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Edx · Jun 14, 2005

razzelflabben said:
Aboslutely, when I talk to people about evolution/creation/origins, I have yet to meet anyone who does not evolution. So I don't always specify as such, it is commonly understood. That has never been a problem in this discussion as least from my side, in that I assume you to have intellignet on the topic.

Then why didnt you just state that ?

No matter, at least I dont have to address this again.

I was told when I started this thread that was nonscence, that scientific words had exact meaning, now here we are looking at scientific definitions that have migrating meanings and you still haven't appologized for assuming that communication was not necessary.

No they dont have migrating meanings. You just cant seem to understand how it is used.

It is important in a debate of evolution and creation to specify if one is talking about the process, common ancestry, speciation, etc. If the terms cannot specify, then when asked directly, it is important to clarify rather then allow the terms to have no meaning as you are doing here.

The theory of evolution encompass all of that, including the biological process. That is why people refer to "Evolution" for short. You can see by the context what they are talking about, and if it isnt at once obvious it isnt very difficult to find out.

The toe is broader by nature than evolution and includes but is not limited to common ancestry, that being the broad understanding of said

Not really. "Evolution" in this context would be the biological process, not the theory as a whole. Commen ancestry is not a biological process, its a conclusion based on all the evidence. That is why its in the theory of evolution. Also natural selection is the name given to the biological process of evolution, but it is also a theory.
See?

. For this reason, when we look at the definitions you gave, we can for communicate reasons, assume that evolution includes but is not limited to speciation while the toe includes but is not limited to common ancestry.

Speciation is a consequence of the process. Common ancestry is a conclusion.

The same is true of common ancestry. Because the discussion is focused on evolution/creation, and a word exists for speciation, then when talking about small scale ancesters, we may use the word speciation whereas when we are talking about a broader view and understanding of common ancestry, that being man-apes, etc., we can then safely use the word common ancestry without fear of being misunderstood.

No its the same thing in reality. Everyone has a commen ancestor, but you are talking about the scale here. See while common ancestry is generally refering to things on a longer time scale, this is true, if you mount up all the small incremental steps you are going to get, "common ancestry" on a longer time scale.

So it doesnt really mean anything when "commen ancestry" is used in this way. As much the way Creationists use the term "macro evolution" is totally wrong, even that term is more meaningfull than using commen ancestry" like this .

That is why I asked you to clarify. If I accept all three definitions when you are talking about evolution, then the word has no meaning in discussion because you can change it's meaning anytime you want.

Not at the same time!

Like I said you must look at the context. Do you need some more examples?

I know you understand this concept, don't try to deny it in yourself while forcing others into it because you don't agree or like what they are saying. Be consistant, put some actual meaning to the words you use.

I am being consistant you just need to understand how it works. You havent shown you have, so thats why you dont think its consistant. That, and I also believe you are being pedantic on purpose.

Then, I must disagree with you. The biological process of evolution is fundamental to our understanding of modern biology, however, the toe, as defined above is not, it is only a theory and has little to do with modern biology

You didnt really just say that did you? I will have to get back to basics...

Is aerodynamics only a theory? Is gravity only a theory? Is germ theory only a theory? Is atomic theory only a theory? Etc...

Now, back to what you said. It has everything to do with modern biology. See the last time I told you that, and where you disregarded the link becasue it said "evolution" and you needed clarification. Now considering I told you they were refering to the fact and theory of biological evolution and everything therein you can now address it properly, cant you?
[page 38, post 397]

Now a moment ago, you were saying there is no difference, now you understand the idea that evolution is referring to the biological say there is, which is it? No wonder I don't yet know what your answer to the question is! Are they the same or are they different in meaning and if they are different, which is the foundations of modern biology?

There is a difference depending on what you are talking about. Evolution theory contains everything, the "fact and theory of biological evolution and everything therein". If you are talking specifically about a biological process then you probably arent talking about commen ancestry.

Its like kind of like saying biology is science, but not all science is biology. See?

addressed this in another post today.

"Actually the only single parent population specified is man, at least until we get to the flood which is a different story. In fact, the word abundantly is used which would suggest that many of a given creature were created at the same time...."

This doesnt address what I wrote. Im saying they posit a barrier where an organism can evolve no more out of their (undefined) "kind". The above doesnt stop that from being an issue.

addressed in earlier post today.

Where? Couldnt find this one.

see here we're back to no difference. Which is it, a difference, or no difference?

BOTH. Since i am refering to the theory of Evolution, I am also talking about the biological process.

So in the context, are you defining evolution as biological evolution or as the toe?

Depends on the context. Ive already shown you various examples. I will try to be more specific in future, but this is how everyone else uses the word.

Say what, I accept your comment as a compliment and that means that I am admitting that I am being deliberately difficult? How do you do that? How do you get that from my accepting your comment as a compliment? Boy, I must really be hard headed. .

-snip-
It didnt mean what you seem to think it meant

Preceeding the part of my post you were "complimented" on, something which you apparently didnt read, I wrote:

"Well I said you were doing it on purpose, actually. You ignored my answers when I answered your question as to the difference between evolution and the theory of evolution, claiming I never gave you any answer at all and that I "refused". In the post you were replying to here, I had simply rearranged my last reply you claimed I never answered."

I then concluded that with:

"I dont consider this conduct of yours to be "slow", because that supposes you are too stupid to understand the basics of reading comprehension. I dont think thats you. I think you know exactly what you're doing"

razzelflabben · Jun 15, 2005

gluadys said:
Logically derived from the evidence.

Do at least attempt to be real here. Logic=
the branch of philosophy that analyzes inference
reasoned and reasonable judgment; "it made a certain kind of logic"
the principles that guide reasoning within a given field or situation; "economic logic requires it"; "by the logic of war"
<LI>a system of reasoning
now do you see that logic is not an "absolute science" it of objective and therefore, is not an absolute. So to claim that it is the logic conclusion, means that it is an absolute for you not necessarily for everyone. Which in turn means that the claim that large scale common ancestry is the logical conclusion, requires an authority who determines what is logical. (logical to science, logical to philosophy, etc.) But we all know that evolutionists can't accept an authority on the issue, remember the pages and pages of nonsense about that, so if we can't agree on an authority, then we can't accept something as being logical because quite frankly, logic is a shifting meaning based on what we deem logical. So what you have really been saying all along is that what you deem logical is the logical conclusion because you refuse to accept an authority that would define logic in terms of scientific observations. And see, all along I was trying to help you make your case but you choose to label me a creationist because I didnt parrot your arguements back to you. Interesting, very interesting.

I take it you have not heard of ERVs.

Been there, done that, still waiting for evidence, not your comment below that evidence is observation. That means that speculations, assumptions, and logic are not part of evidence. Please keep that in mind as we proceed.

We have observed speciation. We have even produced speciation in the laboratory. This is fact, not assumption.

Cool, you have said what I did and managed to make it sound unique to the post. What talent!

No, we have not directly observed the chimpanzee/human speciation, because it took place about 5-7 million years ago. But we have ample evidence that it did happen and that it happened in that time frame.

Ah, but the claim has been made repeatedly that we have and when clarity is asked for a slew of insults and accusations arise. So then we are to assume that previous claims to evidence for common ancestry (large scale) are exaggerated and we have no such evidence? Cool, now we are getting somewhere.

The common ancestry of chimpanzees and humans is a logical fact given the evidence and should be taught as such. Obviously the common ancestry of species, where speciation has been directly observed ought to be taught as fact. Other facets of common ancestry should be taught in accordance with the evidence available.

But see, you refuse to accept an authority that would allow you to make this claim. If the logical conclusion is scientific, then you must accept science as the authority by which we are determining. It is really to simple for a discussion like this but since the people here don't seem to be able to grasp the simple, we can go over it again if you like.
The problem is, that common ancestry (large scale) is being taught as fact and by your own admission, it is not fact. So I wonder if your claim is that speciation should be taught as fact but other facets of common ancestry should be taught in accordance with the evidence (observations) available that you support the way the toe is being taught, instead of joining in the fight to correct faulty teaching? I wonder why you don't just admit that we have no observations of common ancestry (large scale)? I wonder why you don't accept that you believe the toe including common ancestry (large scale) rather than know it to be fact? Hummm, those would prove to be some interesting answers.

Common ancestry, by and large, is not an assumption. It is a conclusion from the evidence.

speciation or common ancestry?

A further indication that you have:
1. not looked at the evidence and/or
2. dont understand the evidence because you dont understand the theory of evolution.

Evidence IS observation. It never relies on anything else.

Oh boy, you are so far off it is laughable, if evidence is observation and you admit that we have not nor can observe common ancestry (large scale) and common ancestry is the most common point of disagreement, then you are also admitting that we have no evidence for common ancestry, thus the toe. But I'm the one who doesn't know the evidence, yeah sure, you are trapping yourself in your own idealizm and the sad thing is that you don't even know it. It is at least fun to talk with people who assume to not have all the answers rather than those who do.

Yes, common ancestry would not exist without speciation. And speciation has been directly observed in a number of cases. In others it can be inferred from the evidence.

But remember by your own admission, evidence is not inferred, therefore only speciation is observed. Go figure....

1. the horse is not a descendant of the zebra or vice versa. They are both species derived from a common ancestor.
. humans are not descended from apes. Humans are apes. Modern humans are all one species. Ape is not a species; it is a group to which many species belong. (the official taxonomic term for this group is a family.) All apes, including humans, are derived from a common ancestor who lived IIRC about 10-15 million years ago. With the currently existing members of the ape family, humans are most closely related to chimpanzees. Humans and chimpanzees are both related to a common ancestor which lived about 5 million years ago. If we take extinct members of the human family into account, we are most closely related to H. neanderthalensis as both species were derived from H. erectus though at different times. (Neanderthals would be like much older cousins to us.) Our own species appeared around 160,000 years ago.

Note that the closer the relationship, the more recent the common ancestor.

2. I agree, there is lack of communication. So discussions which spread knowledge are a good idea.

3. The biggest lie being told is that there is no evidence for evolution, particularly common ancestry and transitional fossils.

Well, I haven't heard this claim, so maybe you should define what you mean when using the word evolution here in this statement, the same would be helpful for your meaning of common ancestry. See, the way evolutionists use these words removes all meaning so specify for us what you are meaning to say here so we can either agree or disagree.

Darwin specified that he was speaking of the origin of species. His theory does not cover how life started. That is the problem with your definition of origins. It includes two different things: how life got started (abiogenesis) and how species developed (evolution). These are two different processes and cannot be welded together into a common concept of origins.

You don't like my definition, fine, let's look it up Origins-
beginning: the place where something begins, where it springs into being; "the Italian beginning of the Renaissance"; "Jupiter was the origin of the radiation"; "Pittsburgh is the source of the Ohio River"; "communism's Russian root"
an event that is a beginning; a first part or stage of subsequent events
lineage: the descendants of one individual; "his entire lineage has been warriors"
Note that none of the three applicatable definitions limits origins to the one thing, for example, the first definition can include the beginnings of a species. The second again we see stages or segments of understanding, not limited to "creation". The third uses the word event. So when we are talking about the origins of life, it is reasonable to assume that origins means not only how life originates, but also how present day organisms came to being. Which is the definition I gave. Wonder why you don't get ths yet, one of those hard concepts again I suppose. To simplistic for such a great mind as yours?

I am saying that your answer doesnt relate to what I was talking about. I was talking about origin of life and your response a was all about common descent. This is how we get into problems using a vague term like origins to cover unrelated ideas.

Oh, I'm sorry, our origins which includes origins of the species, is not relavent to our discussion because....

I didnt say single parent; I said single ancestral kind. A kind does not necessarily consist of only one specimen (though I have seen creationists who think it does.)

and your point is.....doesn't change what I said one iota to clarify what was said.

Yes, I agree. But all of these were, according to most creationists, all the same species. So the horse kind was not what we now call a horse, but a common ancestor of horses, donkeys, zebras and the now-extinct quagga.

I dont know of any biological meaning of evolution which would exclude natural selection or common ancestry.

ed was kind enough to present two, read his post.

ROLFL, you now owe me a new irony meter. You just broke mine to smithereens.

whatever, the meaning of the words I have been consistant and backed up by dictionary definitions when applicatable if that makes them shifting and meaningless, I would think you would want to take it up with the dictionary companies, but okay, maybe I am more talented than I thought I was. Coool!

Well it has been observed in some cases, and evidence of common ancestry has been observed in many more cases.

Okay, be clear, what definition are you going with for common ancestry here.

Yes it annoys me when you do not respond to the questions I asked.

So lets try again.
Would you deny that a horse and a zebra have a common ancestor? Yes or no?

I personally don't know, that is a question for science and science has not observed such therefore has no evidence of such to present.

Would you deny that a human and a chimpanzee have a common ancestor?...Yes or no?

I personally don't know, that is a question for science and science has not observed such therefore has no evidence of such to present.

We can discuss why you said yes or no later.

We can also wait until you have answered these to consider a universal common ancestor.

Oh, that's right, we can't discuss it because I didn't give you a yes or no answer so you don't know what pat answer to give. I keep forgetting that indoctrinated thing that you rely on where only the standard answers and questions exist and none others. Opps, I do really have to keep that in mind in the future.

So you are ok with the common ancestor of two species (like zebra-horse) but not with common ancestry where is involves a series of many speciations (human-chimpanzee). Is that right?

Did I say that? Where did I say that? What I said is that I don't know. Speciation does occur, we observe that, but that is beyond the observation of zebra and horse, much less human and chimpanzees. So what fact/truth does science tell us about this question, hummm, nothing, Go figure, that is the only claim I have ever made and now, you make the same claim. Bully, you finally got it.

It is also kind of silly. It is like saying you agree people (or species) have parents, but denying that they have great-grandparents.

What are you going on about? None of this makes a bit of sense, you are not being to kind to yourself to resort to this type of nonsense dribble. Please do try to make it relavent to what I have said and not to what you think you want me to say.

It has been read. It has been understood. And it has been correctly judged as vague and unclear. Repeating over and over that origins is how life started and came to it's present forms doesnt clarify things, because this definition is vague and unclear in itself. So if you expect people to understand, you need to develop a new definitionor better yet several definitions so people know what aspect of origins you are talking about. Or you could simply add a word to your vocabulary: abiogenesis.

This from people who do not diferentiate between common ancestry and speciation or evolution and the toe, something like the pot calling the kettle black isn't it. The definition is clear, just not suited to your arguement. Deal with it.

Abiogenesis means origin of life from non-living matter.
Evolution means genetic and phenotypic changes in species leading to speciation.

Or do you have a problem with learning new vocabulary?

But you see, origins incompasses both, that is why it is the word of choice. Please do try to keep up.

I am not a scientist either, but I take time to learn and understand the vocabulary scientists use. I trust I am not making things sound scientific, but simply using scientific terms correctly. It is not all that hard to translate what you understand into scientific terms as long as your understanding is based on science.

You are not a scientist but you play one on the forum. Here's the problem with your assumption, I am not good at names and dates, so when I am learning a new language, it doesn't mean that I don't understand it when I insert a word incorrectly. That is why I assume that I don't have to provide a grand appology for every misstated word. Of course I am wrong about that because there is not oppertunity for practise and learning, only for being proficient. So, that leaves me an imbasile because I am learning where to insert what words and we move on. That's cool, I don't care what you label someone who is learning and practising, as long as they are sincerely and pationately learning and practising and so, I'm an imbasile and we move on.

It would save us all a lot of trouble if you would start using the scientific terminology you have been introduced to. Origins, as you use it, is not scientific terminology and cannot be translated into scientific terminology because it is too broad and vague.

see above.

razzelflabben · Jun 15, 2005

Edx said:
No they dont have migrating meanings. You just cant seem to understand how it is used.

Don't be too sure about that. You gave 3 different acceptable meanings for the word evolution and you can pick and choose from that list at will, that dear one is shifting definitions and is in blantant defiance of effective communication. Pick a definition and stick with it.

The theory of evolution encompass all of that, including the biological process. That is why people refer to "Evolution" for short. You can see by the context what they are talking about, and if it isnt at once obvious it isnt very difficult to find out.

and yet in one place you said evolution is... and in another you said the....is the theory of evolution. So either you see a difference but refuse to accept one or your don't see a difference even when the definition stares you in the face. Now I know all too well that the words can be used interchangably, but the question I asked was which you were asserting, and not whether or not many people use them interchangably. But, I guess I don't really need an answer to that question, because I simply can't understand that they are often used interchangably, I wonder why you didn't show us all the possible ways the term theory of evolution could be used. Humm?

Not really. "Evolution" in this context would be the biological process, not the theory as a whole. Commen ancestry is not a biological process, its a conclusion based on all the evidence. That is why its in the theory of evolution. Also natural selection is the name given to the biological process of evolution, but it is also a theory.
See?

exactly but that does not answer the question now does it? It does assume that I don't understand what I have been trying to tell you but that is your tactic isn't it, to avoid dealing with the real issue in exchange for assuming that the other person doesn't understand makes it easier for you huh?

No its the same thing in reality. Everyone has a commen ancestor, but you are talking about the scale here. See while common ancestry is generally refering to things on a longer time scale, this is true, if you mount up all the small incremental steps you are going to get, "common ancestry" on a longer time scale.

So it doesnt really mean anything when "commen ancestry" is used in this way. As much the way Creationists use the term "macro evolution" is totally wrong, even that term is more meaningfull than using commen ancestry" like this .

Ah back to changing the meaning again. I distinguish between speciation and common ancestry because the terms are there to distinguish between the two for me. Therefore common ancestry (large scale) is according to glaudy's (on the other thread) not evidenced. I wonder why evolutionists can't even seem to agree on what is evidenced and what is not.

Is aerodynamics only a theory? Is gravity only a theory? Is germ theory only a theory? Is atomic theory only a theory? Etc...

Last time I checked, they were still theories, and your point is.......

Now, back to what you said. It has everything to do with modern biology. See the last time I told you that, and where you disregarded the link becasue it said "evolution" and you needed clarification. Now considering I told you they were refering to the fact and theory of biological evolution and everything therein you can now address it properly, cant you?
[page 38, post 397]

There is a difference depending on what you are talking about. Evolution theory contains everything, the "fact and theory of biological evolution and everything therein". If you are talking specifically about a biological process then you probably arent talking about commen ancestry.

Which when coupled with your contridictory quotes is why I asked you for clarity. Go figure, something you said wasn't clear and you were ask to clarify it on a thread that is suppose to be about communication. What is this world coming to!

Its like kind of like saying biology is science, but not all science is biology. See?

"Actually the only single parent population specified is man, at least until we get to the flood which is a different story. In fact, the word abundantly is used which would suggest that many of a given creature were created at the same time...."

This doesnt address what I wrote. Im saying they posit a barrier where an organism can evolve no more out of their (undefined) "kind". The above doesnt stop that from being an issue.

and your point is.......

BOTH. Since i am refering to the theory of Evolution, I am also talking about the biological process.

So your claim then is that the thoery of evolution is the foundation of modern biology. Thanks, I will respectfully disagree.

Depends on the context. Ive already shown you various examples. I will try to be more specific in future, but this is how everyone else uses the word.

-snip-
It didnt mean what you seem to think it meant

Preceeding the part of my post you were "complimented" on, something which you apparently didnt read, I wrote:

"Well I said you were doing it on purpose, actually. You ignored my answers when I answered your question as to the difference between evolution and the theory of evolution, claiming I never gave you any answer at all and that I "refused". In the post you were replying to here, I had simply rearranged my last reply you claimed I never answered."

I then concluded that with:

"I dont consider this conduct of yours to be "slow", because that supposes you are too stupid to understand the basics of reading comprehension. I dont think thats you. I think you know exactly what you're doing"

I know what you meant, but I chose to accept it as a compliment in that it is the first time I have ever heard an evolutionist formally give a "creationist" (since that is what you think I sound like, not because I am one) a kind word, even if it was intended to be otherwise. Thanks again, I will charish it since they don't happen very often.

gluadys · Jun 15, 2005

razzelflabben said:
Do at least attempt to be real here. Logic=
the branch of philosophy that analyzes inference
reasoned and reasonable judgment; "it made a certain kind of logic"
the principles that guide reasoning within a given field or situation; "economic logic requires it"; "by the logic of war"
<LI>a system of reasoning
now do you see that logic is not an "absolute science" it of objective and therefore, is not an absolute. So to claim that it is the logic conclusion, means that it is an absolute for you not necessarily for everyone. Which in turn means that the claim that large scale common ancestry is the logical conclusion, requires an authority who determines what is logical. (logical to science, logical to philosophy, etc.)

Thought you knew more of philosophy than that. Logic is not decided by an authority. It is decided by the rules of logic. The rules of logic do not change from one discipline to another. They are the same in science as in philosophy as in criminology as in mathematics as in cryptology. They are designed to avoid fallacious reasoning and have nothing to do with absolutes.

Been there, done that, still waiting for evidence, not your comment below that evidence is observation. That means that speculations, assumptions, and logic are not part of evidence. Please keep that in mind as we proceed.

So you have heard of ERVS but you dont understand them. Fair enough.
It is quite correct that speculation and assumption and logic are not part of evidence. But logic is important for understanding evidence. It is the application of logic to evidence that results in hypotheses which eventually become theories. It is also the application of logic to hypotheses that derives testable predictions from them.

Ah, but the claim has been made repeatedly that we have and when clarity is asked for a slew of insults and accusations arise. So then we are to assume that previous claims to evidence for common ancestry (large scale) are exaggerated and we have no such evidence? Cool, now we are getting somewhere.

The claim has been made and substantiated that we have observed speciation. You were given numerous examples in the Challenging Evolution thread. All direct observations of speciation are of relatively short-lived species such as bacteria, insects, mice and salmon.
I dont know that anyone has ever claimed we directly observed the speciation of humans and chimpanzees (that would be rather like observing the birth of your great-grandmother). However, we have observed the evidence of the human/chimp speciation. (Just as one may observe a birth certificate for your great-grandmother). No, the claims of evidence for common ancestry(large-scale) are not exaggerated at all.

But see, you refuse to accept an authority that would allow you to make this claim. If the logical conclusion is scientific, then you must accept science as the authority by which we are determining.

No, I dont need to accept science as an authority. I need to see that the logic is sound. See above.

The problem is, that common ancestry (large scale) is being taught as fact

Because it is.

So I wonder if your claim is that speciation should be taught as fact but other facets of common ancestry should be taught in accordance with the evidence (observations) available that you support the way the toe is being taught, instead of joining in the fight to correct faulty teaching?

If we teach according to the evidence we have to teach that common ancestry is fact.

I wonder why you don't just admit that we have no observations of common ancestry (large scale)? I wonder why you don't accept that you believe the toe including common ancestry (large scale) rather than know it to be fact? Hummm, those would prove to be some interesting answers.

But we do have observations of evidence for which the only logical conclusion is common ancestry.

speciation or common ancestry?

Common ancestry. Of course, speciation is evidence of common ancestry, because once speciation occurs you have a common ancestor. Just as once you give birth to a child you are a parent.

Oh boy, you are so far off it is laughable, if evidence is observation and you admit that we have not nor can observe common ancestry (large scale) and common ancestry is the most common point of disagreement, then you are also admitting that we have no evidence for common ancestry, thus the toe.

My bad. I should have said evidence is what we observe. Sometimes we have direct observation of a process like speciation. Other times we have observed evidence from which we conclude speciation. Either way it is evidence.

It is just the same as with a crime. Sometimes it happens that an eyewitness has directly observed an arsonist setting a fire. That is like the direct observation of speciation in real time. On other occasions there is no eyewitness who saw the fire being set, but there is still evidence (such as fire-starting material) that indicates the fire was set deliberately and was not an accident. Similarly we have evidence of speciation that we have not directly observed. And this evidence is just as valid as the fire marshals evidence of arson.

But remember by your own admission, evidence is not inferred,

Right, evidence is observed, not inferred.

therefore only speciation is observed.

No. Evidence is observed. Speciation is inferred from the evidence.

Well, I haven't heard this claim, so maybe you should define what you mean when using the word evolution here in this statement, the same would be helpful for your meaning of common ancestry. See, the way evolutionists use these words removes all meaning so specify for us what you are meaning to say here so we can either agree or disagree.

This was a response to a large paragraph. To which part of it are you referring?

beginning: the place where something begins, where it springs into being; "the Italian beginning of the Renaissance"; "Jupiter was the origin of the radiation"; "Pittsburgh is the source of the Ohio River"; "communism's Russian root"
an event that is a beginning; a first part or stage of subsequent events

Yes, this all makes sense. These are all about origins, not about subsequent development. To say the Renaissance originated in Italy tells us nothing of how it evolved in France. To say the radiation originated in Jupiter tells us nothing of its character when it arrived on Saturn. To say Pittsburgh is the source of the Ohio river tells us nothing about its trek to the Mississippi. So all of these focus on how things came to be, not on how they developed after they came to be.

lineage: the descendants of one individual; "his entire lineage has been warriors"

Not origins and not development either.

So when we are talking about the origins of life, it is reasonable to assume that origins means not only how life originates, but also how present day organisms came to being.

We can speak of origins of life or we can speak of origin of species. But we should not confuse one with the other. They are as different as the origin of the radiation on Jupiter and the origin of the Ohio river.

Which is the definition I gave. Wonder why you don't get ths yet, one of those hard concepts again I suppose. To simplistic for such a great mind as yours?

It is not a hard concept. It is a confusing concept because you are trying to deal with two different types of origin in one definition. Better to have a separate definition for each---like abiogenesis (origin of life) and speciation (origin of species).

Oh, I'm sorry, our origins which includes origins of the species, is not relavent to our discussion because....

Because origin of species is not relevant to a discussion on the origin of life, and vice versa.

and your point is.....doesn't change what I said one iota to clarify what was said.

My point is that you changed the meaning of what I said, so it did not clarify, it confused.

whatever, the meaning of the words I have been consistant

Now you owe me two irony meters.

Okay, be clear, what definition are you going with for common ancestry here.

A common ancestor is a species which is ancestral to two or more other species. Common ancestry occurs at every level of phylogeny from species to family to order to phylum and even to kingdoms.

I personally don't know, that is a question for science and science has not observed such therefore has no evidence of such to present.

Yes, it is a question for science and science has observed the evidence which indicates that horses and zebras have a very recent common ancestor. Part of that evidence is that the two species can sometimes produce a hybrid (a zorse). It is generally considered that when members of two species can mate and produce offspring (though the offspring is often sterile) that they are closely related.

In fact, most (perhaps all) creationists agree with the common ancestry of the horse and the zebra.

Do you consider it questionable?

I personally don't know, that is a question for science and science has not observed such therefore has no evidence of such to present.

Except for hybridization (which we would not expect since humans and chimpanzees have been separated for much longer than the horse and zebra) we have just as much evidence confirming the relationship of humans and chimpanzees to a common ancestor as we do of the common ancestry of the horse and zebra. One such piece of evidence are those ERVS which have no other logical reason for being other than common ancestry.

Did I say that? Where did I say that? What I said is that I don't know. Speciation does occur, we observe that, but that is beyond the observation of zebra and horse, much less human and chimpanzees..

Sorry, I did make one of those bad assumptions again. What you said was:

When I talk about common ancestry being taught as fact, I am talking about large scale common ancestry, that being man-ape etc.

Since the horse-zebra speciation is small scale, and accepted by creationists who oppose large-scale evolution, I assumed you also accepted it. I stand corrected.

So what fact/truth does science tell us about this question

Science has lots of observations and evidence on speciation and common ancestry. I am sure you have already been referred many times to talkorigins article 29 Evidences for macro-evolution.

What are you going on about? None of this makes a bit of sense, you are not being to kind to yourself to resort to this type of nonsense dribble. Please do try to make it relavent to what I have said and not to what you think you want me to say.

Hey! You agree with me. It is indeed nonsense to say people have parents but not great-great grandparents. It is just as silly to say that speciation can only result in parent species and never great-great grandparent species. Glad you see how silly that is.

The definition is clear, just not suited to your arguement. Deal with it.

No, it is too vague to be of any use.

But you see, origins incompasses both,

Just as it encompasses both the origin of the Renaissance in Italy and the origin of the Ohio River in Pittsburgh. However, that does not mean that the origin of the Renaissance is relevant to the origin of the Ohio. When talking about one, we are clearly not talking about the other. Same goes for origin of life and origin of species. It is important to be clear which origin is being discussed.

Please do try to keep up.

Sorry if my need for clarity is rather demanding on you. Chalk it up to my inadequacy in dealing with more than one topic at a time.

So, that leaves me an imbasile because I am learning where to insert what words and we move on. That's cool, I don't care what you label someone who is learning and practising, as long as they are sincerely and pationately learning and practising and so, I'm an imbasile and we move on.

Please dont put words in my mouth. When you label yourself, that is not me speaking that is you. I would love to see you practice using some of this new vocabulary, even if you occasionally use it incorrectly. Just as I encouraged by students to practice speaking French even if they sometimes stumbled.

Edx · Jun 15, 2005

razzelflabben said:
ed was kind enough to present two, read his post.

.

No, what I said was one was referring to the process. The other was referring to the theory as a whole. Natural Selection as a biological process is a fact but it is also a theory, while commen ancestry isnt a process its a conclusion.

Ed

razzelflabben · Jun 16, 2005

gluadys said:
Thought you knew more of philosophy than that. Logic is not decided by an authority. It is decided by the rules of logic. The rules of logic do not change from one discipline to another. They are the same in science as in philosophy as in criminology as in mathematics as in cryptology. They are designed to avoid fallacious reasoning and have nothing to do with absolutes.

Oh please do be serious, there are different ways to come to a logical conclusion. for example, If I use science as the method of determining what is logical, then my conclusion will be quite different than if I use religion as the mthod of determineing what is logical. Both bring us to a logical conclusion but both rely on different criteria for determining logic. That is why what is logical for one may not be logical for another. That is also why you were asked on the other thread to deal with the topic scientifically because we are choosing scientific method as the authority we reference when talking about origins (more on the definition for origins later). But since you refuse to accept an authority, then logic is whatever I want to make it, as long as I have a process that gets me there. See, you can't do that. Logic means nothing if you don't accept an authority as to how to get there. Take geometry, when dealling with proofs, there is a process that is accepted as right. I could use "logic" to get a different answer but it would be wrong because it is not the accepted process. Science works the same way, there is an accepted process for determining logical conclusions of the eivdence. but, if we don't accept that the scientific process is the right one, then we cannot accept what is logical because it may or may not be logical based on the process we use. So we must establish scientific process of elimination as the criteria for determining what the logical conclusion is in order to call it logical from a scientific standpoint. But if we never establish scientific methods as our authority by which to determine logic, then logic is meaningless, because there is no base process, rules, and what is logical to you may not be to me. That is why an authority must be determined and accepted, but you refuse and so therefore, we must discard any arguement that deals with logic because it has no base of understanding. (The problem here is that you accept an authority you just refuse to admit that you do, so now, it is time to decide, do you admit that you must accept an authority, or do we discard logical conclusion from the equasion, you can't have it both ways)

So you have heard of ERVS but you dont understand them. Fair enough.
It is quite correct that speculation and assumption and logic are not part of evidence. But logic is important for understanding evidence. It is the application of logic to evidence that results in hypotheses which eventually become theories. It is also the application of logic to hypotheses that derives testable predictions from them.

And it is these very assumptions and "logical conclusions" and are not equal to evidence. If you want to claim assumptions and "logical conclusions" as evidence of fact, that is up to you, but I personally think that we have seen tooo many times when assumptions and "logical conclusions" were in actuality false to use such as claims of fact.

The claim has been made and substantiated that we have observed speciation. You were given numerous examples in the Challenging Evolution thread. All direct observations of speciation are of relatively short-lived species such as bacteria, insects, mice and salmon.

See, here in is the problem, I have never once denied speciation, in fact, on many occasions I have said, speciation is observed and therefore fact, but still I get pages and pages of dialog trying to convince me that speciation is observed and therefore fact because I don't understand speciation. How does that work exactly? I always thought that if I was saying the same thing as someone else, that we agreed rather than disagreed, but when I come to the forum debates over evolution and creation, I find that the rules are different, and that agreeing with someone doesn't mean that you agree. What are these new rules please so that I can keep up and know what is being said? Thanks, I look forward to the list of new rules.

I dont know that anyone has ever claimed we directly observed the speciation of humans and chimpanzees (that would be rather like observing the birth of your great-grandmother). However, we have observed the evidence of the human/chimp speciation. (Just as one may observe a birth certificate for your great-grandmother). No, the claims of evidence for common ancestry(large-scale) are not exaggerated at all.

Exactly, which is where I take issue. In fact, it is the only actual claim I have made as to which theory is fact, that we have no direct observations that would settle the question with absolutes and not assumptions. To this I have been called a creationist, creationist sounding, not understanding of the evidence, not understanding of the theory, not listening, not willing to communicate, not speaking the truth, trying to be dfficult, and the list of accusations goes on and on and on, is it any wonder that people come here and feel that communication does not exist? Is it any wonder that people feel like the evolutionists here act like a pack of wolves going for a kill? Is it any wonder that the debate rages on? Is it any wonder that you sound like a bunch of endoctrinated boobs who do not understand any part of what you are saying? We have no direct observations of common ancestry (large scale) any claims otherwise are lies. We have direct observations of common ancestry (speciation) of which we infer, speculate, assume, logically conclude common ancestry (large scale). Now, the debate would then become about what is logical conclusion, assumptions, and speculations are good and what is bad, but that is a very different arguement than what you have been trying to create for me to talk about which is why I suspect that you are getting agitated, because my arguements don't fit the regular arguements and therefore you don't quite know what to think, the thought should have occured to you by now, that I might understand your claims, and simply want to challenge your idealism, but then again, that would be outside the endoctrination answers and would not be a permitted debate and therefore labeling me the enemy is much easier.

No, I dont need to accept science as an authority. I need to see that the logic is sound. See above.

See above, logical conclusions are reached in a variety of ways, not all relying on scientific methods.

If we teach according to the evidence we have to teach that common ancestry is fact.

define common ancestry, remember that none shifting definition you claim changes from speciation to large scale common ancestry and we can't know from this statement which of these none shifting definitions you mean. Thanks

But we do have observations of evidence for which the only logical conclusion is common ancestry.

There's that term logical again. If you have no established process of criteria for establishing logic, logic has no meaning and since you refuse to accept scientific method as your authority on determining logic, you have no arguement.

Common ancestry. Of course, speciation is evidence of common ancestry, because once speciation occurs you have a common ancestor. Just as once you give birth to a child you are a parent.

Again we shift that none shifting definition of common ancestry to get out of the arguement that you cannot win. Brovo, I am learning how to do it now, thanks for the lesson.

My bad. I should have said evidence is what we observe. Sometimes we have direct observation of a process like speciation. Other times we have observed evidence from which we conclude speciation. Either way it is evidence.

Another shifting definition, oh goody can't wait for another lesson. See the words conclude speciation, concluding is assumptions, speculations, theory, it is not observations/evidence for. These assumptions, logical conclusions, speculations, theory, can help us to find truth, but they are not truth/fact, they are assumptions, logical conclusions, speculations, theory and should be taught as such or not taught at all. Instead we teach them as fact then wonder why people who disagree witht he assumptions, logical conclusions, speculations and theories, have a problem. The problem is in how we are teaching, not in what science has discovered.

It is just the same as with a crime. Sometimes it happens that an eyewitness has directly observed an arsonist setting a fire. That is like the direct observation of speciation in real time. On other occasions there is no eyewitness who saw the fire being set, but there is still evidence (such as fire-starting material) that indicates the fire was set deliberately and was not an accident. Similarly we have evidence of speciation that we have not directly observed. And this evidence is just as valid as the fire marshals evidence of arson.

Oh goody, a crime analogy again. Didn't you read any of the posts "others" made when telling me that determining whether the police that investigated a crime was a greater authority and the judge listening to the crime, that wasn't an acceptable analogy because the courtroom has nothing to do with it and neither by the way does an analogy about predjudice jurors, so we should avoid this entire paragraph before "others" gets thier pants in a bunch and go on for pages and pages about the same old nonsense. But you know what, I always liked trying to ride in the grain wagon standing up and rarely fell, so let's go with the shift and let the accusations and complaints continue.

In both situations you refer to there is an eye witness, now I am wondering, what eye witness you are claiming for common ancestry (large scale) the best we can compare speciation to, is fire starting materials and that would not be a totally accurate analogy, but we can work with it. So we have fire starting materials, we have the burnt house, and nothing more, I wonder, how can we thus know who started the fire? WE CAN'T WITHOUT MORE EVIDENCE Thus, we cannot know without more evidence if for sure we have common ancestry (large scale) or only speciation. Which once again is the problem, you are claiming that speciation is evidence for common ancestry (large scale) it is not, it is evidence for speciation. To go further, we must rely on assumptions, "logical conclusion", speculation, etc. see above. None of which are evidence of fact/truth.

razzelflabben · Jun 16, 2005

part 2

Right, evidence is observed, not inferred.

so why then if we agree do you claim above that speciation is evidence of common ancestry (large scale) when clearly it relys on inferrance? Got to wonder why you are so inconsistant?!? And don't just feed me a line of you don't understand nonsense, we all know you have explained it multiply times and I understand the arguement all to well, in fact, I wish I didn't understand it as well as I did because then, you would be making at least a bit of sense. So deal with the inconsistancy in your arguement and not resort to accusations of not understanding. Thanks.

No. Evidence is observed. Speciation is inferred from the evidence.

Okay, more inconsistancies, but let's work with it. So common ancestry (large scale) is what we infer from the inferrances we make from the observations? Wow, your arguements get weaker by the moment and to think that I hadn't ruled out the toe yet, makes me wonder if I sould even consider it a possibility when I here this kind of arguement.

This was a response to a large paragraph. To which part of it are you referring?

Humm,. let me see, maybe to the understanding of the words I asked you to clarify, that might be a logical conclusion since I directly asked to you clarify the words. But then again, logic doesn't require an authority so asking you to clarify certain words would not logically result in an understanding of what was being questioned. Cool, I am seeing how this works now, if we make our definitions shifting and then accuse others of not understanding, then we can say whatever we want as long as it sounds proper and claim victory. Got it, it is not logical to assume that if I ask you to clarify what meaning you are attributing to evolution and common ancestry in the paragraph, that I am asking for clarity of the words evolution and common ancestry, but it is logical to assume common ancestry 9large scale) from the inferred understanding of speciation, thus knowing fact... and I am the one who is wrong and doesn't understand. Right!

Yes, this all makes sense. These are all about origins, not about subsequent development. To say the Renaissance originated in Italy tells us nothing of how it evolved in France. To say the radiation originated in Jupiter tells us nothing of its character when it arrived on Saturn. To say Pittsburgh is the source of the Ohio river tells us nothing about its trek to the Mississippi. So all of these focus on how things came to be, not on how they developed after they came to be.

Not origins and not development either.

Oh boy more fun. We have covered this so many times my head hurts. Teaching a subject does not mean that I teach everything I know, it can mean that I teach the basics, in depth, part of, etc. Origins was a word chosen because it incapsolates both how life originated and how life came to be in it's current form. This definition is not inconsistant with the dictionary defintion and is commonly accept among the people that I normally talk to. So when using the word origins, you now know what I mean. Argueing over the meaning of the word does not change the intended meaning when stated. So let's see, communication means that we 1.argue over the definition or 2. accept the meaning presented and thus deal with the question presented. You choose 1. and I respectfully tell you that you have no idea of what communication is if all you can see is a way to try to prove my definition wrong and never once look at the issue raised, but that is a common tactic of evolutionist here on the forum so we can move on. When I use the word origins, I am not limiting the discussion to abiogensis or speciation, and that was made abundantly clear to you. It encompasses both and yes I'm sure I used a wrong word somwhere there so ream me a few pages for that before we can move on.

We can speak of origins of life or we can speak of origin of species. But we should not confuse one with the other. They are as different as the origin of the radiation on Jupiter and the origin of the Ohio river.

And yet how strange, in my question, I was referring to both and thus combined them with a word that fit. go figure, using a word the way it is commonly used. Who could have guessed?

It is not a hard concept. It is a confusing concept because you are trying to deal with two different types of origin in one definition. Better to have a separate definition for each---like abiogenesis (origin of life) and speciation (origin of species).

see above

Because origin of species is not relevant to a discussion on the origin of life, and vice versa.

see above

My point is that you changed the meaning of what I said, so it did not clarify, it confused.

But you see, I didn't change the meaning of the word, you may not have understood the meaning, but the meaning was consistant. That is why communication is necessary.

Now you owe me two irony meters.
A common ancestor is a species which is ancestral to two or more other species. Common ancestry occurs at every level of phylogeny from species to family to order to phylum and even to kingdoms.

Okay, show us an observation of such for each of the taxominy that you present. That is, species to family, family to order, order to phylum and phylum to kingdom and don't rely on assumptions. I really look forward to seeing this evidence. Thanks.

Yes, it is a question for science and science has observed the evidence which indicates that horses and zebras have a very recent common ancestor. Part of that evidence is that the two species can sometimes produce a hybrid (a zorse).

And this is evidence (observation) how? Inferrance, speculation, assumptions, sure, but observation of common ancestry how exactly?

It is generally considered that when members of two species can mate and produce offspring (though the offspring is often sterile) that they are closely related.

What test observes this and what definition is applied to close here?

In fact, most (perhaps all) creationists agree with the common ancestry of the horse and the zebra.

Cool, now, what evidence do we have for such and does not rely on assumptions?

Do you consider it questionable?

I consider it unobserved by science. Which in short hand means that science doesn't know for sure, fact, truth. Is it possible sure, does science suggest it without doubt. Does the evidence suggest it, maybe. Do we know for sure, have truth/fact. NO

Except for hybridization (which we would not expect since humans and chimpanzees have been separated for much longer than the horse and zebra) we have just as much evidence confirming the relationship of humans and chimpanzees to a common ancestor as we do of the common ancestry of the horse and zebra. One such piece of evidence are those ERVS which have no other logical reason for being other than common ancestry.

theres that logic again. You really need to deal with this issue, if it is not logical that when I ask you your intended meaning for evolution and common ancestry, that I am asking you to define what you mean by evolution and common ancestry, then I do not accept your authority that common ancestry (large scale) is a logical conclusion. Your logic leaves much to be desired.

Sorry, I did make one of those bad assumptions again. What you said was:

When I talk about common ancestry being taught as fact, I am talking about large scale common ancestry, that being man-ape etc.

Since the horse-zebra speciation is small scale, and accepted by creationists who oppose large-scale evolution, I assumed you also accepted it. I stand corrected.

I accept observations as fact, and assumptions as otherwise. go figure, consistancy who could have guessed?

Science has lots of observations and evidence on speciation and common ancestry. I am sure you have already been referred many times to talkorigins article 29 Evidences for macro-evolution.

Hey! You agree with me. It is indeed nonsense to say people have parents but not great-great grandparents. It is just as silly to say that speciation can only result in parent species and never great-great grandparent species. Glad you see how silly that is.

What are you talking about, I really think you are referring to somone elses post and not mine because I said nothing even remotely close to what you are addressing here. What are you going on about?

No, it is too vague to be of any use.

Oh, you mean like evolution can mean change, biological change, or the theory of evolution. Oh, I forgot, that isn't vague, it is a percise definition that needs no clarity and thus has perfect meaning and understanding. Cool, I think I am starting to get the picture. If it is to your advantage to use vague meanings it is percise defintions if you don't like what someone else is saying than the definition is shifting and vague. Got it, it all relies on what is to your advantage. I'm getting the hang of it now.

Just as it encompasses both the origin of the Renaissance in Italy and the origin of the Ohio River in Pittsburgh. However, that does not mean that the origin of the Renaissance is relevant to the origin of the Ohio. When talking about one, we are clearly not talking about the other. Same goes for origin of life and origin of species. It is important to be clear which origin is being discussed.

see above

Sorry if my need for clarity is rather demanding on you. Chalk it up to my inadequacy in dealing with more than one topic at a time.

Please dont put words in my mouth. When you label yourself, that is not me speaking that is you. I would love to see you practice using some of this new vocabulary, even if you occasionally use it incorrectly. Just as I encouraged by students to practice speaking French even if they sometimes stumbled.

I am paraphrasing all the accusations and attacks that have been launched at me during this thread. If it is not what you intend for someone to "hear" then maybe you sould rethink your attacks and words. Just a thought for what it's worth.

Edx · Jun 16, 2005

razzelflabben said:
Don't be too sure about that. You gave 3 different acceptable meanings for the word evolution and you can pick and choose from that list at will, that dear one is shifting definitions and is in blantant defiance of effective communication. Pick a definition and stick with it.

No Im not picking and choosing. You are claiming my consisent useage is inconsistent because the word "evolution" means something different depending on what you are talking about and I just may be taking about something completely different. But Im not "switching definitions", it just how the word is used.

The first definition is a commen word not refering to anything scientific, which mearly means "to change over time". If I did "choose" this one, why would it not be perfectly obvious I had? If someone was talking about the evolution in relation to technology, would that be confusing?

When you say something "evolved" in a biological context you would be refering to definition 2 because you are talking about the process of evolution.

If you use "Evolution" in a general sence you are refering to the scientific theory as a whole, and since the theory refers to everything that also includes the "process".

and yet in one place you said evolution is... and in another you said the....is the theory of evolution. So either you see a difference but refuse to accept one or your don't see a difference even when the definition stares you in the face.

I was talking about the theory in both cases (if I am thinking of the same), but in the second case I was being more specific since I remembered you kept claiming to be confused.

I wonder why you didn't show us all the possible ways the term theory of evolution could be used. Humm?

What? You arent seriously asking for an exaustive list of every single way you can possibily use the the word are you? Maybe you really do need to understand reading comprehension better if thats the only way you will understand. And whats the implication of "Humm??". I already asked if you needed more examples.

exactly but that does not answer the question now does it? It does assume that I don't understand what I have been trying to tell you but that is your tactic isn't it, to avoid dealing with the real issue in exchange for assuming that the other person doesn't understand makes it easier for you huh?

I did answer that question, btw. Again, rephrase your question if I dont seem to "get it" (which I clearly do not). Dont just spend the entire reply to it attacking my character.

And no that isnt my tactic btw, thats yours. For example you keep claiming I refused to answer your question as to the difference between evolution and the TOE and claimed that you recieved no answer at all, even when you have been showed that I had done so many times.

Ah back to changing the meaning again. I distinguish between speciation and common ancestry because the terms are there to distinguish between the two for me. Therefore common ancestry (large scale) is according to glaudy's (on the other thread) not evidenced. I wonder why evolutionists can't even seem to agree on what is evidenced and what is not.

I wasnt actually very clear, so that is my fault.

There is no such thing as "common ancestry (large scale)". Everything has a "commen ancester". Now when you are talking about common ancestor in regards to evolution theory you are talking about the conclusion drawn based on all the evidence that terrestrial organisms are genealogically related. You cant have a "large scale commen ancester". That makes no sence at all. Neither does saying "common ancestry (large scale). If you want to misuse a term, at least call it macro evolution.

Last time I checked, they were still theories, and your point is.......

And they will ALWAYS be theories, they will never rise to anything else as thats not how they work.

Come on I thought you understood how scientific theories work by now? I dont really want to have to start explaining this all over again.

Which when coupled with your contridictory quotes is why I asked you for clarity. Go figure, something you said wasn't clear and you were ask to clarify it on a thread that is suppose to be about communication. What is this world coming to!

They only seem to be contradictory to your seemingly endless pedantic and sematical nature.

So do you understand nor not? Perhaps you need to explain what I have told you about this, and I will tell you where you are wrong or correct.

And you skipped this part of my post:
Now, back to what you said. It (Evolution) has everything to do with modern biology. See the last time I told you that, and where you disregarded the link becasue it said "evolution" and you needed clarification. Now considering I told you they were refering to the fact and theory of biological evolution and everything therein you can now address it properly, cant you?
[page 38, post 397]

and your point is.......

I said:
But even most Creationists agree to a certain amount of common ancestry. They believe that all forms of life and all the different species can be traced back to a few created "kinds". They however believe there is a barrier where the "kind" cannot change any further. They leave "kind" undefined, otherwise one could just point out there is no magical barrier at all.
You said:
Actually the only single parent population specified is man, at least until we get to the flood which is a different story. In fact, the word abundantly is used which would suggest that many of a given creature were created at the same time...."
I said:
"This doesnt address what I wrote. Im saying they posit a barrier where an organism can evolve no more out of their (undefined) "kind". The above doesnt stop that from being an issue. "
So how did you address what I wrote?

So your claim then is that the thoery of evolution is the foundation of modern biology. Thanks, I will respectfully disagree.

Thats what Ive been saying all this time.

And you can disagree all you want, it wont stop you not knowing a whole lot about the subject. You call scientific theories "only theories", a responce that can only mean you dont know what a scientific theory really is or how it really works. So if you dont even know that, you cant possibily have studied this subject as much as you claim. And before you claim Im "assuming", this is going by what you have written and no assumptions need be taken to conclude this.

I know what you meant, but I chose to accept it as a compliment in that it is the first time I have ever heard an evolutionist formally give a "creationist" .....

If you understood what I meant, then why did you act all surprised when I simply told you what I wrote?. I was saying you were being deliberately difficult, and that you knew you were being deliberately difficult because otherwise you cant understand basic reading comprehension. I cant believe that, not from what I have seen from you. I just think your arguing style is to be as difficult and confusing as possible. So if you knew what I meant, then why did you act all surprised when I simply told you what I wrote?

Ed

Edx · Jun 16, 2005

razzelflabben said:
Oh goody, a crime analogy again. Didn't you read any of the posts "others" made when telling me that determining whether the police that investigated a crime was a greater authority and the judge listening to the crime, that wasn't an acceptable analogy because the courtroom has nothing to do with it and neither by the way does an analogy about predjudice jurors, so we should avoid this entire paragraph before "others" gets thier pants in a bunch and go on for pages and pages about the same old nonsense. But you know what, I always liked trying to ride in the grain wagon standing up and rarely fell, so let's go with the shift and let the accusations and complaints continue.

You were wrong then too, as you are wrong now and I will address it again if we ever finish with what we are dealing with at the moment.

Ed

Lonnie · Jun 16, 2005

razzelflabben said:
Creation
Evolution
The theory of creation
The theory of evolution
Speciation
Kind
Theory
Evidence
Scientific method

That's probably to much to start with so feel free to pick and choose. Thanks in advance for keeping this calm and non judgemental.

Creation: I think when the word "Creation" is used on these forum boards is reffering to when God created(like when he created the earth)

Evolution: A change in a species.

Theory of Creation: God created the heavens and the earth, and everything that lives upon them.

Theory of Evolution: That one species evolved into another species.

Kind: If two "creatures", of opposite sex, could reproduce with eachother then they are of the same kind; there offspring would also be of the same kind.

Theory: I just use the defenition from a dictionary...

Evidence: Materials that could be used to support a theory, or an idea.

Scientific Method: I just use the defenition from a dictionary, or some other reliable source.

I think this is a good idea to have such a thread, I know that more than 50% of the arguemnets I hear, is because people have differnt defenitions of some words.

Edx · Jun 16, 2005

Lonnie said:
Evolution: A change in a species.

Theory of Evolution: That one species evolved into another species.
.

Since you said "species" and not "kind" you must see a difference, so I wonder why you are Creationist.

Ed

gluadys · Jun 17, 2005

razzelflabben said:
Oh please do be serious, there are different ways to come to a logical conclusion. for example, If I use science as the method of determining what is logical, then my conclusion will be quite different than if I use religion as the mthod of determineing what is logical.

Shouldn't be. Applying logic to different subjects ought not to change logical conclusions.

Both bring us to a logical conclusion but both rely on different criteria for determining logic.

The criteria are not set by science or religion (or politics or horticulture, or whatever). They are set by the rules of logic and do not change from one field to another. Perhaps you are confusing criteria with premises.

That is why an authority must be determined and accepted, but you refuse and so therefore, we must discard any arguement that deals with logic because it has no base of understanding.

The authority for logic is the rule of logic which disallows upholding false premises with fallacious argumentation.

And it is these very assumptions and "logical conclusions" and are not equal to evidence.

I was speaking only of logical conclusions. Why bring assumptions into the conversation? Are you making the assumption that a logical conclusion from the evidence has no more validity than an untested assumption?

See, here in is the problem, I have never once denied speciation, in fact, on many occasions I have said, speciation is observed and therefore fact, but still I get pages and pages of dialog trying to convince me that speciation is observed and therefore fact because I don't understand speciation.

I doubt that you do understand speciation, but we can leave that for now. Since you agree that it happens, we do not differ on this point.

Exactly, which is where I take issue. In fact, it is the only actual claim I have made as to which theory is fact, that we have no direct observations that would settle the question with absolutes and not assumptions.

First, science doesn't deal in absolutes. It deals in evidence. We don't have direct observation of speciations which occurred before we were born, but we do have evidence that they did. As I said, you couldn't possibly be an eye-witness to the birth of your grand-mother, but you can have convincing evidence that she was born. So stop all the hand-waving about assumptions and start looking at the evidence.

See above, logical conclusions are reached in a variety of ways, not all relying on scientific methods.

Logical conclusions are reached by using the rules of logic. Logic does not rely on scientific method, but parts of the scientific method do rely on logic.

define common ancestry, remember that none shifting definition you claim changes from speciation to large scale common ancestry and we can't know from this statement which of these none shifting definitions you mean. Thanks

Common ancestry refers to two or more species having the same ancestor. The ancestor may be the most recent common ancestor of just two closely related species (such as the zebra and the horse) or the common ancestor of several groups of species (such as the common ancestor of mammalian carnivores-- a group that includes felines, canines, ursines and pinnipeds) or the most recent common ancestor of all species that live or ever have lived.

[snip meaningless ranting]

In both situations you refer to there is an eye witness, now I am wondering, what eye witness you are claiming for common ancestry (large scale) the best we can compare speciation to, is fire starting materials and that would not be a totally accurate analogy, but we can work with it. So we have fire starting materials, we have the burnt house, and nothing more, I wonder, how can we thus know who started the fire?

The job of the fire marshall is not to find out who started the fire. It is to find out if anyone started the fire deliberately or whether the fire was an accident. He doesn't need to know who started the fire to determine that it was set deliberately.

razzelflabben said:
part 2
so why then if we agree do you claim above that speciation is evidence of common ancestry (large scale) when clearly it relys on inferrance?

For the same reason we can infer the former existence of long-deceased great-great-great-grandparents from the observed existence of parents.

Plus the evidence which confirms the inference is correct. Especially the evidence that could not possibly exist if the inference was not correct.

So common ancestry (large scale) is what we infer from the inferrances we make from the observations?

No, you don't infer from inferences; you infer from evidence. You don't need to double up on the inferences. Hmmm, I recall you trying to use that tactic earlier in this thread. I don't think we need a repeat.

Humm,. let me see, maybe to the understanding of the words I asked you to clarify, that might be a logical conclusion since I directly asked to you clarify the words.

You said you hadn't heard "this claim" before. I was wondering which of the three claims you were referring to. Can't answer the question on the meaning of the words, without knowing in what context they were being used. So which claim were you referring to?

Origins was a word chosen because it incapsolates both how life originated and how life came to be in it's current form.

And that is what makes it useless in this discussion. How life originated and how life came to be in its current form are two separate issues. Just as where the Ohio river originates and where it ends are two separate questions with two separate answers. No one would include the Mississippi in an answer about the origin of the Ohio river. And no one would include Pittsburgh in a question about where the Ohio river flowed to.

You are deliberately using a vague word to create confusion.

When I use the word origins, I am not limiting the discussion to abiogensis or speciation,

You want to include even more than these two topics? What additional topics do you want to bring under this umbrella? The more you include the more nebulous the concept becomes.

And yet how strange, in my question, I was referring to both and thus combined them with a word that fit. go figure, using a word the way it is commonly used. Who could have guessed?

The common use of words is often too vague and fluid when discussing science. That is why science (like most specialities) has its own special vocabulary in order to speak with precision. Learning scientific vocabulary is part of learning science. Common meanings don't cut it.

But you see, I didn't change the meaning of the word, you may not have understood the meaning, but the meaning was consistant. That is why communication is necessary.

You changed the word to one with a different meaning, and that changed the overall meaning. The word you used (parent) was not a synonym for the word I used (ancestral kind) and could not be used as a substitute without changing its meaning.

Okay, show us an observation of such for each of the taxominy that you present. That is, species to family, family to order, order to phylum and phylum to kingdom and don't rely on assumptions. I really look forward to seeing this evidence. Thanks.

Doesn't work that way. The only things which can have common ancestors are individuals within a species and species within the category of living things. Levels reflect the degree of relationship and how far back the common ancestor they share occurs in their history.

For example: two brothers share a common ancestor in their parents (or at least one of them) This is analogous to two species of sunflower sharing a recent ancestor. This would be a species-to-species relationship within a genus.

If the most recent common ancestor for two individuals is a great-great-grandparent, they are not siblings but 3rd cousins. This is analogous to the relationship of a gorilla and a baboon, which are not in the same genus, but are in the same sub-order: Catarrhini and whose common ancestor lived some 25 million years ago (as compared to the common ancestor of chimps and humans who lived only 5 million years ago).

On a family tree we can keep multiplying the degree of cousinship (as in 32nd cousin 5 times removed) and adding another "great" in front of "grandparent". And every time we do, we have to go deeper in history to find the common ancestor the two individuals share.

Similarly on the tree of life, the greater the distance between two species (e.g a species of turtle and a species of pine tree) the farther back in time their common ancestor. (This one would have lived in the pre-Cambrian era.)

So, the relationship is always between species, but the more distant it is, the more likely we are to find the species in different genera, families, orders, classes, etc. and the more remote in time is the common ancestor they share. That is what I meant by different levels.

And this is evidence (observation) how? Inferrance, speculation, assumptions, sure, but observation of common ancestry how exactly? What test observes this and what definition is applied to close here?

The test is observation of mate choice and sometimes hybridization. "Close" means very close in both phenotype and genotype with the possibility of producing hybrid offspring.

Cool, now, what evidence do we have for such and does not rely on assumptions?

They differ in very few genes and phenotypic characters and can be induced to mate. There are several hybrid offspring of horse/zebra mating. Check "zorse" on google.

I consider it unobserved by science.

Which doesn't mean that science has not observed it. It is not a matter of opinion as to what science has and has not observed. So you should think twice about assuming science has not observed something. Science has observed much more than any one person can know--even if that person is a scientist! So check it out before you say science has not observed it.

theres that logic again. You really need to deal with this issue

You really need to deal with ERVs.

razzelflabben · Jun 17, 2005

Edx said:
No Im not picking and choosing. You are claiming my consisent useage is inconsistent because the word "evolution" means something different depending on what you are talking about and I just may be taking about something completely different. But Im not "switching definitions", it just how the word is used. \

The first definition is a commen word not refering to anything scientific, which mearly means "to change over time". If I did "choose" this one, why would it not be perfectly obvious I had? If someone was talking about the evolution in relation to technology, would that be confusing?

When you say something "evolved" in a biological context you would be refering to definition 2 because you are talking about the process of evolution.

If you use "Evolution" in a general sence you are refering to the scientific theory as a whole, and since the theory refers to everything that also includes the "process".

You can't see the possibilities of shifting meanings in a word that is used so broadly, Okay, then I shall save the lesson of what shifting means for another thread, can't wait to debate you agian.

I was talking about the theory in both cases (if I am thinking of the same), but in the second case I was being more specific since I remembered you kept claiming to be confused.

Oh now wasn't that hard.... I asked you if you meant evolution (the process) or the theory of evolution (the theory) and you spent pages explaining how the word evolution can mean both only to finally come to this page and say, yes I mean the toe (theory thus including the process but not limited to) Golly your good and communication (sarcasm) It wasn't a hard thing to do, answering the question now was it? It shouldn't have been hard for you to understand that I knew the word could be used interchangably with the term toe since I actually asked you to specify which you meant, but that isn't consistant with your tactic on the forum, you would rather assume that anyone who doesn't parrot the responses you have been programed to give knows nothing about the topic. Cool, thanks for answering the question, it is what I assumed from all you dribble, but you really did need to say it so that we didn't have to assume.

What? You arent seriously asking for an exaustive list of every single way you can possibily use the the word are you? Maybe you really do need to understand reading comprehension better if thats the only way you will understand. And whats the implication of "Humm??". I already asked if you needed more examples.

What are you going on about now? I ask you to identify what definition you were using in this case and now somehow I'm saying somthing else, how do you do that? I am in awe!

I did answer that question, btw. Again, rephrase your question if I dont seem to "get it" (which I clearly do not). Dont just spend the entire reply to it attacking my character.

Did about 1,000 times and all you could do is assume that I didn't understand that when I asked you to identify which definition you were using that I didn't understand that the word can use different meanings. That is the kind of logic that makes me ignore your claims that common ancestry (macro evolution) are logical conclusions to our evidence. I can't even take that claim seriously when you pull this kind of logic out of your hat, it does give me a good laugh that you take your own claims seriously and expect other to do the say, but it's all about logic without an authority and your logic is illogical as you have just evidenced to us. So, move on.

And no that isnt my tactic btw, thats yours. For example you keep claiming I refused to answer your question as to the difference between evolution and the TOE and claimed that you recieved no answer at all, even when you have been showed that I had done so many times.

See here, the question was which definition you were using when claiming that evolution is the foundation of modern biology, then later say that the foundation of modern biology is the theory of evolution. From this question you inferred that I didn't understand that evolution can be used mean different things, and you went into a long discourse of "educating" me as to the various possible meanings for the word evolution. But you answered the question right?

I wasnt actually very clear, so that is my fault.

There is no such thing as "common ancestry (large scale)". Everything has a "commen ancester". Now when you are talking about common ancestor in regards to evolution theory you are talking about the conclusion drawn based on all the evidence that terrestrial organisms are genealogically related. You cant have a "large scale commen ancester". That makes no sence at all. Neither does saying "common ancestry (large scale). If you want to misuse a term, at least call it macro evolution.

Okay, so now, we have no evidence for the claims that the toe is evidenced. Theory including the most common point of disagreement that of common ancestry (large scale, macroevolution) (by the way, many evolutionists dont' accept the term macroevolution, so I'm not sure what word you want me to use here, so I'll try to use them all to cover the subject) and you are claiming the "logic" of the conclusion that we draw is common ancestry (large scale, macroevolution) but, you are basing it on the same kind of logic that says that when I ask you which difinition you are referring to, I don't understand that the word can be used to mean more than one thing. Thank you but if that is the criteria for determining fact about our origins (life and species, abiogenisis and speciation) then, I will pass, I can find a lot better logic than that.

And they will ALWAYS be theories, they will never rise to anything else as thats not how they work.

Oh goody another case of not reading what was typed and how wrong that makes me. Okay, try this again. We do not teach the theory of gravity as fact and theory because it is assumed that the theory is based on fact, that is the way theory works, or do we need to go over that with you again? So to say that the toe is fact and theory is an attempt to confuse people about what is being said and what is not. It is this attempt to confuse that leaves a bad taste in the mouths of many. Either the toe is fact or theory, not anymore both than any scientific theory is both. So either teach the theory of gravity as fact and theory (of which I have never ever heard done) or assume that people know that theory implys that the theory is based on observations (fact) and stop with the nonsence of it is fact and theory. You aren't confusing anyone except yourselves.

Come on I thought you understood how scientific theories work by now? I dont really want to have to start explaining this all over again.

If you are going to insist on claiming the theory of evolution is fact and theory and not consistantly do it for the other scientific theories, then I think you need the lesson in what scientific theory is. It is built into the definition, you must know that by now after all the pages of debate over what a theory is, you have to at least have heard once by now that theory is based on fact. Do we really have to go through all of that yet again for you?

They only seem to be contradictory to your seemingly endless pedantic and sematical nature.

depends on whether you meant evolution or the theory of evolution.

So do you understand nor not? Perhaps you need to explain what I have told you about this, and I will tell you where you are wrong or correct.

And you skipped this part of my post:
Now, back to what you said. It (Evolution) has everything to do with modern biology. See the last time I told you that, and where you disregarded the link becasue it said "evolution" and you needed clarification. Now considering I told you they were refering to the fact and theory of biological evolution and everything therein you can now address it properly, cant you?
[page 38, post 397]

I said:
But even most Creationists agree to a certain amount of common ancestry. They believe that all forms of life and all the different species can be traced back to a few created "kinds". They however believe there is a barrier where the "kind" cannot change any further. They leave "kind" undefined, otherwise one could just point out there is no magical barrier at all.
You said:
Actually the only single parent population specified is man, at least until we get to the flood which is a different story. In fact, the word abundantly is used which would suggest that many of a given creature were created at the same time...."
I said:
"This doesnt address what I wrote. Im saying they posit a barrier where an organism can evolve no more out of their (undefined) "kind". The above doesnt stop that from being an issue. "
So how did you address what I wrote?

I was adding a footnote, sorry, didn't know that was against the rules, I really wish someone would post the rules so we can keep up. Footnotes are bad, asking for clarity is bad, shifting definitions are only good if it makes you sound knowledgable, claiming that you don't understand that what somone is asking is what they want to know is logical, logic has no bases of understanding, and any claim can be made without support, got it, now I'm starting to get the idea of how debate on the evolution/creation part of the forum works, can't wait to try out all these new lessons in a real debate and not just a thread about communication. How exciting!!!! You are opening up a totally new frontier of understanding for me.

Thats what Ive been saying all this time.

And you can disagree all you want, it wont stop you not knowing a whole lot about the subject. You call scientific theories "only theories", a responce that can only mean you dont know what a scientific theory really is or how it really works. So if you dont even know that, you cant possibily have studied this subject as much as you claim. And before you claim Im "assuming", this is going by what you have written and no assumptions need be taken to conclude this.

see above

If you understood what I meant, then why did you act all surprised when I simply told you what I wrote?. I was saying you were being deliberately difficult, and that you knew you were being deliberately difficult because otherwise you cant understand basic reading comprehension. I cant believe that, not from what I have seen from you. I just think your arguing style is to be as difficult and confusing as possible. So if you knew what I meant, then why did you act all surprised when I simply told you what I wrote?

Ed

Huh, what the heck are you talking about? I said I accepted it as a compliment because it is the nicest thing I have ever heard an evolutionist formally say to a "creationist" and that is surprise how? Surprised that you said it so nicely maybe, but not surprised that you said what you did. The problem is that most evolutionist you included, attack the intelligence and character of anyone who disagrees with you, you insult there intelligence with almost every post and you don't expect anything in return. Including anyone to tell you how they read your posts and what they feel you are saying. But you see, those words are harmful to the individual as well as communication and are most usually blantant lies. This type of behavior is usually used to hide the persons own feelings of inadequacy on the subject, but that is a different discussion. So anytime you or others here indicate that someone who doesn't see things quite the same way that you do, isn't totally ignorant, it is a big deal. Even if it is a snide remark or a sidewards compliment. I expected that that is the best you can do, and so I accepted it with enthusiasm because it was a huge step for you.

razzelflabben · Jun 17, 2005

Lonnie said:
Creation: I think when the word "Creation" is used on these forum boards is reffering to when God created(like when he created the earth)

Evolution: A change in a species.

Theory of Creation: God created the heavens and the earth, and everything that lives upon them.

Theory of Evolution: That one species evolved into another species.

Kind: If two "creatures", of opposite sex, could reproduce with eachother then they are of the same kind; there offspring would also be of the same kind.

Theory: I just use the defenition from a dictionary...

Evidence: Materials that could be used to support a theory, or an idea.

Scientific Method: I just use the defenition from a dictionary, or some other reliable source.

I think this is a good idea to have such a thread, I know that more than 50% of the arguemnets I hear, is because people have differnt defenitions of some words.

Thanks, but I am afraid you might be disapponted with the amount of actual communication that is happening here so far, a lot of "teaching" about why the creationsts are wrong and not much this is how I understand what is being said. Thanks for joining in though, right now we are talking about the multiple meanings for the word evolution and how it means biological change as well as the theory of evoluiton. Oh, we are also talking about how common ancestry just means that we have a parent and not that man is related to apes and horses to zebras, etc. Looking forward to your comments.

razzelflabben · Jun 17, 2005

deep breath and plung in, you really do love these long posts that deal with a lot of different topics don't you? BTW, why aren't you doing anything with the other thread, you started it, I thought you would have a greater interest in it than this one. Oh well, here we go.

gluadys said:
Shouldn't be. Applying logic to different subjects ought not to change logical conclusions.

The criteria are not set by science or religion (or politics or horticulture, or whatever). They are set by the rules of logic and do not change from one field to another. Perhaps you are confusing criteria with premises.

The authority for logic is the rule of logic which disallows upholding false premises with fallacious argumentation.

I was speaking only of logical conclusions. Why bring assumptions into the conversation? Are you making the assumption that a logical conclusion from the evidence has no more validity than an untested assumption?

Okay, what is logical to you is not logical to everyone else. The process of determining what is logical is the same process, but the conclusions vary. Why is that do you suppose? I ask for clarity of definitions and the logical conclusion by people here on the forum is that I don't understand that the word can have different meanings. The process of determining a logical conclusion is the same, but the conclusiion is not. Why is that? Call it whatever you like, it still boils down to the same thing, Logic is not an absolute and it certainly doesn't equal fact/truth. So what do we have, we have a theory that relies on "logic" that is not defined by any authority, that is being taught as fact/truth. and you can't figure out why people have problems with it? Logically speaking, I don't see any way that you can't understand what the problem is and why people get testy, but that is the logical conclusion to draw. Oh, I get it, because you shift understanding of words to have no meaning then you can claim a different logical conclusion which removes all logic from the equasion and then, we have no problem. Cool! In other words, logic is not an absolute and I wonder why you left out quotes in my post that evidenced the various logical conclusions that could be drawn? I think we should delve into logic, what do you think? How about if we start here? http://www.philosophypages.com/lg/e01.htm But, you can't accept logic as an authority so I wonder why you have any belief at all? Humm, consistant application does cause perticular problems doesn't it?

I doubt that you do understand speciation, but we can leave that for now. Since you agree that it happens, we do not differ on this point.

Right, I don't parrot back the evolutionist answer so we can assume I don't understand and you are the one who knows logic?

First, science doesn't deal in absolutes. It deals in evidence. We don't have direct observation of speciations which occurred before we were born, but we do have evidence that they did. As I said, you couldn't possibly be an eye-witness to the birth of your grand-mother, but you can have convincing evidence that she was born. So stop all the hand-waving about assumptions and start looking at the evidence.

Here you go again with a bunch of nonsense that relates in no way to anything I have said. What are you wanting to talk about now?

Logical conclusions are reached by using the rules of logic. Logic does not rely on scientific method, but parts of the scientific method do rely on logic.

Logic relies of propositions, where do those come from when we have no authority to base them on? From religion? science? math? maybe we can base them on stories? Sorry, you can't get around the fact, that you need to determine what authority you will accept on the issue. Deny it all you want, it doesn't go away.

Common ancestry refers to two or more species having the same ancestor. The ancestor may be the most recent common ancestor of just two closely related species (such as the zebra and the horse) or the common ancestor of several groups of species (such as the common ancestor of mammalian carnivores-- a group that includes felines, canines, ursines and pinnipeds) or the most recent common ancestor of all species that live or ever have lived.

[snip meaningless ranting]

There you go again shifting the meaning to suit your agenda. Common ancestry, large scale, macroevolution, is not fact, it is not observed, and cannot be observed. When most creationists dispute evolutionists, this is the point of disagreement. Changing words around to have no meaning do nothing to end the disagreement, in fact, it shows a lack of knowledge and understanding on your part. we all understand that a common ancester is someone that is that we are related to, please do use some reason here. Common ancester usually refers to macroevolution, large scale evlution and is commonly understood as such. Inferring, apecualting, assuming that the speciation continues indefinately is not evidence, it is not even logic, it is however assumptions. If you dont understand this, you can't possibly understand what science can tell us about the toe.

The job of the fire marshall is not to find out who started the fire. It is to find out if anyone started the fire deliberately or whether the fire was an accident. He doesn't need to know who started the fire to determine that it was set deliberately.

Oh now we bring the fire marshall into the equasion, who is he exactly in this analogy? Anyway, here is the problem with your analogy, the fire marshall doesn't have enough evidence to determine whether or not the fire was set. What he has is a burnt building and fire starting material. Many years ago, my grandparets house burnt, the house had in it matches. Does that mean that the house was set on fire or that it caught fire by some other means? Do you know? There is a family friend whose house caught fire many years ago, thier house contained flamable chemicals. How did thier fire get started? So that is the problem with making claims without evidence to back them up, you don't have enough evidence to support the claims. You rely on assumptions, oh that's right they aren't assumptions they are logicall conclusions, so what logical conclusions do you want to give for there two houses burning and when your done, Ill tell you what happened based on all the evidence that could be collected, not just on what was.

For the same reason we can infer the former existence of long-deceased great-great-great-grandparents from the observed existence of parents.

Because science knows how life propagates, we can infer that common ancestry, large scale, macroevolution happens? What are you talking about?

Plus the evidence which confirms the inference is correct. Especially the evidence that could not possibly exist if the inference was not correct.

Oh please do try hard to make some kind of sense when posting. What are you talking about?

No, you don't infer from inferences; you infer from evidence. You don't need to double up on the inferences. Hmmm, I recall you trying to use that tactic earlier in this thread. I don't think we need a repeat.

Okay, you said that we inferred speciation from the observations, and that we base our logical conclusion of common ancestry, large scale, macroevolution on the inferrances of speciation, that logically means that we are inferring based on an inferance of our observations. Oh I am glad that I haven't bought into that nonsense. You do need to listen to what you are saying somtimes and not just say what you have been taught.

You said you hadn't heard "this claim" before. I was wondering which of the three claims you were referring to. Can't answer the question on the meaning of the words, without knowing in what context they were being used. So which claim were you referring to?

so long ago I don't even remember what we are talking about.

And that is what makes it useless in this discussion. How life originated and how life came to be in its current form are two separate issues. Just as where the Ohio river originates and where it ends are two separate questions with two separate answers. No one would include the Mississippi in an answer about the origin of the Ohio river. And no one would include Pittsburgh in a question about where the Ohio river flowed to.

You are deliberately using a vague word to create confusion.

I am using an appropriate word to ask a question that is still unanswered because you would rather try to prove that the meaning of the word is wrong than answer the question. And by the way, look at the definitions for the word evolution, it can mean at least two different things scientifically, I wonder why it can have more than one meaning but the word origins cannot incorperate two different things? Because it doesn't fit your arguement?

You want to include even more than these two topics? What additional topics do you want to bring under this umbrella? The more you include the more nebulous the concept becomes.

Huh? More that two topics? I can limit it one one, how life came to it's current state. How's that? Now it has only one meaning and you can answer the question.

The common use of words is often too vague and fluid when discussing science. That is why science (like most specialities) has its own special vocabulary in order to speak with precision. Learning scientific vocabulary is part of learning science. Common meanings don't cut it.

and this after the wonderful drawn on way too long nonsense of a lesson ed gave us on the multiple definitions for the word evolution. Okay then, we see the inconsistancy in the claim and reality, time to move on before we get into a debate on the meaning of the exact scientific nonchanging definition for the word evolution.

You changed the word to one with a different meaning, and that changed the overall meaning. The word you used (parent) was not a synonym for the word I used (ancestral kind) and could not be used as a substitute without changing its meaning.

HuH? what are you going on about? Are we talkinga bout common ancestry, or origins. Origins have not ever been defined as parent or ancestrial kind or whatever other nonsense you are talking about. In fact, when ask for definition, the definition has always been how life came to being including it's current form. (paraphrased) Now as to the claims of changing definitions for common ancestry, that only definition I have used (understand the varying definition) is that of large scale, macroevolution, and now to add more clarity, ancestrral kind. I even went into a long segment as to why this is what I am talking about when using the word common ancestry. But I have changed it's meaning? You really have to be talking about some other post, who are you confusing with me?

Doesn't work that way. The only things which can have common ancestors are individuals within a species and species within the category of living things. Levels reflect the degree of relationship and how far back the common ancestor they share occurs in their history.

For example: two brothers share a common ancestor in their parents (or at least one of them) This is analogous to two species of sunflower sharing a recent ancestor. This would be a species-to-species relationship within a genus.

If the most recent common ancestor for two individuals is a great-great-grandparent, they are not siblings but 3rd cousins. This is analogous to the relationship of a gorilla and a baboon, which are not in the same genus, but are in the same sub-order: Catarrhini and whose common ancestor lived some 25 million years ago (as compared to the common ancestor of chimps and humans who lived only 5 million years ago).

On a family tree we can keep multiplying the degree of cousinship (as in 32nd cousin 5 times removed) and adding another "great" in front of "grandparent". And every time we do, we have to go deeper in history to find the common ancestor the two individuals share.

Similarly on the tree of life, the greater the distance between two species (e.g a species of turtle and a species of pine tree) the farther back in time their common ancestor. (This one would have lived in the pre-Cambrian era.)

So, the relationship is always between species, but the more distant it is, the more likely we are to find the species in different genera, families, orders, classes, etc. and the more remote in time is the common ancestor they share. That is what I meant by different levels.

Nice lesson, now how about dealing with the issue I presented instead of assuming that I don't know all this stuff.

The test is observation of mate choice and sometimes hybridization. "Close" means very close in both phenotype and genotype with the possibility of producing hybrid offspring.

How close is very close?parent, grandparent, great great great great great grandparent....?

They differ in very few genes and phenotypic characters and can be induced to mate. There are several hybrid offspring of horse/zebra mating. Check "zorse" on google.

And this equal common ancestry, large scale, macroevolution, ancestrial kind, how???????????

Which doesn't mean that science has not observed it. It is not a matter of opinion as to what science has and has not observed. So you should think twice about assuming science has not observed something. Science has observed much more than any one person can know--even if that person is a scientist! So check it out before you say science has not observed it. -

You admitted yourself that there are no scientific observations for common ancestry, macroevolution, large scale, ancestrial kind, yet you get after me for saying that science has not observed it. Okay, we have no data to suggest that science has observed common ancestry, macroevolution, large scale, ancestrial kind. Cool, and you think I like symantics!

You really need to deal with ERVs.

Maybe when we are finished with the other thread you started.

Edx · Jun 17, 2005

razzelflabben said:
You can't see the possibilities of shifting meanings in a word that is used so broadly, Okay, then I shall save the lesson of what shifting means for another thread, can't wait to debate you agian.

It is only used broadly when used as a commen word to mean "to change over time"

When you are talking about biology you are either talking about the theory as a whole, or specifically refering to the process. You can tell which by the context, something you cant seem to be able to do.

Oh now wasn't that hard.... I asked you if you meant evolution (the process) or the theory of evolution (the theory) and you spent pages explaining how the word evolution can mean both only to finally come to this page and say, yes I mean the toe (theory thus including the process but not limited to) Golly your good and communication (sarcasm) It wasn't a hard thing to do, answering the question now was it?

Well if you would have looked at the context you could have figured it out easily. But you wouldnt and wont do that, you had to drag this out into semantics for pages because you obviously enjoy being pedantic on purpose.

you would rather assume that anyone who doesn't parrot the responses you have been programed to give knows nothing about the topic.

By "programmed" you must mean more educatated and knowledgable than you.

<snipped ranting>

What are you going on about now? I ask you to identify what definition you were using in this case and now somehow I'm saying somthing else, how do you do that? I am in awe!

What am I going on about? Yea, I wonder...

You: "why you didn't show us all the possible ways the term theory of evolution could be used."
Me: "You arent seriously asking for an exaustive list of every single way you can possibily use the the word are you?"

Did about 1,000 times

No you didnt.

and all you could do is assume that I didn't understand that when I asked you to identify which definition you were using that I didn't understand that the word can use different meanings.

Of course it has different meanings. Only 2 are relevant, and it isnt rocket science to look at the context and figure out if Im talking specifically out the process or the general theory (which includes the process)

But as usual you just refuse to think about it, you would rather argue in circles. Like I said I dont think this is because you lack the intelligence its because you wont even attempt to use it.

That is the kind of logic that makes me ignore your claims that common ancestry (macro evolution) are logical conclusions to our evidence.

Its the ONLY conclusion that explains all the evidence.

I can't even take that claim seriously when you pull this kind of logic out of your hat, it does give me a good laugh that you take your own claims seriously and expect other to do the say, but it's all about logic without an authority and your logic is illogical as you have just evidenced to us. So, move on.

As evidenced by your discussion about logic with gluadys you dont understand that either. I'll let her deal with that though, we are dealing with your other appeals to sematics.

See here, the question was which definition you were using when claiming that evolution is the foundation of modern biology, then later say that the foundation of modern biology is the theory of evolution. From this question you inferred that I didn't understand that evolution can be used mean different things, and you went into a long discourse of "educating" me as to the various possible meanings for the word evolution. But you answered the question right?

See the bolded parts above. Put the two together. Now are you telling me you couldnt gather from the context that they mean the same thing?

EDIT: Btw, I never actually said modern biology is the theory of evolution. If you are going to misquote me, at least misquote me accuractly.

And even if you were still confused. Why would I be saying, in the first quote, that the process of evolution is the foundation of modern biology? You cant have a process being the foundation, only the scientific theory as its the framework that ties all aspects of biology together. That is what I told you first of all, yet you still thought there was some kind of obscurity. Why cant you look at the context and figure it out? Why are you so pedantic?

Okay, so now, we have no evidence for the claims that the toe is evidenced.

Talk about jumping the gun! We werent talking about evidence, I was talking about what a term means which you were using in the wrong way. I dont think theres any point trying to talk to you about the evidence, if you cant even agree on the way science uses terms.

Theory including the most common point of disagreement that of common ancestry (large scale, macroevolution) (by the way, many evolutionists dont' accept the term macroevolution, so I'm not sure what word you want me to use here, so I'll try to use them all to cover the subject)

What I said was, you are misusing "common ancestry" in the way creationists misuse "macro evolution". Macro evolution is the same as their use of "micro evolution", but looking over a longer time scale. It its not about the pace or tempo.

And you are claiming the "logic" of the conclusion that we draw is common ancestry (large scale, macroevolution) but, you are basing it on the same kind of logic that says that when I ask you which difinition you are referring to, I don't understand that the word can be used to mean more than one thing. Thank you but if that is the criteria for determining fact about our origins (life and species, abiogenisis and speciation) then, I will pass, I can find a lot better logic than that.

I think it can be expalined with this simplistic, yet amusing cartoon

Oh goody another case of not reading what was typed and how wrong that makes me. Okay, try this again. We do not teach the theory of gravity as fact and theory because it is assumed that the theory is based on fact, .........--snip---.........So either teach the theory of gravity as fact and theory (of which I have never ever heard done) or assume that people know that theory implys that the theory is based on observations (fact) and stop with the nonsence of it is fact and theory. You aren't confusing anyone except yourselves.

Why do you refuse to actually undertsand anything, and only pretend your uneducated idea of science is actually fact, claiming knowledge you prove you dont have and berating others for not agreeing with your distorted view of science?

As usual you are wrong here as well, and present your ignorence in your usual arrogant patronising way. Gravity is a fact and a theory. Just like all scientific theories. The theory of Gravity is General Relativity (see also here, and here).

If you are going to insist on claiming the theory of evolution is fact and theory and not consistantly do it for the other scientific theories, then I think you need the lesson in what scientific theory is. It is built into the definition, you must know that by now after all the pages of debate over what a theory is, you have to at least have heard once by now that theory is based on fact. Do we really have to go through all of that yet again for you?

Of course I have been doing it consistently as thats how a scientifc theory works. A scientific theory is a fact and a theory. All scientific theories work that way. Evolution is a fact and a theory. Your understanding of this exactly what you would expect from somone that has no understanding of how science works.

depends on whether you meant evolution or the theory of evolution.

Either it was the specifics of the process, or I was talking generally of the theory (which includes the process). And you couldnt understand from the context what I was talking about?

And this is the second time you have skipped this part of my post:
Now, back to what you said. It (Evolution) has everything to do with modern biology. See the last time I told you that, and where you disregarded the link becasue it said "evolution" and you needed clarification. Now considering I told you they were refering to the fact and theory of biological evolution and everything therein you can now address it properly, cant you?
[page 38, post 397]

I was adding a footnote, sorry, didn't know that was against the rules,

<snipped more irrelevant ranting>

Thats nice. Now can you go back and address what I wrote now. Thanks.

Huh, what the heck are you talking about? I said I accepted it as a compliment because it is the nicest thing I have ever heard an evolutionist formally say to a "creationist" and that is surprise how? Surprised that you said it so nicely maybe, but not surprised that you said what you did. ....---snip---.....So anytime you or others here indicate that someone who doesn't see things quite the same way that you do, isn't totally ignorant, it is a big deal

I didnt say you knew what you were talking about, you dont. I said that it wasnt that you are just too unintelligent to undertsand, but that you dont bother at all and rather be deliberately difficult on purpose and insist on being as pedantic and semantical as possible for the sake of disagreeing with absolutely everything. If you can find a compliment in there, you can have it.

The problem is that most evolutionist you included, attack the intelligence and character of anyone who disagrees with you, you insult there intelligence with almost every post and you don't expect anything in return. .

I get frustrated with you because of you being difficult on purpose. If you were willing to listen and learn, instead of trying to convince everyone your own distorted uneducated view of science is accurate and refuse to listen to how things really work, I wouldnt treat you the way I do. You cant even agree on the way science uses terms, only wanting them to use them the way you use them instead, and imposing that on others. So then how can you possibily understand the complex ins and outs of the theory itself?

And you are such a hypocrite. You of all people dont have the right to get the pity vote, youve been treating people far worse than anyone has treated you. Gluadys has been extremely patient with you and all you can do is insult her and imply lack of intelligence and anything else that crosses your mind. Youve been treated very fairly.

Ed

gluadys · Jun 17, 2005

razzelflabben said:
BTW, why aren't you doing anything with the other thread, you started it, I thought you would have a greater interest in it than this one. Oh well, here we go.

Sorry, I missed the fact that you had responded to that thread. Ill get to it next.

Okay, what is logical to you is not logical to everyone else.

If I am not using the rules of logic properly, that is possible. Or if they are not. But then the arguments can be examined to see if any of them are fallacious. And the premises can be examined for factual error. If:

1. the premises are valid, and
2 the rules of logical argument are followed by all parties,

All parties will agree with the conclusion.

When this does not happen, it means there is either some fault in the premises or one or more parties is relying on a fallacious argument.

Logic is not an absolute and it certainly doesn't equal fact/truth.

The point of logic is to weed out errors in reasoning. It is not necessary that the conclusion be true as long as it follows from the premises. However, when the premises are grounded in factual evidence, then the logic will lead to factual conclusions.

Furthermore, the conclusion of a logical argument can be tested for truth by observation of the evidence.

So what do we have,

We have a person (you) who is so intent on not accepting evidence or logical conclusions, that she would rather cast doubt on their ability to lead us to truth than accept the truth they lead us to.

I think we should delve into logic, what do you think? How about if we start here? http://www.philosophypages.com/lg/e01.htm But, you can't accept logic as an authority so I wonder why you have any belief at all? Humm, consistant application does cause perticular problems doesn't it?

Good idea in another thread which I dont think we need just now. However, did you notice the little chart at the bottom of the page relating premises, inferences and conclusions? Did you note that most pathways can lead to either a true or a false conclusion.

But one pathway cannot lead to a false conclusion. That is the pathway in which
a)the premises are true, and
b)the inferences are valid.
If this is the case, then the conclusion cannot be false.

So that is the sort of logic we seek to use in science. And those are the sort of conclusions we want to get to. To do that we use evidence to assure the premises are valid. We attempt to draw valid inferences from the evidence. Then we come to a conclusion. The weak link here are the inferences. Are they really valid. Fortunately we have a way of determining that. We examine the conclusion in the light of the evidence it predicted (which is different from the evidence we started with). If the evidence disagrees with the conclusion, then we know the inferences we drew were not valid, for if they were, the conclusion must be true.

Here you go again with a bunch of nonsense that relates in no way to anything I have said.

On the contrary, it is a direct response to what you said. If you dont see that, no wonder you have a problem with logic.

Logic relies of propositions, where do those come from when we have no authority to base them on? From religion? science? math? maybe we can base them on stories? Sorry, you can't get around the fact, that you need to determine what authority you will accept on the issue. Deny it all you want, it doesn't go away.

Propositions can come from any source. In science, propositions are based on evidence.

Common ancestry, large scale, macroevolution, is not fact, it is not observed, and cannot be observed.

Speciation is macro-evolution and has been observed directly both in nature and in experiments. So, you are wrong on all counts.

Inferring, apecualting, assuming that the speciation continues indefinately is not evidence, it is not even logic, it is however assumptions.

We have no evidence that bars repeated speciation. If you have some, present it.

Oh now we bring the fire marshall into the equasion, who is he exactly in this analogy?

When there is no eye-witness of arson, the fire marshal is the person whose job it is to determine whether or not there is evidence of arson. If there is no evidence of arson, the fire is considered an accident, and the insurance company has to pay up. If there is evidence of arson, the police need to open an investigation to find the arsonist. And the insurance company wont pay up until they are satisfied that their client is not the arsonist.

In the analogy, the fire marshal is the researcher who must look for evidence of past speciations which cannot be observed by an eye-witness.

Anyway, here is the problem with your analogy, the fire marshall doesn't have enough evidence to determine whether or not the fire was set.

We dont know what evidence the fire marshal has until he tells us. It is often very clear from the evidence how a fire started and whether it was started deliberately---even when the arsonist tries to leave no clues.

Nature, of course, doesnt even try to hide evidence, so the scientific researcher can also establish evidence that leads to a definite conclusion.

You suppose there is not evidence, but there is. You just havent looked at it or havent understood it yet.

Because science knows how life propagates, we can infer that common ancestry, large scale, macroevolution happens? What are you talking about?

Yes, because we can trace the path of DNA from one species to another, just as we can from one person to another.

Oh please do try hard to make some kind of sense when posting. What are you talking about?

Same thing I was talking about above in the discussion on logic. Evidence on its own may allow for several inferences which lead to different conclusions. In that case we need to test the conclusions and the inferences they are based on against more evidence.

But sometimes evidence can lead to only one inference, to only one conclusion. When we have eliminated all conclusions but onethat conclusion must be true. Common ancestry is that sort of conclusion.

I am using an appropriate word to ask a question that is still unanswered because you would rather try to prove that the meaning of the word is wrong than answer the question. And by the way, look at the definitions for the word evolution, it can mean at least two different things scientifically, I wonder why it can have more than one meaning but the word origins cannot incorperate two different things? Because it doesn't fit your arguement?

No. Because we can tell from the context which of the two meanings of evolution is being used. But we cant tell from the context which of the meanings of origins is being used.

Huh? More that two topics? I can limit it one one, how life came to it's current state. How's that? Now it has only one meaning and you can answer the question.

Yes. Would you mind refreshing my memory. What was the question?

HuH? what are you going on about? Are we talkinga bout common ancestry, or origins.

That depends. Are you referring to your original definition of origins, or the more limited definition above? In the latter case, no we are not talking about origins. In the first case maybe we are. The discussion at that time was about how living things came to be---not about how they developed since they came to be.

Origins have not ever been defined as parent or ancestrial kind or whatever other nonsense you are talking about.

It would be a good idea to review the original conversation before going off on a tangent.

In fact, when ask for definition, the definition has always been how life came to being including it's current form. (paraphrased)

Yes, we are all well aware of that. But that doesnt help us distinguish these two concepts when they need to be distinguished.

Now as to the claims of changing definitions for common ancestry, that only definition I have used (understand the varying definition) is that of large scale, macroevolution, and now to add more clarity, ancestrral kind. I even went into a long segment as to why this is what I am talking about when using the word common ancestry. But I have changed it's meaning? You really have to be talking about some other post, who are you confusing with me?

Macro-evolution is to speciation as great-grandparents are to parents. If you can figure out how to become a great-grandparent, you have figured out macro-evolution.

Nice lesson, now how about dealing with the issue I presented instead of assuming that I don't know all this stuff.

If you know this stuff, what is the issue?

How close is very close?parent, grandparent, great great great great great grandparent....?

That will differ case by case. Rarely, speciation can occur in a single generation, so then it would be as close as the two species having the same parent. Mostly it takes hundreds of generations, and the actual number of generations varies from one situation to another.

And this equal common ancestry, large scale, macroevolution, ancestrial kind, how???????????

It is evidence that the horse and the zebra had a common ancestor fairly recently. Since they are different species now, that means there has been a speciation (aka macro-evolution).

You admitted yourself that there are no scientific observations for common ancestry, macroevolution, large scale, ancestrial kind, yet you get after me for saying that science has not observed it.

I admitted no such thing. Science has made many observations of the evidence for common ancestry from the smallest to the largest scale.

Maybe when we are finished with the other thread you started.

Yes. Along with a thread on logic. Highly necessary for understanding ERVs.

razzelflabben · Jun 20, 2005

Edx said:
It is only used broadly when used as a commen word to mean "to change over time"

When you are talking about biology you are either talking about the theory as a whole, or specifically refering to the process. You can tell which by the context, something you cant seem to be able to do.

And then we add the possible definition of shorthand for the toe, which includes common ancestry, ancestrial kind, large scale, macroevolution but is not limited to common ancestry...... which is the most common point of disagreement. So, when the words are used interchangably, there are times when it will be necessary for you to clarify what you mean. That is all I did, not assume what you meant, but instead asked you to clarify. Wow how stupid I am, I asked you to clarify which definition you meant when I could have assumed what you meant. Don't you hate people who ask questions and try to understand what you mean before jumping to conclusions and attacking your character. They are quite a nuisance and pain in the butt because they take away our excuse, that they simply didn't understand, thus leaving us empty handed when it comes to viable arguements. I do wish these type of people would simply leave the forum so as to never challenge our ideas and views don't you?!? WRONG!!! People like that are needed on the forum and in our lives, they help us learn what we believe rather than to just tell us what to believe. They test us to make sure we understand what we are saying, they are very benificial to learning, knowing, and logic. But you don't have any patience for being questioned because in your opinion anyone who doesn't parrot the same answers is simply an uneducated fool trying to prove that they know more than they know. You have been perfectly clear in this belief, no need to ask for clarity, you have voiced in many times and in many different ways and the claim is always the same. And to this, I would say to you that you need to close you mouth long enough to learn that differing opinions does not equal uneducated fools, but something much greater, that of thinking and learning and communicating.

Well if you would have looked at the context you could have figured it out easily. But you wouldnt and wont do that, you had to drag this out into semantics for pages because you obviously enjoy being pedantic on purpose.

sorry, I looked at the context and still wasn't sure, I asked my husband who was standing nearby, and he wasn't sure from the context, I read the post you included and still wasn't sure what you meant when in one place you said evolution and the other you said theory of evolution. But that's okay, you go ahead and blame me without taking any responsibility yourself, that seems to be a trend with you, I'm use to it.

By "programmed" you must mean more educatated and knowledgable than you.

<snipped ranting>

If I had meant educated and knowledgable, I would have used the words educated and knowledgable. Instead I used the word programmed because your arguements are the same canned arguements used by evolutionists no matter what question is raised. If I asked you how the fossil record evidences evolution you would come back with the arguement that I don't understand evolution if I have to ask you how the fossil record evidences evolution. If we are talking about common ancestry, large scale, microevolution, ancestrial kind, you will go back to the arguement that common ancestry means parent and nothing more. They are canned answers that do not address the questions being asked, because they assume the questions rather than listening to the questions. That is the meaning of programmed and how it applies to the statement I made.

What am I going on about? Yea, I wonder...

You: "why you didn't show us all the possible ways the term theory of evolution could be used."
Me: "You arent seriously asking for an exaustive list of every single way you can possibily use the the word are you?"

No you didnt.

Way much later in the discussion. Do keep up.

Of course it has different meanings. Only 2 are relevant, and it isnt rocket science to look at the context and figure out if Im talking specifically out the process or the general theory (which includes the process}

But as usual you just refuse to think about it, you would rather argue in circles. Like I said I dont think this is because you lack the intelligence its because you wont even attempt to use it

see above

Its the ONLY conclusion that explains all the evidence.

not necessarily

As evidenced by your discussion about logic with gluadys you dont understand that either. I'll let her deal with that though, we are dealing with your other appeals to sematics.

can't wait to see how she tries to argue her way out of it, it would be fun to see if your arguement and her's are the same since it is ourside the usually evolutionist arguements.

See the bolded parts above. Put the two together. Now are you telling me you couldnt gather from the context that they mean the same thing?

EDIT: Btw, I never actually said modern biology is the theory of evolution. If you are going to misquote me, at least misquote me accuractly.

And even if you were still confused. snip for space

Why the heck do you think I asked you for clarity?

Talk about jumping the gun! We werent talking about evidence, I was talking about what a term means which you were using in the wrong way. I dont think theres any point trying to talk to you about the evidence, if you cant even agree on the way science uses terms.

your confusing discussions here.

What I said was, you are misusing "common ancestry" in the way creationists misuse "macro evolution". Macro evolution is the same as their use of "micro evolution", but looking over a longer time scale. It its not about the pace or tempo.

different discussion, are you ready for some questions, oh that's right, you don't like to be questioned, okay, we'll do this one another time another thread when you are ready.

I think it can be expalined with this simplistic, yet amusing cartoon
snip comic for space

Now isn't it ironic that you view creationists this way all the while when evolutionist present evidence they must explain how the observations fit the theory. Very interesting irony isn't it?

Why do you refuse to actually undertsand anything, and only pretend your uneducated idea of science is actually fact, claiming knowledge you prove you dont have and berating others for not agreeing with your distorted view of science?

Huh? I ask people to clarify what they mean and I am pretending that my uneducated idea of science is fact, and refuse to learn. How do you do that? No wonder so many people refuse to accept the logic you portray as fact as baseless rhetoric. But that is another topic and another time. Thanks for not attacking my character based on evidence you don't even read much less take the time to understand. That really helps you to prove my claims wrong. NOT!

As usual you are wrong here as well, and present your ignorence in your usual arrogant patronising way. Gravity is a fact and a theory. Just like all scientific theories. The theory of Gravity is General Relativity (see also here, and here).

Of course I have been doing it consistently as thats how a scientifc theory works. A scientific theory is a fact and a theory. All scientific theories work that way. Evolution is a fact and a theory. Your understanding of this exactly what you would expect from somone that has no understanding of how science works.

Agian, you fail to understand or address the issue presented. Okay, here we go one more time. When was the last time you said that the theory of gravity is fact and theory? The above in trying to prove that I don't understand anything? First time I have ever seen the claim. In fact, I took the time to do a quick web search on gravity and none of the sites even once suggested that the theory of gravity is fact and theory. Why is this when the toe is so quick to make the claim? Theory, by process and thus definition is based on fact. In order for the theory to be moved into the realm of scientific theory, it must be based on some degree of fact, it is understood that is why the theory of gravity doesn't rely on the claim it is fact and theory, and focuses it's attention on theory. In doing so, we assume a couple of things, 1. people are not totally stupid and understand that theory is based on fact. 2. that it is the theory part that is not fact. 3. that any debate thereof is not about the facts, but the theory part. In contrast, the evolutionist makes a spacific point of saying that the toe is fact and theory. A point that suggests that 1. people are ignorant 2. that the theory is not theory 3. that any debate thus is debate over fact and not theory. When we evaluate the debate, we find however that the debate is over the theory part and not the fact part and that people understand that theory is fact and theory and object to being told that you don't already know this. Go figure, it starts a discussion off on the wrong foot when we begin by calling people stupid and in fact tooo stupid to know what they have known since their first science class. You see, it is not the claim that a theory is fact and theory that is invalid, but rather the limiting that claim to the thoery of evolution as if it were a badge of honor to be claimed as fact and theory thus minimizing the reality of what a theory is, in fact, instead of making your case, it trivializes your arguements and makes them meaningless. That is the problem with the claim that the toe is fact and theory, not that it is not, but that you make a point of saying so shows lack of knowledge and understanding which is what you claim of others. And the evidence of my words can be found every time you look up a theory and note how many make the claim that the theory is fact and theory.

Either it was the specifics of the process, or I was talking generally of the theory (which includes the process). And you couldnt understand from the context what I was talking about?

see above

And this is the second time you have skipped this part of my post:
Now, back to what you said. It (Evolution) has everything to do with modern biology. See the last time I told you that, and where you disregarded the link becasue it said "evolution" and you needed clarification. Now considering I told you they were refering to the fact and theory of biological evolution and everything therein you can now address it properly, cant you?
[page 38, post 397]

see above

<snipped more irrelevant ranting>

Thats nice. Now can you go back and address what I wrote now. Thanks.

I didnt say you knew what you were talking about, you dont. I said that it wasnt that you are just too unintelligent to undertsand, but that you dont bother at all and rather be deliberately difficult on purpose and insist on being as pedantic and semantical as possible for the sake of disagreeing with absolutely everything. If you can find a compliment in there, you can have it.

covered, I still accept it as a compliment because it is the nicest thing you I have ever heard you say to someone you deem a "creationist"

I get frustrated with you because of you being difficult on purpose. If you were willing to listen and learn, instead of trying to convince everyone your own distorted uneducated view of science is accurate and refuse to listen to how things really work, I wouldnt treat you the way I do. You cant even agree on the way science uses terms, only wanting them to use them the way you use them instead, and imposing that on others. So then how can you possibily understand the complex ins and outs of the theory itself?

right, and that is why I asked you to clarify your use of the word evolution, because I have no interest in communication, learning, listening, only interested in convincing people that I am right. Okay then, if the irony of that statement is not apparent, then nothing ever will be and your claims to knowing and understanding the theory of evolution must also be greatly exaggerated using a logic that I hope I never accept as truth.

And you are such a hypocrite. You of all people dont have the right to get the pity vote, youve been treating people far worse than anyone has treated you. Gluadys has been extremely patient with you and all you can do is insult her and imply lack of intelligence and anything else that crosses your mind. Youve been treated very fairly.

Ed

I don't ask for pity, in fact, I have enjoyed this thread emensely and learned much, in fact, what I once would have given the toe credit for I have found was hasty on my part and I should not have done so because the claims have no basis. That is the problem with only mimicing what you have been told to believe without ever understanding what you believe. But that is another discussion. I have not attacked anyones character and take great care to avoid such, I have however told you how you sound and why sounding that way is so harmful to communication. I have also told you what character flaws you have displayed, but never once attacked your intelligence, your abilities, your personhood, much less your truthfullness. Of which I cannot say the same for you. You have attacked my intelligence, my abilities to understand, my honesty, my reasons for being here, etc. the list just keeps going on and on which is why I find this a character flaw in you. NOw please be aware that we all have character flaws, and they are nothing more than things that we should work on and say nothing about the person in general. In fact, I have spoken of how much I have enjoyed our discussion, how knowledgable I think you are, how much I look forward to futher discussions, I have told you I have no interest in convincing you of anything, because I respect your opinion. Doesn't sound like the same thing at all does it. And yet your claim is that I have treated you far worse, when the kindest thing you have said is a sideways critisism of my purpose for being here which brings into question my honesty. Hummm, I wonder what you see as being the same?

razzelflabben · Jun 20, 2005

Let's see if we can take this down to common disagreements rather than going on and on for pages about how I don't understand that same things that I am trying to tell you okay? Okay!

gluadys said:
Sorry, I missed the fact that you had responded to that thread. Ill get to it next.

If I am not using the rules of logic properly, that is possible. Or if they are not. But then the arguments can be examined to see if any of them are fallacious. And the premises can be examined for factual error. If:

1. the premises are valid, and
2 the rules of logical argument are followed by all parties,

All parties will agree with the conclusion.

When this does not happen, it means there is either some fault in the premises or one or more parties is relying on a fallacious argument.

But this requires that all people are 1. agreeing on the premises (what authority do we accept) and 2. that everyone is agreeing on the rules of logic, (authority of rules of logic must be accepted) But you don't want to accept any authority so all rules are thrown out and all premises are thrown out because there is no consistance, no rules that we can agree on. Why can't you people see past your disagreements with me to even remotely try to understand what I am saying (I know, because I am to stupid to try to communicate, move on) Accepting an authroity is nothing more than accepting an agreed upon set of terms that we deem as right. Remember way back when we talked about accepting an athority and I told you that it is what makes the creationist come to a different conclusion than the evolutionists, what authority they choose. It is because the creationist accepts the premises of the bible/God as authroity whereas you might choose the authority of science/scientists/scientific method. Without this authority to base our premises on, to establish the rules of logic, then our conclusions will very likely be different. So if we have no rules, no premises, no authority, we have no logical conclusion. This isn't rocket science and I can't fathom where you are having problems.

The point of logic is to weed out errors in reasoning. It is not necessary that the conclusion be true as long as it follows from the premises. However, when the premises are grounded in factual evidence, then the logic will lead to factual conclusions.

Furthermore, the conclusion of a logical argument can be tested for truth by observation of the evidence.

But if the rules of logic are not accepted as the authroity for determining a logical answer. See, you are trying to not accept an authority but ask others to accept one. If I want to come to a logical, educated conclusion, then I must accept your say on what is logical and educated, in essence, accept you as the authority on the subject. I can't accept you as the authority on the toe because I know there is much about it that you personnaly don't understand. So any arguement that you make based on you as the authority is meaningless and since you choose no authority to base your claims on, you have nothing but personal opinions to offer on the subject of which I will respectfully not accept as fact and look for someone who accepts science and scientific method as authority to determine our understand of our origins.

We have a person (you) who is so intent on not accepting evidence or logical conclusions, that she would rather cast doubt on their ability to lead us to truth than accept the truth they lead us to.

Whatever,when discussion our scientific understanding of our origns, I accept science and scientific method as the authority not you and your personal opinions. This includes logical conclusions as part of scientific theory but not fact. However, you are asking me to accept your opinions based on you being the authority base of your opinions and not science or scientific method. Can't and won't go there no matter how many times you want to question my intelligence and motives, for scientific answers, I choose the authority of science and not you. Go figure. Especially since you have already admitted to not being a scientist, I don't see how your opinion based on your own logic would help us to know what science has to tell us about our origins.

Good idea in another thread which I dont think we need just now. However, did you notice the little chart at the bottom of the page relating premises, inferences and conclusions? Did you note that most pathways can lead to either a true or a false conclusion.

But one pathway cannot lead to a false conclusion. That is the pathway in which
a)the premises are true, and
b)the inferences are valid.
If this is the case, then the conclusion cannot be false.

This is only true if the premises and the rules of logic are consistant but if there is no authority to determine the absolutes, then, there is no garentee that the conclusions are the same.

So that is the sort of logic we seek to use in science. And those are the sort of conclusions we want to get to. To do that we use evidence to assure the premises are valid. We attempt to draw valid inferences from the evidence. Then we come to a conclusion. The weak link here are the inferences. Are they really valid. Fortunately we have a way of determining that. We examine the conclusion in the light of the evidence it predicted (which is different from the evidence we started with). If the evidence disagrees with the conclusion, then we know the inferences we drew were not valid, for if they were, the conclusion must be true.

This is scientific method, but you don't accept this authority so we cannot assume that your conclusions are based on the scientific method or on your own agenda. So we can come to different conclusions, using the same methods and claims, and logic cannot answer why you believe one thing and I believe another. It can identify what premises are different, but without an authority, my premises are just as valid as yours and so we are no closer to the truth than when we started.

On the contrary, it is a direct response to what you said. If you dont see that, no wonder you have a problem with logic.

Propositions can come from any source. In science, propositions are based on evidence.

see above

Speciation is macro-evolution and has been observed directly both in nature and in experiments. So, you are wrong on all counts.

Okay, let's define microevolution and macroevolution because apparently, you don't understand the problem that creationists have with the toe. Maybe you need to listen to what they are saying long enough to understand the heart of the debate since none of the words we are alowed to use have meanings that are understood when debating only when you are talking.

We have no evidence that bars repeated speciation. If you have some, present it.

And no evidence that it continues on indefiniately. Go figure, that is the problem.

When there is no eye-witness of arson, the fire marshal is the person whose job it is to determine whether or not there is evidence of arson. If there is no evidence of arson, the fire is considered an accident, and the insurance company has to pay up. If there is evidence of arson, the police need to open an investigation to find the arsonist. And the insurance company wont pay up until they are satisfied that their client is not the arsonist.

In the analogy, the fire marshal is the researcher who must look for evidence of past speciations which cannot be observed by an eye-witness.

Okay, the researchers. have evidence, they have a burnt building and the fire starting materials. The is like saying we have existance and speciation. Now, tell me with that information how the fire marshel knows if there was a arson fire or accidental fire? Because the fire starting materials exist, we are going to assume that the fire was arson, okay, now we'll give the claim over to the police to put a case together. What nonsence. The fire marshall relies on more than just that arson is possible, he needs more evidence than that. I know you believe that more evidence exists, but it is your belief based on your own authority and has no bases on our scientific understand.

We dont know what evidence the fire marshal has until he tells us. It is often very clear from the evidence how a fire started and whether it was started deliberately---even when the arsonist tries to leave no clues.

we can know what evidence science has, but we need to identify science as the authority before we can look at the evidence objectively and fairly and determine what science knows and doesn't know.

Nature, of course, doesnt even try to hide evidence, so the scientific researcher can also establish evidence that leads to a definite conclusion.

But God does hide things. "It is the glory of God to conceal a thing and the honor of kings to search out a matter". In fact, much about nature is hidden from man that is why we need science and scientific method.

You suppose there is not evidence, but there is. You just havent looked at it or havent understood it yet.

Your opinion based on no concretes.

Yes, because we can trace the path of DNA from one species to another, just as we can from one person to another.[/quoote] Then identifying the basic genetic information that identifies tails in humans as genetic and 6 legges calfs as random should be an easy thing, why can't any evolutionist provide the evidence for this? It truely would be evidence for common ancestry, large scale, macroevolution, ancestrial kind.

Same thing I was talking about above in the discussion on logic. Evidence on its own may allow for several inferences which lead to different conclusions. In that case we need to test the conclusions and the inferences they are based on against more evidence.

But sometimes evidence can lead to only one inference, to only one conclusion. When we have eliminated all conclusions but onethat conclusion must be true. Common ancestry is that sort of conclusion.

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and this is your opinion based on no absolutes except your own opinion. has no meaning or relavency to a scientific discussion.

No. Because we can tell from the context which of the two meanings of evolution is being used. But we cant tell from the context which of the meanings of origins is being used.

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Right because origins doesn't have a shifting meaning. The meaning is both, not either or.

Yes. Would you mind refreshing my memory. What was the question?

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Why is origins so important to so many people?

That depends. Are you referring to your original definition of origins, or the more limited definition above? In the latter case, no we are not talking about origins. In the first case maybe we are. The discussion at that time was about how living things came to be---not about how they developed since they came to be.

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There you go again worrying about semantics and not about the explainations given for what is being asked or talked about. YOu asked me what I meant by origins and I stated it many times. That is what I mean when using the word origins. If you don't like the definition, offer an alternate one(of which I asked for and noone offered one) or accept my use of the word and then address the definition of the word later.

It would be a good idea to review the original conversation before going off on a tangent.

Yes, we are all well aware of that. But that doesnt help us distinguish these two concepts when they need to be distinguished.

Macro-evolution is to speciation as great-grandparents are to parents. If you can figure out how to become a great-grandparent, you have figured out macro-evolution.

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see above, I'm sure you are smart enough to know what the debate is about and to be able to provide words that would appropriately identify what is being disputed.

If you know this stuff, what is the issue?

That will differ case by case. Rarely, speciation can occur in a single generation, so then it would be as close as the two species having the same parent. Mostly it takes hundreds of generations, and the actual number of generations varies from one situation to another.

It is evidence that the horse and the zebra had a common ancestor fairly recently. Since they are different species now, that means there has been a speciation (aka macro-evolution).

I admitted no such thing. Science has made many observations of the evidence for common ancestry from the smallest to the largest scale.

Yes. Along with a thread on logic. Highly necessary for understanding ERVs.

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see above

gluadys · Jun 20, 2005

razzelflabben said:
But this requires that all people are 1. agreeing on the premises (what authority do we accept)

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Premises are statements, not an authority. For example, I might have a major premise that states:

All swans are white.

And a minor premise which states:

There is a swan in the millpond.

My conclusion would then be:

The swan in the millpond is white.

If both my premises are correct, the conclusion will also be correct.

In this case my major premise is not correct. It is not the case that all swans are white. So it may be that the swan in the millpond is not white either. If we observe that the conclusion is false, we know that one or both of the premises must be false as well.

and 2. that everyone is agreeing on the rules of logic, (authority of rules of logic must be accepted)

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The rules of logic do not require accepting an authority. They are simply rules that people have discovered that lead to conclusions that cannot be wrong if the premises are correct. What the rules of logic will not tell us is whether or not the premises are correct.
But neither the premises, nor the rules, require an authority.

But if the rules of logic are not accepted as the authroity for determining a logical answer.

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Because, despite the name rules, logic is not an authority. An authority could change the rules. But the rules of logic cannot be changed. They simply describe how to be sure the conclusion of a logical process is consistent with the premises.

If I want to come to a logical, educated conclusion, then I must accept your say on what is logical and educated, in essence, accept you as the authority on the subject.

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I am not asking you to accept any authority, including mine.

Whatever,when discussion our scientific understanding of our origns, I accept science and scientific method as the authority not you and your personal opinions. This includes logical conclusions as part of scientific theory but not fact.

Click to expand...

Good, in part. Scientists dont accept a logical conclusion as fact just because it is logical. They check the logical conclusion against the reality of nature first. A scientist would say my argument about the swan in the millpond is indeed logical and follows from the premises. But that would not be good enough to make it a fact. So the scientist would go and take a look at the swan in the millpond.

This is only true if the premises and the rules of logic are consistant but if there is no authority to determine the absolutes, then, there is no garentee that the conclusions are the same.

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Did you read your own link? Did you study the chart and the explanations? It is the very nature of logic that if the premises are true, and the inferences are valid, the conclusion cannot be false. No authority is needed to establish any absolutes.

Logical conclusions are not debatable. When logical conclusions are not true, the problem does not lie in the conclusion, but either in the premises (at least one is not true) or in the inferences (they were not valid, but based on fallacious reasoning). So when presented with a logical conclusion that is contrary to fact, it is necessary to go back to the premises and the inferences to see what is wrong with them.

In science, the final and only authority is always the observed facts. Logic can steer us toward finding what the facts are, but it does not replace them.

This is scientific method, but you don't accept this authority

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Scientific method is a process, not an authority. It is a method of research, not something that tells you what your research must lead to. When all parties use the same method (which includes, but it not limited to, logical arguments), they will come to the same conclusions, though it may take a long time and a lot of convincing evidence to get there.

If you and I are coming to different conclusions, we can find out who is right by following scientific procedure. (Or we can find there is not enough evidence to decide.)

So we can come to different conclusions, using the same methods and claims, and logic cannot answer why you believe one thing and I believe another.

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No we cannot. If the same methods are used to test the same claims, under the rules of logic, it is not possible for the conclusions to be different. A logical conclusion is not debatable. The claims are debatable, the premises can be challenged, logical inferences can be examined for fallacies, methods can be called into question. These are what we have to look at---these and the reality of nature which is the final scientific arbiter.

It can identify what premises are different, but without an authority, my premises are just as valid as yours and so we are no closer to the truth than when we started.

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Sure, your premises are just as valid as mine. We dont need an authority to validate premises. The logical conclusion based on those premises will decide. If the conclusion is not true, we know that some of the premises are not true, or that the inferences (aka predictions) based on the premises failed to follow the rules of logic in some way.

Okay, let's define microevolution and macroevolution

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They have already been defined scientifically. Using a non-scientific definition only obscures matters. If creationists want to draw the line between micro-evolution and macro-evolution somewhere other than the definition of species, they will have to say where that is. And they will have to explain why speciation can occur to the extent of parent and daughter species, but not to the extent of great-grandparent and great-granddaughter species.

because apparently, you don't understand the problem that creationists have with the toe.

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What I am saying is that creationist problems with evolution are based on a false understanding of how evolution works. Learn how evolution works and creationist problems (in so far as they are scientific) melt away. Theological problems, of course, are a different matter.

Maybe you need to listen to what they are saying long enough to understand the heart of the debate since none of the words we are alowed to use have meanings that are understood when debating only when you are talking.

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There is no point re-inventing scientific vocabulary. Scientific terminology is well-defined. The correct solution is not to try and change it, but to learn to use it.

And no evidence that it continues on indefiniately.

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The logic of reproduction says it continues on as long as species continue to exist. So does a great deal of evidence. If you have evidence that there is a barrier to evolution continuing as long as a population lives, please present it so that we can discuss it.

Okay, the researchers. have evidence, they have a burnt building and the fire starting materials. The is like saying we have existance and speciation. Now, tell me with that information how the fire marshel knows if there was a arson fire or accidental fire?

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To do that, I would have to take the training a fire marshal gets to do her job. And to understand most of what I learned, so would you. Nevertheless, this is the sort of thing a fire marshal does, based on what she learned and on her experience. That is why her testimony in court will be accepted as expert testimony. Do you really think that insurance companies and courts would base important decisions on the testimony of a fire marshall if unwitnessed arson could not be detected? You know, just by reading the papers, that fires are investigated to see what caused them. So you know it is possible to determine the cause. If it were not, it would be pointless to investigate.

Because the fire starting materials exist, we are going to assume that the fire was arson,

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Absolutely not! No action can be taken on an assumption. The evidence must be examined and a conclusion based on the evidence must be determined. Only when it is concluded (not assumed) from the evidence that this is a case of arson will the police become involved. The simple existence of fire-starting materials is not enough to base a conclusion on.

The fire marshall relies on more than just that arson is possible, he needs more evidence than that.

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Exactly. See above.

I know you believe that more evidence exists, but it is your belief based on your own authority and has no bases on our scientific understand.

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Evidence either exists or it doesnt. That is not a matter of anyones belief.

we can know what evidence science has, but we need to identify science as the authority before we can look at the evidence objectively and fairly and determine what science knows and doesn't know.

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??? This makes no sense.

But God does hide things. "It is the glory of God to conceal a thing and the honor of kings to search out a matter".

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And science does not attempt to investigate God. If God is hiding any part of nature, that is evidence the scientist has no access to. It would be Gods fault then, if the scientist comes to incorrect conclusions.

Your opinion based on no concretes.

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Interesting that you pass this statement off as my opinion rather than asking what the evidence is. The evidence is there and when you are ready to look at it with an open mind, it will still be there.

Yes, because we can trace the path of DNA from one species to another, just as we can from one person to another.

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Then identifying the basic genetic information that identifies tails in humans as genetic

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Yes, that has been done. The genetic basis of the human tail is the same as that for the coccyx, since the coccyx is composed of the bones that form the tail in other vertebrates, and (temporarily) in the human embryo, and in those rare humans who are born with a tail.

and 6 legges calfs as random

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This is a deformity caused by a malfunction in embryonic development. It has no relation to evolution unless we start getting populations of six-legged calves, instead of isolated individuals born with a rare disorder. Remember, individuals do not evolve. Only populations evolve.

and this is your opinion based on no absolutes except your own opinion. has no meaning or relavency to a scientific discussion.

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Not my conclusion. The conclusion of the vast majority of biologists who have working knowledge of the evidence. Not based on absolutes either, but on evidence and logical inferences from the evidence.

Right because origins doesn't have a shifting meaning. The meaning is both, not either or.

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Yes. It is. Thats the problem with it.

Why is origins so important to so many people?

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I dont know about other people. My reason for learning about it was that it bothers me a great deal that Christians are being fed a line of false teaching, both scientifically and theologically, by the creationist movement (and now the ID movement as well). I believe the truth is never an enemy of God, and should never be presented as if it is. I want my children, my future grandchildren, all children to be taught the truth both in school and in church. I want them taught the truth about God and about Gods world. And that cannot be as long as creationism has a foothold in the church.

There you go again worrying about semantics and not about the explainations given for what is being asked or talked about.

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LOL. You start a thread called Start communicating and you complain about semantics? Cant communicate without attention to semantics. Just what do you think semantics is all about?

YOu asked me what I meant by origins and I stated it many times. That is what I mean when using the word origins. If you don't like the definition, offer an alternate one(of which I asked for and noone offered one) or accept my use of the word and then address the definition of the word later.

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I have no difficulty using the word origin both in the phrase origin of life and origin of species. In both cases, origin means source, beginning. But the processes are quite different in each case. The first process is abiogenesis. The second is evolution. I refuse to use a meaning for origin which obscures this essential difference.

see above, I'm sure you are smart enough to know what the debate is about and to be able to provide words that would appropriately identify what is being disputed.

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Indeed, the debate is about whether or not it is possible to become grandparents. Creationists insist it is impossible, but can provide no reason why. And since grandparents do exist, it seems the creationists must be wrong.

Start communicating

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