]

Yes but as they say they are all still dogs. Just looking at them you can see this. But the main thing is that as the breeds move further away from the natural original state they become less fit. They can inherit many problems like diseases ect. So rather than a better and fitter animal it is a weaker animal overall. This is the opposite of evolution and this is what tests are showing. Even the so called beneficial mutations are now being seen as having some cost of fitness to an animal. Even the neutral ones have a very small negative effect that is held over. A positive effect is so rare that given the amazing amount of species we see now and have ever been it would have taken 10 histories or more of earth to produce this through beneficial mutations.

The great variety we see is not from mutations and natural selection but for existing genetics which an animal can tap into. WE are only now discovering the vast majority of the genome has some function. This may be able to change the coding of genes to do all sorts of things in switching on and off different functions. There maybe more ability for an animal to change within their own genomes and gene pool that first thought. Add to this the underestimated ability of HGT and other things like epigentics and mutations via natural selection begin to wither into the background as the driving force for change.

Does evolutionary theory need a rethink?
Charles Darwin conceived of evolution by natural selection without knowing that genes exist. Now mainstream evolutionary theory has come to focus almost exclusively on genetic inheritance and processes that change gene frequencies.
Yet new data pouring out of adjacent fields are starting to undermine this narrow stance. An alternative vision of evolution is beginning to crystallize, in which the processes by which organisms grow and develop are recognized as causes of evolution.

We believe that the EES (extended evolutionary synthesis) will shed new light on how evolution works. We hold that organisms are constructed in development, not simply ‘programmed’ to develop by genes. Living things do not evolve to fit into pre-existing environments, but co-construct and coevolve with their environments, in the process changing the structure of ecosystems.

The number of biologists calling for change in how evolution is conceptualized is growing rapidly. Strong support comes from allied disciplines, particularly developmental biology, but also genomics, epigenetics, ecology and social science1, 2. We contend that evolutionary biology needs revision if it is to benefit fully from these other disciplines. The data supporting our position gets stronger every day.
http://www.nature.com/news/does-evolutionary-theory-need-a-rethink-1.16080
The frailty of adaptive hypotheses for the origins of organismal complexity
The vast majority of biologists engaged in evolutionary studies interpret virtually every aspect of biodiversity in adaptive terms. This narrow view of evolution has become untenable in light of recent observations from genomic sequencing and population-genetic theory.
http://www.pnas.org/content/104/suppl_1/8597.full

I am not an expert on evolution, my knowledge is fairly limited in the topic, but about the dogs, natural selection only selects the fittest animals, while the weaker die or get rejected by the group si they don't reproduce. But in artificial selection we selected the most useful to us (the more calm ones for.companions, the most aggressive to hunt, the fastest.to run races, etc.) and we did it in a much faster rate than natural selection, so they are more vulnerable to get.sicknesses because sometimes their genetic material is too similar because they breed the same limited number of normal wolves, usually they were a pack so the genes.are too similar and that causes.bad.mutations and worsened sicknesses. If it was natural selection, the ill dogs would probably die and that wouldn't happen at all. But i used artificial selection in.dogs because i thought it was fairly similar to natural selection and a thing that can be observed while it's happening. (I made a water monkey farm and separated the bigger ones, then again and again.and again until i had a tank with normal ones and another one where they were bigger from.birth)

 

[stevevw]

And why was he calling him a monkey, steve? Why didn't he call him an ape? You know the answer already: it goes back to a mistaken understanding of hominid evolution.

No thats what you are implying and there's no evidence for this but your opinion and those of a biased atheist site. Everyone else doesn't see it that way and just sees it as a response to a person who was being a bully. Implying he is connected to a monkey rather than an ape is what makes the joke. Monkeys have always been used as the butt for jokes not apes. He used the monkey on purpose to make it a joke because the monkey is the one that is seen as being silly or funny not the ape. You have injected more into it and are implying that he is being serious about where we come from.

Surely you dont think that an intelligent scientist like Dr Carson who understands the more complex aspects of evolution like biology and genetics doesn't know one of the most basic tenets of evolution. Most people know what evolution claims that our ancestors are apes such as Lucy and not monkeys like Tarzan's off sider cheetah. It is well known to everyone about the long list of apes evolution from the skulls they display that are all ape type creatures.

 

[stevevw]

I am not an expert on evolution, my knowledge is fairly limited in the topic, but about the dogs, natural selection only selects the fittest animals, while the weaker die or get rejected by the group si they don't reproduce. But in artificial selection we selected the most useful to us (the more calm ones for.companions, the most aggressive to hunt, the fastest.to run races, etc.) and we did it in a much faster rate than natural selection, so they are more vulnerable to get.sicknesses because sometimes their genetic material is too similar because they breed the same limited number of normal wolves, usually they were a pack so the genes.are too similar and that causes.bad.mutations and worsened sicknesses. If it was natural selection, the ill dogs would probably die and that wouldn't happen at all. But i used artificial selection in.dogs because i thought it was fairly similar to natural selection and a thing that can be observed while it's happening. (I made a water monkey farm and separated the bigger ones, then again and again.and again until i had a tank with normal ones and another one where they were bigger from.birth)

I'm no expert either and Archaeopteryx would love that. But as far as I understand it if artificial selection is choosing the fastest and more aggressive to be better hunters ect then they are mimicking natural selection in some ways. The point is though if these dogs are left back in the wild they would revert back to their natural state anyway which was the most fittest and best way for them to survive. Even with natural selection it seems mutations cannot produce positive and beneficial improvements in an upward fashion towards a better and more complex one.

Thats what the test seem to show and any so called beneficial mutation such as bacteria evolving antibiotic resistance is a use of existing genetics and still has a cost in the long run. It is normally a loss of a function so that the bacteria can do something different than it did before and the consequences that come with that change mostly have a cost to the fittest of the animal. But also tests show that even when they try to gain new abilities that were not there before it is impossible. A simple change in proteins to gain a new function would require 6 or more mutations. For 6 or more mutations to happen it would take more than the history of planet earth existing.

 

[masterp48hd]

I'm no expert either and Archaeopteryx would love that. But as far as I understand it if artificial selection is choosing the fastest and more aggressive to be better hunters ect then they are mimicking natural selection in some ways. The point is though if these dogs are left back in the wild they would revert back to their natural state anyway which was the most fittest and best way for them to survive. Even with natural selection it seems mutations cannot produce positive and beneficial improvements in an upward fashion towards a better and more complex one.

Thats what the test seem to show and any so called beneficial mutation such as bacteria evolving antibiotic resistance is a use of existing genetics and still has a cost in the long run. It is normally a loss of a function so that the bacteria can do something different than it did before and the consequences that come with that change mostly have a cost to the fittest of the animal. But also tests show that even when they try to gain new abilities that were not there before it is impossible. A simple change in proteins to gain a new function would require 6 or more mutations. For 6 or more mutations to happen it would take more than the history of planet earth existing.

They would revert to a.point, but when they are fully evolved into.another.species (for instance a pug or Rottweiler or.pitbull whatever) they won't become wolves, i mean they would porbably die anyways because we.artificially chose those.who were more dossile and friendly to humans so they were made dependant to humans, they wpuld.most certainly die in.the wilderness. Artificial selection will always select.the most useful for the one who selects them, because the fittest to sustain wolve's habitats will always be wolves. And animals don't evolve if It's not necessary, if the climate or the predators or s9me factor changes the species will remain at a stable evolution level

 

[stevevw]

I addressed your comments, noting that most of the research you linked to didn't appear to be relevant. Moreover, as with steve, your interpretation of the findings appears to be somewhat at odds with the authors, so there's that. You are quickly on your way to mastering the gish gallop, however.

Like I said anyone who disagrees with you say doesn't understand evolution. So the list grows longer and now its me, Dr Carson, any biologist, geneticist or scientists connected with religion and now pshun2404. And what is the evidence for this, your say so. When you say all the evidence that pshun2404 posted appears not to be relevant what do you mean by appears. That seems to sound like a superficial statemnet that is not based on any investigation of the evidence. Why dont you check out the evidence posted and then come back with some rebuttal and show how it is wrong.

 

[GrowingSmaller]

So, life is a complex system.

For example, remove the drive belt from a car and it will break down. Remove the heart from the human body and it will break down.

Even though the body has (most probably) evolved, maybe we can be forgiven for suspicion of irreducible complexity. Not because its true the the body actually is irreducubly complex, but because the precise history of our evolution, including gene switches and what not, is far from intuitively obvious.

In fact it more *obvious* that we popped out of nothing, isnt it, than many other so called intuitions we hold as reasonable and dear?

 

[KCfromNC]

Wow and one of them was a creationists journal, how awful.

It shows that the claim that all of the sources non-creationist was false. Either the poster was unaware of the content of his alleged sources or being less than honest. Either way, if he can't get a simple claim correct we should be be a good bit more skeptical about the more extreme ones - such as implications that scientists have disproven evolution.

What about the rest.

They were mostly uninteresting quote-mining cribbed from creationist propaganda sites. Thanks for asking, though.

Some of the best experts have connections to religion ie Max Planck, Albert Einstein, Kenneth R Miller to name a few.

Are you willing to convert to Einstein's view of god because of his accomplishments as a scientist? If not, why expect than anyone else would care?

 

[KCfromNC]

KCofNC...I have answered so many of Arche's "simple questions" and it is a waste of time. The man simply answers "I do not understand" or to him "That makes no sense"....there seems to be an inability for the person to reason for his self, to think outside the box...anyone (even non-creationists) who have an insight from their own field of study if it disagrees with the indoctrinated mantra is automatically rejected void of consideration and declared to be "un-knowledgeable", "too old", "quote mined" and more, regardless of the fact that they are mostly Ph.D's in their fields (convenient blow offs)...and then there is the famous "that work is too old" and not "from a current" journal or study. and then not an "Evolutionary Biology Journal" so the sources of insight is purposely shrunk down further and further until all one is left with that he will accept are only current (and that is used only as convenient to his points) EBs who agree with his perspective (thus a stacked deck...a typical approach used by propagandists of all sorts). So there is NO reasoning, no original or new insight allowed, no creative or objective thought considered. Its sad really.

I believe in evolution but definitely know there is no evidence for abiogenesis OR cross genus or phyletic morphism....there is much evidence for information preceding aggregation (laws and guiding principles in nature that govern the formation of complex systems which YOU keep claiming IS there, and I agree). Things do not become complex forms by random coincidence or by many repeated mutations upon mutation...Proteins for example fold particular ways because they are following instructions to do so (that's my point exactly) not because nature did so by accident and it was successful because it worked so it stayed.

I believe in Natural Selection, AND that that was how it was meant to be, not that it just happened (by chance) to be that way...but I do not believe in the pseudo-lamarkian "giraffes got longer necks after 1000s of generation of reaching for the highest leaves" or "finches beaks got longer so they could get to the available food". There were many varieties of finches present (about 15 just on the Darwin's Islands...and they are not even actual finches but passerines of the Tanager family) and those that could get to the food on a given island survived, those that could not either died off or flew to other nearby islands where food they could get to was available. Then they mated reinforcing the varieties in their respective places.

And yes I believe there is intelligence behind much of what we see especially regarding living systems. I believe the evidence points to that as well. I believe "natural" means are because this is the process used to accomplish these goals. And I believe that plan and purpose are demonstrated in forms and functions. The forms and functions follow plan and purpose in their becoming. Not only originally but now. So if you or Arche want to go back and review many of the arguments I have given I am telling you they are invitations to think for yourself and consider the logic.

For one already given example, there are NO functional Proteins outside of living systems and no system can be a living system without functional Proteins being present. Therefore one did not precede the other while the other was evolving...they both came to be, simultaneously! Show me one example of DNA existing independent of a cell and thus making or becoming a living cell? Or show us a cell with no DNA suddenly or over time evolving it? And if so where did the functional Proteins the cell depended on for its existence come from in the first place when there was no transcription/translation taking place?

Now see, that is perfectly logical, and it generates a legitimate scientific question that EBs should consider, but the response from Arche would be "I do not understand your point" (DUH!) or "that makes no sense" (because it shakes up the accepted indoctrination), or "what are you trying to say (which already has been said but his indoctrinated logic loops will not allow such consideration to process...indoctrination always has these loops to guard against anything penetrating) or he would demand where have a whole slew of "current" "EB" scientists in "Current EB supportive Journals only" expressed the same thing (no room for original thought or insight allowed)? Don't forget I was you guys for about 30 years...thinking outside the box I was convinced of was not easy it took a decade...

You could have just written "I don't have answers to any of the points you raised" and saved yourself a lot of time.

 

[Archaeopteryx]

No thats what you are implying and there's no evidence for this but your opinion and those of a biased atheist site.

I've already addressed the "biased" atheist site point several times. Not doing it again. Go back, re-read.

Everyone else doesn't see it that way and just sees it as a response to a person who was being a bully. Implying he is connected to a monkey rather than an ape is what makes the joke. Monkeys have always been used as the butt for jokes not apes. He used the monkey on purpose to make it a joke because the monkey is the one that is seen as being silly or funny not the ape. You have injected more into it and are implying that he is being serious about where we come from.

Oh steve. Look how much how you have to read into Carson's "joke" to rescue it. The joke is funny to creationists because many (perhaps most) creationists think that evolution posits that human beings descended from monkeys. That's the context in which the joke makes sense; that's why they found it funny. He didn't just call his opponent a monkey; he attributed a belief to his opponent: "I believe I came from God, and you believe you came from a monkey. And you’ve convinced me you’re right."

In any case, as I noted in my previous comment, that was not the only evidence I presented that cast doubt on Carson's understanding of evolution. In your previous post, you tried to misrepresent the entire discussion by pinning my case all on the "joke," even though I presented the "joke" comparatively late in the discussion (on p. 33).

Surely you dont think that an intelligent scientist like Dr Carson who understands the more complex aspects of evolution like biology and genetics doesn't know one of the most basic tenets of evolution.

I've already addressed this. Go back, re-read.

Most people know what evolution claims that our ancestors are apes such as Lucy and not monkeys like Tarzan's off sider cheetah. It is well known to everyone about the long list of apes evolution from the skulls they display that are all ape type creatures.

And yet one of the most prevalent misconceptions about hominid evolution is that it entails that human beings descended from monkeys.

 

[Archaeopteryx]

Like I said anyone who disagrees with you say doesn't understand evolution. So the list grows longer and now its me, Dr Carson, any biologist, geneticist or scientists connected with religion and now pshun2404.

Could you stop misrepresenting my position?

And what is the evidence for this, your say so.

This thread and others are replete with evidence of your misunderstandings. It's not my say so. It's your posts.

When you say all the evidence that pshun2404 posted appears not to be relevant what do you mean by appears.That seems to sound like a superficial statemnet that is not based on any investigation of the evidence.

I don't know what point pshun2404 thinks he is making or how the links he posted support that point. As I noted before, much of the text appears to be amalgamated from creationist websites that quote selectively from the articles in question.

Why dont you check out the evidence posted and then come back with some rebuttal and show how it is wrong.

Rebuttal to what? What am I rebutting? I don't even know what point he is trying to make.

 

[pshun2404]

You could have just written "I don't have answers to any of the points you raised" and saved yourself a lot of time.

No I didn't. Why would you lie like that? Very unbecoming I must say....