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[The Barbarian]

Philosophy is not post-modern (at least not most of it).

My problem with philosophy is the lack of agreement by philosophers on some very basic issues. If science was like that, there'd be no progress at all.

 

[RC Tent]

My problem with philosophy is the lack of agreement by philosophers on some very basic issues. If science was like that, there'd be no progress at all.

Philosophy is not science, it does not have the same requirements for progress. It has a different target, serves a different purpose, therefore has different parameters.

Your inability to deal with that does not make science something it is not.

 

[The Barbarian]

So what progress has philosophy made recently?

 

[Job 33:6]

@RC Tent

I wonder about post #132, and your thoughts.

Thanks,

 

[RC Tent]

So what progress has philosophy made recently?

Provide your definition of "progress" as it applies in philosophy.

You can provide some scientific evidence that science can establish what is real too, without it we do not know if your claim that science can do that is real do we?

 

[RC Tent]

@RC Tent

I wonder about post #132, and your thoughts.

Thanks,

Please point me to where someone has said that the "transitional parts do not exist".

I might be missing where it is, but I didn't see that. I tried creationist science sites, and mainstream biology criticising them, but I cannot see where there is someone saying that.

 

[Job 33:6]

Please point me to where someone has said that the "transitional parts do not exist".

I might be missing where it is, but I didn't see that. I tried creationist science sites, and mainstream biology criticising them, but I cannot see where there is someone saying that.

Thanks,

They don't acknowledge that such features do or don't exist. They just call tiktaalik a fish (indirectly implying that it only has fish features and that there is nothing out of the ordinary about it) and end the discussion there, without acknowledging the presence of features, such as a neck, which are otherwise only found in land based animals (fish don't have unfused skulls, but tiktaalik does).

Tiktaalik actually has a lot of features and looks a lot like a salamander. Flat head, a head that can turn and look while it's body stays stationary. Eyes in top of the head like an alligator, salamander or frog that pokes it's head above water, robust limbs for lifting it's body against the weight of gravity, spiracles for air breathing etc. But you wouldn't ever hear any young earthers admit this. Even though it is physical reality.

By your response, I am lead to believe that you acknowledge that it isn't a matter of subjection, whether or not tiktaalik holds features that are predominantly found in land dwelling animals and are not found in other fish.

Is this correct?

 

[The Barbarian]

Provide your definition of "progress" as it applies in philosophy.

Hmm... you said...

Philosophy is not science, it does not have the same requirements for progress. It has a different target, serves a different purpose, therefore has different parameters.

So tell us about those requirements and what progress has been made lately.

You can provide some scientific evidence that science can establish what is real too

O.K. The philosopher Democritus, based on experiments he made, (hence science) inferred the existence of tiny things he called "atoms" ("indivisible") that made up all matter, including air and water. Dalton's work with chemistry showed that chemical reactions were consistent with the existence of atoms, but still no hard confirmation of Democritis' theory.

Einstein, noting the "Brownian Movement" of tiny particles in water, supposed that they were being pushed around by the random movement of molecules (which are made of atoms). So basically Einstein calculated the force on a pollen grain floating in water. Then, by watching how pollen grain moved around in still water, you can determine the size of water molecules that are hitting them.
How Einstein Showed that Atoms Existed

Later, we were able to actually get images of individual atoms:

You are looking at a single strontium atom.

without it we do not know if your claim that science can do that is real do we?

It's how we know. Hypotheses make testable predictions. If these are repeatedly confirmed the hypothesis is then a theory and we know it is correct.

 

[RC Tent]

Thanks,
They don't acknowledge that such features do or don't exist. They just call tiktaalik a fish (indirectly implying that it only has fish features and that there is nothing out of the ordinary about it) and end the discussion there, without acknowledging the presence of features, such as a neck, which are otherwise only found in land based animals (fish don't have unfused skulls, but tiktaalik does).

I think they are calling tiktaalik a fish because they think it is a fish. I accept they don't believe it can be a transitional fossil, because their religious convictions preclude believing that they exist. I don't think they are being dishonest, I think they are totally seeing what they believe is there.

I believe you are seeing a transitional form fossil that fits with the expectations of evolutionary theory, so what you are saying is both honest and in keeping with current scientific thought.

People are looking at the same fossil, and not seeing the same thing, because their sense of reality affects what they see.

No one is definitely lying and no one is nuts, human mental capacity is vastly diverse.

No one has to be lying, it can be extremely hard to believe that other people are indeed telling the truth when our strong convictions and beliefs are in conflict with theirs.

By your response, I am lead to believe that you acknowledge that it isn't a matter of subjection, whether or not tiktaalik holds features that are predominantly found in land dwelling animals and are not found in other fish.
Is this correct?

It reminds me of these things....mudskipper fish. I think they are really cute.

Mudskippers hang about on land sometimes, most fish don't.

 

[RC Tent]

It's how we know. Hypotheses make testable predictions. If these are repeatedly confirmed the hypothesis is then a theory and we know it is correct.

You are describing a part of scientific method, not proving that science is the only way to test reality or know about it.

God could be the way some people know some things.

God (as theists believe in God) is not a scientific concept, that is a fact. It is real.

Whether or not there is a God is a question about reality, and science cannot test it.

 

[Job 33:6]

I think they are calling tiktaalik a fish because they think it is a fish. I accept they don't believe it can be a transitional fossil, because their religious convictions preclude believing that they exist. I don't think they are being dishonest, I think they are totally seeing what they believe is there.

I believe you are seeing a transitional form fossil that fits with the expectations of evolutionary theory, so what you are saying is both honest and in keeping with current scientific thought.

People are looking at the same fossil, and not seeing the same thing, because their sense of reality affects what they see.

No one is definitely lying and no one is nuts, human mental capacity is vastly diverse.

No one has to be lying, it can be extremely hard to believe that other people are indeed telling the truth when our strong convictions and beliefs are in conflict with theirs.



It reminds me of these things....mudskipper fish. I think they are really cute.

Mudskippers hang about on land sometimes, most fish don't.

There is a difference between asking yourself if something is a fish or not a fish, and asking the question of if it has traits of land animals, such as a neck and head that can turn or spiracles for breathing air and a flat head with eyes on top like a crocodile, and robust limbs for lifting it's body against gravity etc.

Do you agree that tiktaalik has features that are common in land animals? Such as the unfused skull?

I think tiktaalik is a fish too. But I also acknowledge that it isn't just an everyday common fish. I acknowledge that it has features that give it the appearance of something similar to an amphibian like a salamander.

It does have some similar features to mudskippers, I agree. Though mudskippers do not have unfused skulls, and they don't have wrist bones and robust girdles, and while some fish have a somewhat flat heads, their eyes aren't on top like salamanders and crocodiles.

 

[The Barbarian]

You are describing a part of scientific method, not proving that science is the only way to test reality or know about it.

Turns out, we use it for one reason. It works. That is how we learned to make computers out of dirt. That's how we know there are atoms. (Which was first realized by an Ionian philosopher who used that method.

God could be the way some people know some things.

It's the way I know some things. Problem is, there are several hundred different general messages people tell me are from God, and most of them contradict each other.

God (as theists believe in God) is not a scientific concept, that is a fact. It is real.

Of course. On the other hand, if my sink is backed up, I'm not going to try to exorcise the demons of blockage.

Whether or not there is a God is a question about reality, and science cannot test it.

Yep. Science, by it's methodology, is limited to the physical world. But nothing else we know how to do, works as well as science for that purpose.

 

[The Barbarian]

It does have some similar features to mudskippers, I agree. Though mudskippers do not have unfused skulls, and they don't have wrist bones and robust girdles, and while some fish have a somewhat flat heads, their eyes aren't on top like salamanders and crocodiles.

Mudskippers are pretty interesting. They spend a very large amount of time out of the water, and they can even climb trees. But when we look at the details, everything is different.

The features that make them like the limbed fish like Tiktaalik aren't homologous; they are merely convergently evolved to do the same things, like whale flukes and shark tails. Mudskippers are teleosts; ray-finned fish. Tiktaalik and similar organisms are sarcopterygeans, lobed-fin fish.

 

[Job 33:6]

Mudskippers are pretty interesting. They spend a very large amount of time out of the water, and they can even climb trees. But when we look at the details, everything is different.

The features that make them like the limbed fish like Tiktaalik aren't homologous; they are merely convergently evolved to do the same things, like whale flukes and shark tails. Mudskippers are teleosts; ray-finned fish. Tiktaalik and similar organisms are sarcopterygeans, lobed-fin fish.

Understandable.

 

[NobleMouse]

From your link

"This find is also important because it is based on a prediction made by evolutionary theory. Around 390 million years ago, the only vertebrates were fish. By 360 million years ago, there were four-footed vertebrates on land. So the scientists looked in a place that was 375 million years old."

"First, many scientists still indicate Tiktaalik was a lobe-finned fish. So the fact it is found among other fossils of fish and shallow-water tetrapods is not all that startling." ~Noble Mouse

You're speaking under the pretext that it doesn't have amphibian traits. Sure regular fish are found in many places in the rock record. But fish with unfused skulls, flat heads, spiracles and robust limbs are not present everywhere in the rock record.

"... that it doesn't have amphibian traits." is exactly what I'm describing when I'm talking about not having credence to the antecedent. Your "antecedent" supporting Tiktaalik being a "transition" is because it has traits in common with both fish and tetrapods... but in no instance has it been scientifically observed or demonstrated through any kind of experiment.

If the first fish with tetrapod features appeared say...in the mesozoic (triassic, jurassic, cretaceous), or the cenozoic, or the cambrian, or the carboniferous, or the permian or the ediacaran or anywhere else in the precambrian, it would demonstrate evolution to be false.

But instead, tiktaalik is where the theory suggests it ought to be.

So no, its not just about one fish being found in a succession of fishes that exist everywhere in the fossil record, as you claim it to be.

Actually no it wouldn't demonstrate evolution to be false because aquatic fossils are found in virtually every sedimentary rock layer, even high up in mountains... and this doesn't seem to be a problem for evolutionists... so the modus operandi is obviously the pick-and-choose approach--highlighting what is perceived to be an evolutionary sequence and splashing it into headlines across scientific journals.

And ive already addressed your second point by simply asking you, what other explanation could there be for how the location of tiktaalik was predicted?

You are presenting the informal fallacy of the false dilemma--like if there's a certain set of characteristics present that are shared among multiple life forms then this must [only] mean an "evolution" took place, when in fact there could have simply just been an environment in which fish and tetrapods existed, then were buried and fossilized, with Tiktaalik being in the mix. The fact that fossilized tetrapod footprints have been found as dated 20 million older than Tiktaalik supports that it wasn't where it should have been. But if there is not truly an evolutionary relationship, then finding tetrapod footprints before Tiktaalik is not only a non-issue, but it is expected if not evolutionarily related, and in fact is what is the case.

Your response is insufficient as tiktaalik isnt just a regular everyday fish. Your response also doesnt acknowledge that if tiktaalik were found in the other 99% of the geologic column, evolution would be proven wrong, but instead tiktaalik is found in the 1% where evolutionary theory predicts that it ought to be.

My response, is irrelevant. This is where your reasoning is so bizarre as I've mentioned before--it is as if I, whose background is in Accounting/Finance/Business, can't convince you evolution is not true, then you maintain that evolution must be true. Can you explain your rationale on this? Everything you think you know about biological evolution has been shown to be false by scientists with degrees in fields like biology and genetics, doing extensive research. Darwinian evolution cannot create the new information needed to create an entirely new living organism, as the ID folks put it well, this requires an intelligent agent. Naturalistic/materialistic mechanisms cannot create information, only transmit it once it is created. Literally, leaders in these fields met at the Royal Society in London some time back now and have been calling for looking to new mechanisms to support evolution because random mutation + natural selection don't do it. Far more research and effort has gone into demonstrating this than the simplistic view of "evolution must have occurred because a fossil with certain morphological traits was found in sedimentary rock layers along with other fossils in which it shares these traits". Bearing repeating: Tetrapod footprints were found and conventionally dated to be 20 million years older than Tiktaalik so the more you continue to repeat it was found exactly where predicted, the more you demonstrate the prediction was wrong.

 

[Job 33:6]

"Actually no it wouldn't demonstrate evolution to be false because aquatic fossils are found in virtually every sedimentary rock layer, even high up in mountains..."

You're factually incorrect here. Tetrapodomorphs are not found in the ordovician, silurian, cambrian, ediacaran or prior. And tetrapodomorphs predating fish would refute evolution (obviously because they can't predate fish if they are descended from them)

Just as finding:

1.mammals superpositionally prior to reptiles, amphibians or fish

2.birds prior to reptiles, amphibians or fish

3.reptiles prior to amphibians or fish;

Would all result in refutation of evolution.

If you can't understand this, then it is your own fault.

 

[The Barbarian]

Everything you think you know about biological evolution has been shown to be false by scientists with degrees in fields like biology and genetics, doing extensive research.

Odd then, that biologists and geneticists overwhelmingly think their work supports evolutionary theory. Maybe they know things that you don't?

Darwinian evolution cannot create the new information needed to create an entirely new living organism, as the ID folks put it well, this requires an intelligent agent.

Evolution never produces an entirely new species (animals produce entirely new living organisms all the time; it's called "reproduction") Evolution always modifies something already there to make new traits. This is why there are so many transitionals in the fossil record.

And new information happens everytime a new mutation occurs. Would you like to see the numbers on that?

Naturalistic/materialistic mechanisms cannot create information, only transmit it once it is created.

No, that's wrong. Perhaps you don't know how information is determined for living populations. Would you like to learn about that?

Literally, leaders in these fields met at the Royal Society in London some time back now and have been calling for looking to new mechanisms to support evolution because random mutation + natural selection don't do it.

Not quite what you were told it is. From a source hostile to Darwinian theory:
Discoveries of this type were the focus of the Royal Society’s “New Trends in Evolutionary Biology” conference. But as the old-school Neo-Darwinists hastened to point out, none of these are new. Much of this has been known for 10, 30, 50 years and more.
Royal Society's “New Trends in Biological Evolution" - A Bloodless Revolution

Some of it, in fact, can be found in Darwin's writing. It's "new" if one isn't familiar with evolutionary theory.

Bearing repeating: Tetrapod footprints were found and conventionally dated to be 20 million years older than Tiktaalik

In other words, you're arguing that if you're alive, your uncle has to be dead. If you thought about this for a minute, I bet you could figure out what's wrong with the argument.

 

[Job 33:6]

"Tetrapod footprints were found and conventionally dated to be 20 million years older than Tiktaalik so the more you continue to repeat it was found exactly where predicted, the more you demonstrate the prediction was wrong."

You assume that there are no such things as "cousins". Both the Polish tracks and tiktaalik, 15-20mya apart, are relatively close to one another in the devonian. Earth history spans 4.56 billion years, so when you look at two sets of fossils a mere 20mya apart, you're looking at the same transition occuring, just in two different locations.

As it has been said many times before, species don't evolve over-night. Transitions also by definition involve populations of animals.

Bottom line, if you really wanted to disprove evolution, all you would have to do is find any of the prior mentions items.

1.mammals superpositionally prior to reptiles, amphibians or fish

2.birds prior to reptiles, amphibians or fish

3.reptiles prior to amphibians or fish;


Telling me that there are tetrapod tracks dated to 395 with tiktaalik in the 375 to 380 range, just tells me that you have two examples transitional species in the early to mid devonian.

 

[RC Tent]

Yep. Science, by it's methodology, is limited to the physical world. But nothing else we know how to do, works as well as science for that purpose.

No, it is not by methodology that it is limited to the physical world.

It is by definition - science | Definition of science in English by Oxford Dictionaries

"the systematic study of the structure and behaviour of the physical and natural world through observation and experiment."

God's existence can be observed, and the possibility (for those who wish to explore it) can be subjected to experiment...science does not explore the existence of non-physical supernatural things by definition, that is what makes such research unscientific.

The definition of a subject of study is not the same thing as the method by which it can be studied.

 

[RC Tent]

"
Actually no it wouldn't demonstrate evolution to be false because aquatic fossils are found in virtually every sedimentary rock layer, even high up in mountains... and this doesn't seem to be a problem for evolutionists.

Yes, it is a policy of "I shall believe that evolution is truth unless you produce this particular thing specified thing to disprove it." It's a manipulative way of making it look as though there is nothing already extant in the gathered data we already have that could cause a person to question evolution.

"
But if there is not truly an evolutionary relationship, then finding tetrapod footprints before Tiktaalik is not only a non-issue, but it is expected if not evolutionarily related, and in fact is what is the case.

With 4.7 billion years to squeeze the perceived reality into, there is a lot of room in which an evolutionist can say "well on the time scale involved, that is a tiny error".

The interesting thing for me in the demands that you produce evidence is that the requests are for you to produce proof that every single claim that is made in the whole total gamut that supports the the concept is wrong, and you are beings asked to do this with just one piece of evidence. They did not develop the theory based on just one piece of evidence, but no reason to doubt it can possibly be even considered, unless the whole thing in it's entirety is taken down with one piece. It is a very aggressive way to debate the issue, I am impressed by your resilience.