Where are the X-Men?

[mindlight]

If evolution is true then surely it should be an ongoing process. So mankind for instance would still be evolving and adapting . Of course there is a sense which we continually adapt to our environment so I am not referring to microevolutionary change and small scale adaptations but rather about evidence of the big jumps to a new superior higher form of human existence.

The superior adaptations should be surviving at the expense of those which are not. In short we should be seeing people with distinct advantages (even special powers) evolving amongst us and people for example with deficiencies like short sight or an obesity problem should be dying out.

The apparent lack of evidence for this master race in our midst and even despite having a living sample of 7 billion people now available for real time scientific research might be considered an argument against evolution.

Prove me wrong if you can , provide evidence of the X-Men amongst us! Even better name one!

 

[seeingeyes]

If evolution enables a species to adapt to it's environment, then the only x-man power that we are likely to see in the near future is the ability to sit in a chair for 22 hours a day without losing muscle mass or gaining excess poundage. How do you think professor x stays so slim?

 

[mindlight]

If evolution enables a species to adapt to it's environment, then the only x-man power that we are likely to see in the near future is the ability to sit in a chair for 22 hours a day without losing muscle mass or gaining excess poundage. How do you think professor x stays so slim?

There are people who survive the "chair" for genetic, diet or stress related reasons and others who spend those 2 hours outside of it in Triathlon or Marathon training! Overall there seems to be classes of emaciated, fat and fit people. It is in the fit people class that I would expect to see adaptations and evidence of quantum leaps in Olympic athletic records and such like. Also I might categorise people by intelligence and see stupid, hopeless, normal and clever. It is among the clever that I would look for the quantum leaps in mental performance. But where are the examples of these massive leaps in IQ, EQ, Creative output or whatever? But we are not seeing these quantum leaps in performance in any particular areas of human performance. So given that our sample size is now 7 billion (Or every year 7 billion many years of evolutionary experience) this must be considered statistically surprising to those who believe in evolution.

 

[Archie the Preacher]

Mindlight, Eyes is giving you a good answer and you're ignoring it because you think you know the answer.

The whole focus of Darwinian evolution is for the species in question to survive. Not get smarter, not get bigger, not go faster, just survive. Some of that other stuff may enter into the process, but the goal is survival. Not smarts.

Modern technology and industry has removed some of the old factors from the 'selection' process. For instance, eyeglasses, contact lenses and surgery have corrected many of the vision problems that might have killed off someone a century ago. Wheelchairs and prostheses have made many who would have been 'cripples' into regular functioning people. Politicians have given other people's money to those who lack the initiative to work.

Evolution in some regards has been circumvented.

There's something else you miss. How do you know there are NOT 'humans' among us who have abilities higher than the average? In some cases, far higher than average? If you think about it, they probably don't want to look like freaks. So some will hide their 'ability'.

Ever watch a little kid playing a video game? Amazing. They are adapting. The human race is adapting, even if you can't see it.

Oh. As much as I really enjoy the X-men series, there is no real reason a human child would be born with destructive beams emanating from his eyes, or wings capable of flight growing from his shoulders. The genetic coding to cause such a change is huge. So try not to get too much of your knowledge of evolution from comic books.

Don't get shooting tips from movies or television, either. Sigh...

 

[mindlight]

Mindlight, Eyes is giving you a good answer and you're ignoring it because you think you know the answer.

The theory of evolution states that we evolved from microbes to more complex organisms. If that sense of qualitative improvement happened over billions of man years then it should also be happening now. I am not interested in the kind of adaptation that effectively amounts to a downgrading of our innate potential as beings though I admit the theory of evolution also allows for that.

The whole focus of Darwinian evolution is for the species in question to survive. Not get smarter, not get bigger, not go faster, just survive. Some of that other stuff may enter into the process, but the goal is survival. Not smarts.

There is a reproductive advantage in being smarter , faster and stronger and so people with these characteristics should according to the theory be surviving and propagating at the expense of those who are slower, dumber and weaker.

Modern technology and industry has removed some of the old factors from the 'selection' process. For instance, eyeglasses, contact lenses and surgery have corrected many of the vision problems that might have killed off someone a century ago. Wheelchairs and prostheses have made many who would have been 'cripples' into regular functioning people. Politicians have given other people's money to those who lack the initiative to work.

Evolution in some regards has been circumvented.

There have always been factors that call into question the primary significance of the theory of evolution. The strong and brave die first in war, an idyllic environment preserves the weak as well as the strong and now technologies means that there is an artificiality to most of our lives.

There's something else you miss. How do you know there are NOT 'humans' among us who have abilities higher than the average? In some cases, far higher than average? If you think about it, they probably don't want to look like freaks. So some will hide their 'ability'.

The bible talks of such people. People with amazing strength like Samson and prophetic foresight like Isaiah or administrative capability like Daniel. People of extraordinary height like Goliath etc. But it provides a different explanation for these people. If evolution were true we would expect people of this type to be growing in numerical significance to the point of not being concealable, to enjoy a reproductive advantage over other humans and to displace them at crucial moments such as mass famines , disease or war. How do you hide a race of 9 foot giants?

Ever watch a little kid playing a video game? Amazing. They are adapting. The human race is adapting, even if you can't see it.

Adaptation is just living. But the kinds of jumps the theory of evolution should expect in a sample of human beings that allows for 70 billion years of human experience every 10 years should be happening and clearly are not. So that calls into question the whole theory.

Oh. As much as I really enjoy the X-men series, there is no real reason a human child would be born with destructive beams emanating from his eyes, or wings capable of flight growing from his shoulders. The genetic coding to cause such a change is huge. So try not to get too much of your knowledge of evolution from comic books.

Don't get shooting tips from movies or television, either. Sigh...

It is people who believe in the evolutionary theory that wrote these scripts not creationists. You are talking to the choir here.

 

[seeingeyes]

The theory of evolution states that we evolved from microbes to more complex organisms. If that sense of qualitative improvement happened over billions of man years then it should also be happening now.

Wait around a million years and see what happens. :shrug:

 

[seeingeyes]

There is a reproductive advantage in being smarter , faster and stronger and so people with these characteristics should according to the theory be surviving and propagating at the expense of those who are slower, dumber and weaker.

Have you ever seen the movie Idiocracy?

 

[Archie the Preacher]

The theory of evolution states that we evolved from microbes to more complex organisms. If that sense of qualitative improvement happened over billions of man years then it should also be happening now.

Ah, I see. You believe that idiocy told you by some other know-nothing which dictates you should be able to watch it happen. I've heard too many really, really stupid people tell me, "Well, last night my dog didn't turn into a horse. That proves evolution is false!" I really want people like you to understand just how ignorant is that sort of thought process and how depressingly dumb one must be to accept it.

I am not interested in the kind of adaptation that effectively amounts to a downgrading of our innate potential as beings though I admit the theory of evolution also allows for that.

In other words, you reject the evolution you think you can see because it doesn't fit your bias.

There is a reproductive advantage in being smarter , faster and stronger and so people with these characteristics should according to the theory be surviving and propagating at the expense of those who are slower, dumber and weaker.

Another false prediction on your part. You really need to look at the mating rituals of young liberal people in the bars on weekends. None of them choose a mate on the basis of intellect. In fact, stupidity seems to be a prime attractive quality in both men and women.

No. Intelligence is not the sole factor in the survival of a species. By your thinking, humans would have killed off all the monkeys by now.

If evolution were true we would expect...

Mindlight, this 'expectation' only logically applies IF the predictor understands the theory under discussion. Since you know next to nothing about the concept or function, your predictions are at best wild guesses and at worst deliberate falsehoods.

 

[mindlight]

Wait around a million years and see what happens. :shrug:

Why assume that 7 billion people are all at the same stage of evolution. If the theory is true then surely you have the possibility of a million years of divergence in the actual human race today in diverse geographically or cultural separated groups.

 

[mindlight]

Ah, I see. You believe that idiocy told you by some other know-nothing which dictates you should be able to watch it happen. I've heard too many really, really stupid people tell me, "Well, last night my dog didn't turn into a horse. That proves evolution is false!" I really want people like you to understand just how ignorant is that sort of thought process and how depressingly dumb one must be to accept it.

In other words, you reject the evolution you think you can see because it doesn't fit your bias.

Fish do not turn into Monkeys- absolutely right! The kinds of claims made by Evolutionists are unprovable because of the timespans they envisage for these changes.

Another false prediction on your part. You really need to look at the mating rituals of young liberal people in the bars on weekends. None of them choose a mate on the basis of intellect. In fact, stupidity seems to be a prime attractive quality in both men and women.

No. Intelligence is not the sole factor in the survival of a species. By your thinking, humans would have killed off all the monkeys by now.

Mindlight, this 'expectation' only logically applies IF the predictor understands the theory under discussion. Since you know next to nothing about the concept or function, your predictions are at best wild guesses and at worst deliberate falsehoods.

I never said intelligence was a sole factor but it is one of the signs of advancement as would be increased speed, resilience or strength for instance.

You seem to be confirming the view, that I hold, that macro evolution is not happening in the natural world and does not happen in real life. Regression seems more common than advancement and so the idea of development from lower level organisms to higher level ones seems preposterous on the practical level. Fish do not develop into monkeys! Rather they hang out metaphorically speaking with molluscs and drop a few notches on the evolutionary scale for the sake of a night of pleasure. Or more likely wake up exactly the same species they were before their night on the town plus headache.

 

[mindlight]

Have you ever seen the movie Idiocracy?

No and it was not much of a box office success. The idea that we could sleep 500 years and wake up in a society of idiots in which we would comparably speaking be Einstein's and Shakespeare's is an amusing story however. The people before the enlightenment believed in God and many of those after it did not. Maybe a traveller through time from 1500 would regard the current culture as idiotic for its atheistic and naturalistic assumptions about Gods creation.

 

[agua]

No and it was not much of a box office success. The idea that we could sleep 500 years and wake up in a society of idiots in which we would comparably speaking be Einstein's and Shakespeare's is an amusing story however.

Have you noticed how a lot of our modern "helps" devices cause us to use less complicated thinking ? There's a possibility people won't know how to solve complicated problems without a computer some day.

 

[seeingeyes]

Why assume that 7 billion people are all at the same stage of evolution. If the theory is true then surely you have the possibility of a million years of divergence in the actual human race today in diverse geographically or cultural separated groups.

I'm not assuming that. But I am assuming that if you want to see a population change, it's gonna take more than three days...

And if you want to see a mutation that causes something that no one even thinks is possible (like psychic powers or magnetism with your mind), then you should pull up a chair, cause it will be a while.

 

[Skaloop]

For starters, evolution does not predict large-scale leaps along the lines of the X-Men. However, there are mutations, in the real sense, that allow people to be almost "superhuman". For example, sports superstars with much higher-than-average hand-eye coordination. Or endurance athletes with extremely high lung capacity. Or swimmers with disproportionately large hands and feet. The sorts of things that allow people like LeBron James or Micheal Phelps to be much better at what they do than the rest of us are capable of.

But in terms of evolution, they don't really help a whole lot with survival or reproduction. Being a good basketball player or swimmer doesn't have any real effect on either of those things. Superstar athletes (or superstar academics, or superstar artists, or superstar poker players, etc.) don't procreate at any greater rate than the rest of us. In fact, it could be argued that the demands of being a superstar anything are actually detrimental to reproduction, since they have to devote so much time to being a superstar and therefore cannot devote as much time to being a parent.

Add into that the fact that there is not the same struggle for survival among humans that generally drives evolution, and even if someone was born the power to control and manipulate metal it wouldn't do much to improve their survival, let alone to enough of a degree to allow the power to spread through the human population.

 

[Archie the Preacher]

Mindlight, I think what shocks me most is you are actually proud of your ignorance. It is unconquerable.

I should know better. I've met your ilk before.

 

[mindlight]

For starters, evolution does not predict large-scale leaps along the lines of the X-Men. However, there are mutations, in the real sense, that allow people to be almost "superhuman". For example, sports superstars with much higher-than-average hand-eye coordination. Or endurance athletes with extremely high lung capacity. Or swimmers with disproportionately large hands and feet. The sorts of things that allow people like LeBron James or Micheal Phelps to be much better at what they do than the rest of us are capable of.

But in terms of evolution, they don't really help a whole lot with survival or reproduction. Being a good basketball player or swimmer doesn't have any real effect on either of those things. Superstar athletes (or superstar academics, or superstar artists, or superstar poker players, etc.) don't procreate at any greater rate than the rest of us. In fact, it could be argued that the demands of being a superstar anything are actually detrimental to reproduction, since they have to devote so much time to being a superstar and therefore cannot devote as much time to being a parent.

Add into that the fact that there is not the same struggle for survival among humans that generally drives evolution, and even if someone was born the power to control and manipulate metal it wouldn't do much to improve their survival, let alone to enough of a degree to allow the power to spread through the human population.

You make some good points.

How is the theory of evolution science if it cannot make predictions based on definable current facts and conditions?

Granted the fanciful powers of fictional XMen might not be the kinds of things that would enhance either survivability or reproduction. What kinds of mutations would be improvements in these areas likely to contribute to the evolution of humanity?

Can you point to any evidence that these are actually happening?

 

[mindlight]

Mindlight, I think what shocks me most is you are actually proud of your ignorance. It is unconquerable.

I should know better. I've met your ilk before.

You cannot know if evolution is true and yet stubbornly affirm it.

 

[mindlight]

Have you noticed how a lot of our modern "helps" devices cause us to use less complicated thinking ? There's a possibility people won't know how to solve complicated problems without a computer some day.

Then there will be 2 classes of people , the Programmers will be Aristocrats and the rest mere consumers. The Programmers will still have intelligence and the rest not.

 

[agua]

Then there will be 2 classes of people , the Programmers will be Aristocrats and the rest mere consumers. The Programmers will still have intelligence and the rest not.

Yeah ! Actually that's very close to the Masonic ideal

 

[SkyWriting]

Mindlight, Eyes is giving you a good answer and you're ignoring it because you think you know the answer.

The whole focus of Darwinian evolution is for the species in question to survive. Not get smarter, not get bigger, not go faster, just survive. Some of that other stuff may enter into the process, but the goal is survival. Not smarts.

Modern technology and industry has removed some of the old factors from the 'selection' process. For instance, eyeglasses, contact lenses and surgery have corrected many of the vision problems that might have killed off someone a century ago. Wheelchairs and prostheses have made many who would have been 'cripples' into regular functioning people. Politicians have given other people's money to those who lack the initiative to work.

Evolution in some regards has been circumvented.

There's something else you miss. How do you know there are NOT 'humans' among us who have abilities higher than the average? In some cases, far higher than average? If you think about it, they probably don't want to look like freaks. So some will hide their 'ability'.

Ever watch a little kid playing a video game? Amazing. They are adapting. The human race is adapting, even if you can't see it.

Well, of the billions, you failed to pick even one that fit your own criteria.

I would have picked the couple on Naked Survival. No, they didn't have kids. I guess not.