Originally posted by truejedi
I read the first two, your 3rd link is no good: permission denied or something, and the i saw that the 4th and 5th were also about the peppered moth, so i skimmed them for anything new. I happen to be a pretty fast reader, not gonna lie.They didn't change color. The darker ones lived, and produced off-spring that were also dark. But at the end of the day, they were still moth's. No matter what, they were going to remain moth's.
animals don't spontaneously become new animals. do you expect them to transform within a single generation?
This is going to be very controversial, but i gotta put it out there:So lightsnake, if color changes shows natural selection, then tell me, why do we have more than one color of human? is THAT natural selection? does it mean that one of our species mutated from black to white, or white to black,and that species had a better chance of survival so it continued to produce? I think we widely consider blacks and whites ABSOLUTE equals, so why was there a need for a mutation from white to black, and if it didn't change anything about the species, why did it continue to exist, instead of blinking out like a useless anomaly very well should in natural selection?
You'll notice humans aren't confined to one reason. It's the same reason as asking why arctic wolves are white
damn here we go again. this is the part where you post sumb ideas and i disprove them and you say "WTF? thats not right! teh b1b13 is not deh r0x0rz!!
Originally posted by Lightsnake
I gave you sources-sources you ignored. Want more?
'Tear down evolution?'
[B]
You don't even understand evolution
http://records.viu.ca/~johnstoi/essays/courtenay1.htm
http://www.allaboutcreation.org/evidence-for-proof-of-evolution-faq.htm
lol the second one is proof for me. It says that darwin invented evolution when virtually nothing was known about science, and that they are still arguing whether darwin's religion is more likely to happen than the new and revised religion of evolution.
second one....
Here's two more. Creationism's a bit hard to prove since first you need to establish:
1. There is a God beyond doubt
Evolution's stand point is that they don't want there to be a god, so now they are trying their damndest to come up with a logical alternative explanation, and failing by a long shot. They have so many holes in their religion, and yet they have shoved it down your throat since you were 6, kid, so that you can't even think for yourself, but post WEBSITES. Omg i can post an evolutionist website, aren't I talented? here you go. here is your all fired style of debating.
http://www.usd.edu/esci/creation/grandcyn.html read this, dumbass.
This says that if the grand canyon was filled in, the Colorado River would have to flow UPHILL to go in its path. The other alternative is that it was one of the places where water was stored underground that collapsed at the end of the deluge. The tide and the violent catastrophe of the flood carved eath's geology, Not a river flowing uphill for millions of years.
Hmmm. and you have showed me how many transitional fossils? list examples of some vestigial appendages.
2. That all creatures were created in their present states-account for extinct species, transitional fossils, vestigial appendages, etc.
The one who needs to sit down is you
I am not going to go through that right now. Right now we are arguing your religion vs my religion. If you want to debate someone else's religion against mine, you will have to wait till after you surrender.
Again. Prove it's your God and not Brahma or Zeus or Odin. There's just as much evidence for any of them.
I thought it was humans that could eventually become gods through evolution. *loony*
Humanism focuses on rationality free of supernatural influence. Learn what you're trying to demean
And what, were those five links I posted non existent or did you ignore them in favor of false quotes?-IE: That Darwin claimed Toucans evolved from bananas
And some pictures?
http://www.allyourfaitharebelongtous.com/content.php?page=view_article.php%3FarticleID%3D16
This site has plenty
As for the teeth thing... good question. once again.... I agree that evolution within species is perfectly plausible. A shark that eats veggies that gets a mutation that allows him to more quickly destroy its prey, the genes are going to be passed down. What it is not going to do, is TURN INTO A FLIPPING DIFFERENT CLASS!!
[/quote]
Once again, i wonder why you are using places so biased as to say "all your faith are belong to us"
Because your using sites that say what you believe, your evidence is incorrect. Or at least.... thats your logic.
http://www.blackwellpublishing.com/ridley/tutorials/Fossils_and_the_history_of_life2.asp
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v432/n7013/images/nature02843-f2.2.jpg
Fossil comparisons
I've heard it before. It's just as wanting now
I convenientlymisplaced adverb... you didn't conveniently see anything. maybe I conveniently did something, but if you are stating suspicions, this makes no sense 🙂
see none of these photos anywhere but bible humper sites...other sites seem to indicate they're hoaxes
Disproven.
BY whom? I don't see anything!
'Theories' have evidence.
really... care to specify, or are you going to use that Darwin quote against me again?
You have falsehoods and nonsense
funny how you didn't even try to disprove my idea that life could not have begun 4 billion years ago because of A) the rapid movement of the earth, and B) the distance it was from the sun.
Biased to hell and back sources being the ONLY sources, yeah. Versus real, documented archaeological finds?
http://www.bible.ca/tracks/taylor-trail.htm now stfu. and i've been asking you for real archaeological finds this whole time.
[quote] Unless you have selective reading abilities...
And hello carbon dating...
hold back a little less, i'd like to see some evidence.
Trust me, kiddo, I haven't tried. I give people this naive a level of kindness by holding back.
Fact: You take a five thousand year old, contradictory book written by humans as gospel. See the flaws in that logic?
*Bursts out laughing* Oh, that's rich...what field, Christian science?biochem. I'm majoring in pharmacy.
five links... that really don't say a thing.
Posted five links and more since
🙄
That's it, you smarmy little brat. It's on. [/B]
Originally posted by truejedi
But what has never been proved, or observed is ANY diverse speciation brought about by incremental changes. The idea? yes. (peppered moth theory, fresh on my mind courtesy of lightsnake)
the actual observation? No. never. it can't be proven or disproven. (the first link lightsnake put up had someone who believed in evolution admit that it can't be proven, just evidenced)
Originally posted by truejedi
I don't know exactly where you are going with that: but it seems to support creationism more than evolution... i mean, observations of our natural world have failed time and time again.... a science based on nothing but observation and intepretation is as fallacy filled as intepreting DE comics however the heck you want based on artwork (i could have had a better analogy but i decided to bring it back towards Star Wars just a little! 😄 )
The earth-centered view of the universe was based on observation: proved false:
The flat earth view was based on observation:
proved false:
Pluto was a planet based on observation:
proved false.That list could go on forever. I would say your argument especially helps creationism....
i mean c'mon...
Originally posted by truejedi
sounds like a page right out of Knightfall's and my side to me. That's what we've been saying. We don't have to have been there to know SOMETHING designed the universe. You say it was mathematical odds and natural selection, we say it was intelligent design. I don't see how your argument helps your side at all.
Originally posted by truejedi
(and notice we are back here again tonight... once again i have homework tomorrow... this is just too much fun tho.)
Originally posted by Lord Knightfa11
damn here we go again. this is the part where you post sumb ideas and i disprove them and you say "WTF? thats not right! teh b1b13 is not deh r0x0rz!!
No hard evidence, no source. And they were all EXTREMELY biased evolutionary sources. Give me pics from a christian site.
That's because its so laughable. Come on already, get another arguement, instead of "you don't understand evolution" and "Its 5000 years old" I said monkeys and your idea of disproving it was saying "apes, not monkeys, lulz 0wnt."
OMG EVOLUTION BiaSEd SIGHTS? I DONT see anYbody who agrees with me on teh roster!!! first one. once again, no pictures, no links, no charts. nothing. Its just another short story by some evolution fanboy.
lol the second one is proof for me. It says that darwin invented evolution when virtually nothing was known about science, and that they are still arguing whether darwin's religion is more likely to happen than the new and revised religion of evolution.
Why do I need to do this? this is like saying to prove that cold, lifeless rocks with rain on them, far far away from their warming sun can spontaneously generate a single celled organism.
No... you can't prove this AT ALL!!!!
Wheras with God I can say look at this, this must have an intelligent designer.
Look at the structure that diamond and the atomic levels of everything. Look how infinitely complex everything is, down to the neutron. How could this be an accident? This must have been designed intelligently.
Evolution's stand point is that they don't want there to be a god, so now they are trying their damndest to come up with a logical alternative explanation, and failing by a long shot.
They have so many holes in their religion, and yet they have shoved it down your throat since you were 6, kid, so that you can't even think for yourself, but post WEBSITES.
fun fact: Plenty of Christians accept evolution. They don't believe in one or the other.
Omg i can post an evolutionist website, aren't I talented? here you go. here is your all fired style of debating.
http://www.usd.edu/esci/creation/grandcyn.html read this, dumbass.
This says that if the grand canyon was filled in, the Colorado River would have to flow UPHILL to go in its path. The other alternative is that it was one of the places where water was stored underground that collapsed at the end of the deluge. The tide and the violent catastrophe of the flood carved eath's geology, Not a river flowing uphill for millions of years.
Hmmm. and you have showed me how many transitional fossils? list examples of some vestigial appendages.
I think not.
I am not going to go through that right now. Right now we are arguing your religion vs my religion.
If you want to debate someone else's religion against mine, you will have to wait till after you surrender.
I thought it was humans that could eventually become gods through evolution. *loony*
I read the darwin quote somewhere, I don't remember where, so i can't back it up and I don't have a copy of "origin of the species" on me.
k. i've already disproved the grand canyon thing. It was formed by rapidly moving waters in 40 days or less, or something else. The river did not flow uphill.
As for the teeth thing... good question. once again.... I agree that evolution within species is perfectly plausible. A shark that eats veggies that gets a mutation that allows him to more quickly destroy its prey, the genes are going to be passed down. What it is not going to do, is TURN INTO A FLIPPING DIFFERENT CLASS!!
Once again, i wonder why you are using places so biased as to say "all your faith are belong to us"
Because your using sites that say what you believe, your evidence is incorrect. Or at least.... thats your logic.
Same song, second verse. the site says it, so you agree with it. Has the site ever fossilized anything to find out the process?
No... because over millions of years, the corpse would DECAY!!!
and whats with the biased sites? find a creationist site that agrees with you.
common its not cool how you are using evidence i disprove EVERY SINGLE TIME that comes from BIASED sites. You have yet to say anything besides "manmade" at any picture I have shown. WTF?
um... an image of a bunch of fossils? i don't get it.
Sad that you can so vehemently disavow something you cannot disprove.
misplaced adverb... you didn't conveniently see anything. maybe I conveniently did something, but if you are stating suspicions, this makes no sense 🙂
I see that none of your photos come from anywhere but evolutionary sites where they write down a lot of jargon, and fail miserably to prove/disprove anything logically.
Except for over a century of scientific study and cataloging, right? Just a fraction of such I've provided.
once again you need a lot of hard evidence which evolution conveniently (right usage XD) has reasons for why it has no evidence.
BY whom? I don't see anything!
I agree. where is evolution's?
really... care to specify, or are you going to use that Darwin quote against me again?
funny how you didn't even try to disprove my idea that life could not have begun 4 billion years ago because of A) the rapid movement of the earth, and B) the distance it was from the sun.
which my theory of a canopy of ice undoes...
hold back a little less, i'd like to see some evidence.
You take a 200 hundred year old, unsubstantiated book written by a human as gospel. See the flaws in that logic?
biochem. I'm majoring in pharmacy.
five links... that really don't say a thing.
🙄 [/B]
Originally posted by Jbill311no, more along the lines of (1+1)2=4, but 1+1*2=3. they look the same, they seem to be true, but its never actually been proven to happen.
[B] I like the logic here: 1+1=2, but 1+1+1+1+1+1+1=/=7. The very IDEA of evolution is that the small, incremental changes adds up to diverse speciation.
I find your star analogy horrible. the stars can be seen, we revolve amongst them, we have been into space, so we know it is 3d, the patterns introduced by stars are also observed at an atomic level. There would be ambiguity if someone said "stars are balls of burning gas" with no proof or precedent.
Evolution is based on observations of our natural world. There is evidence for it, or else Darwin wouldn't have had the idea. The two statements 'nobody was there' and 'nobody can test it' are only distantly related at best, and constitute a half truth when combined. No sentient, living being has had a lifespan long enough to measure the glacial change of species, true, but we don't have to be there to know that something happened. No one has ever seen a star up close, (other than the sun) but few Fundamentalists are willing to argue that the stars at night are pinpricks in the sky showing the light of heaven. They accept the scientific instruments' readings showing that there are billions of stars in the universe. Spectrometry, radio-telescopes, and Hubble are not decried by religionists, and there is less evidence for creationism than there is for the 'fireflies that flew to high and got stuck up in that there big black thingy" -Timone. The Lion King.
As for the peppered moths, they didn't show populations, just percentages. when all of the white moths got eaten by birds, they took the percentage of black ones to white ones left, and then they had a theory for evolution.
Man lightsnake, seriously what's with the animosity? i start in reading your post, realize that each and EVERY point ends with an insult, and i'm not going to bother reading it anymore. (go back and read your last sentences, you spend as many words insulting Knightfall as you do arguing your point. Why not save us all some time and just put something thats worth reading.)
seriously tho, if you keep up with the attitude, ignorance is all that comes across from your viewpoint in what could be an otherwise beneficial debate for both sides.
Before i stopped reading due to your constant insults, i had to refute this, cause you keep bringing it up: i keep refuting it, and you keep bringing it back like its a new idea so:
1. Evolution within species eventually, over a very, very long time in geological amounts transforms the species.
no. it doesn't. You can point out changes WITHIN a species. You can NEVER give me an example of something that switched species. You can't do it.
Science moves toward an objective truth, and discards what is proven false.
tell me, where was creationism "Proven" false. Cause i must of missed the studies on that one.
And knightfall, be fair, you can't ask them to give you christian sources, christian sources aren't going to agree with them. They should be able to give you the sources they want, or ask you to give them nothing but sources from evolutionary based websites. The idea is, they give you whatever sources they want to, and you have sources that directly contradict them, and then you fight over the validity of the sources. Not very beneficial, but its what is fair.
Originally posted by Lightsnake
The site name doesn't impact its evidence. From someone using nothing but Christian sites? Shut up about bias
Oh the irony.indeed. that's what you said to me.
exactly, and how long is it going to take for it to be fossilized by that defenition? by then it will rot.
Unless they were fossilized. You're aware how corpses can be preserved? Hell, we humans have found preserved mammoth bones or ice man bones in the tundra...being hardened and trapped within hardening layers of earth will preserve you as opposed to just being buried or left out in the sun.
I have been given props for my theories and how i have backed everything I say up. I have been apologized to because someone insulted me in my argument and I actually have a logical argument. I don't see anyone giving you these honors, when you have yet to show one bit of fact, just continuously repeat that evolutionists know better than us. And you did not post one christian site.
Posted several christian sites. Will that shut you up?
"OH NOES! THE LIE-entists use EVIDENCE! My FAITH will be a shield against them!"
when you post a 3 page essay on some site with no canon (lolz canon) pictures or sources or documented evidence within them, i pretty much DON'T READ IT! you want me to read your posts? rephrase it and take the time to actually post what you are trying to say, not a load of three page essays.
'Disprove?' In your dreams, you haven't even acknowledged most of it.
And yeah, conveniently I find those pictures absent from any credible looking source and site. In fact, they seem to be totally fake. Only source? Ultra Christian fundie areas. What's next, pictures of gays burning in hell?
There is evidence, such as the radiologist's finds concerning granite. And also all of the complexities that go all the way down to sub sub sub atomic... these weren't made by accident.
I don't want to disprove God existing. I'm fine with God existing. Fact is, though, saying "you can't prove it wrong" is a very stupid argument when you attempt to claim it as fact
I'm conveniently calling you an idiot. Clear enough?
Again proving he doesn't even READ the sources. "It proves nothing!" Are you blind?
Except for over a century of scientific study and cataloging, right? Just a fraction of such I've provided.
Amazing...I post sites detailing evidence and examples and he dismisses them because they're evolution sites.and i post sites detailing real evidence and real examples with hard documented fact behind them, and you dismiss them because they are creationism sites. that was really where I was going with that. You played your hand so that the irony is on my side.
What am I supposed to post instead...magical pink unicorn sites?CHARLIE!!! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q5im0Ssyyus since you disappointed, i had to follow through 🙁
LOL? and this is the one who refuses to find a logical explanation for anything i post, instead posting site upon sight, which i take little bits of and rebut. kk. your a retard.
"he hath sewn his eyes shut because he is afraid to see."
Fun proverb. Applies.
Right in front of you.Considering you didn't even know who Kepler was and thought Darwin 'came to Christ' when he 'realized his theory' failed? I'll hold it against you as evidence you have no idea what you're talking about
So you're a dunce with astronomy as well as biology? It just means the lifeforms on earth adapted as it went.
do you want your links from evolution supporting sites so its not outside your comfort zone? this is sarcasm depicting the irony of how you said all of my sites were biased.
How much more would you like? Should it all be from Christian sites so it's not outside your comfort zone, sweetie?
lols wtf? and yet all you have is a bunch of text to offer me with no documented hard evidence. No transitional forms... no new ideas... just repeating the same thing over and over.
Yes. Good thing ever since that book was written, people have been researching its claims every year since, throwing out what Darwin was wrong about and expanding on what he was right about.
Or do you think nobody's ever challenged or researched Origin of the Species? If you do, you're a ****ing idiot. Modern day biologists acknowledge Darwin's contribution but are almost uniform in pointing out the errors he made in the approach. And that's fine, because science is all about trial and errorsure... people have challenged and researched origin of the species. These people are called creationists. And it would be wise not to throw around insults in a purely intellectual debate.
lol? are you? No. you are a fat, angst little kid slamming other people's ideas into a keyboard.
Oh, so you're totally unqualified to comment on evolutionary biology, astronomy, geology, or any discipline outside your area?
why are you quoting insults? These insults are (yet again) someone else's work, they do not apply (have you disproved my deluge theory? did you disprove my radioactive granite theory? did you disprove my pictures of an actual archeological dig?
That don't say anything you want to hear.
"It is difficult to free a fool from chains he reveres."
-Voltaire.
No. you copy/pasted links into a forum. I'm sorry, there is no backing to anything you are saying.
Originally posted by Lightsnake
Because, Knightfall, apes and monkeys are two very different creatures. We have a two percent difference in DNA from great apes, the Chimpanzee is our closest relative. We did not evolve from apes or monkeys, we share a common ancestor with them. Is that clear enough.
So explain to me why blind cave fish have eyes. Or why men have nipples. Or all the other vestigial appendages
[B/]
why not? 😕
[B]
And what have you posted? Worthless rebuttals that fail to understand the theory? Websites of your own? Fake pictures? They teach it in classrooms just like they teach that America gained its independence from the revolutionary war and y'know why? It's true. They also teach that atoms have protons, neutrons and electrons. Know why? It's true.
[B/]
that borders on the absurd... they teach it in classrooms, so it must be true? please tell me you didn't just say that. They have taught fallacies in classrooms forever. We've been talking about how science suppositions have been changing for years, based on new discoveries. What they teach in classrooms is as near to the truth as they can conceive of.
People who blindly believe what they are taught in classrooms without looking into for themselves are sheep. Nothing more.
[B]
Evolution isn't a religion. It's science. There's a difference
creationism is science as well, not a religion. You said there are many christians who believe in evolution. There are also many non-christians who believe in creationism.
40 days or less? Are you HIGH?
I believe it was 180 days before the waters "subsided"
I posted another link that kinda destroyed yours. Use ACTUAL science, thanks.
again, your interpretation of "actual science" is the only thing you are accepting as a possibility to be "actual science" . That's more than a bit biased towards a pre-conceived notion.
Originally posted by Lord Knightfa11
Aha.... but you said that my evidence was ambiguous because it came from a biased source, even though it is evidence.
indeed. that's what you said to me.
exactly, and how long is it going to take for it to be fossilized by that defenition? by then it will rot.
I have been given props for my theories and how i have backed everything I say up.
I don't see anyone giving you these honors, when you have yet to show one bit of fact, just continuously repeat that evolutionists know better than us. And you did not post one christian site.
when you post a 3 page essay on some site with no canon (lolz canon) pictures or sources or documented evidence within them, i pretty much DON'T READ IT![/Quote
Translation: I ONLY READ WHAT AGREES WITH ME!!!!![Quote]
you want me to read your posts? rephrase it and take the time to actually post what you are trying to say, not a load of three page essays.
um... wow. just wow. http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/paluxy/tsite.html why not just post one of your big scary evolutionist links again and embarrass yourself because it says that the human tracks are real, but are just irregularities in the rock's surface, when 5 toes can clearly be seen and they are all the same size?
There is evidence, such as the radiologist's finds concerning granite. And also all of the complexities that go all the way down to sub sub sub atomic... these weren't made by accident.
I think. who is it convenient for?
well maybe they suggested something before i disproved them.
wow, so they have just a fraction of all the proof you've shown?
😆 🙄
and i post sites detailing real evidence and real examples with hard documented fact behind them, and you dismiss them because they are creationism sites.
that was really where I was going with that. You played your hand so that the irony is on my side. CHARLIE!!! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q5im0Ssyyus since you disappointed, i had to follow through 🙁
here's more:
[B]Diversity of Living Beings
The diversity and the unity of life are equally striking and meaningful aspects of the living world. Between 1.5 and 2 million species of animals and plants have been described and studied; the number yet to be described is probably as great. The diversity of sizes, structures, and ways of life is staggering but fascinating. Here are just a few examples.
The foot-and-mouth disease virus is a sphere 8-12 mm in diameter. The blue whale reaches 30 m in length and 135 t in weight. The simplest viruses are parasites in cells of other organisms, reduced to barest essentials minute amounts of DNA or RNA, which subvert the biochemical machinery of the host cells to replicate their genetic information, rather than that of the host.
It is a matter of opinion, or of definition, whether viruses are considered living organisms or peculiar chemical substances. The fact that such differences of opinion can exist is in itself highly significant. It means that the borderline between living and inanimate matter is obliterated. At the opposite end of the simplicity complexity spectrum you have vertebrate animals, including man. The human brain has some 12 billion neurons; the synapses between the neurons are perhaps a thousand times numerous.
Some organisms live in a great variety of environments. Man is at the top of the scale in this respect. He is not only a truly cosmopolitan species but, owing to his technologic achievements, can survive for at least a limited time on the surface of the moon and in cosmic spaces. By contrast, some organisms are amazingly specialized. Perhaps the narrowest ecologic niche of all is that of a species of the fungus family Laboulbeniaceae, which grows exclusively on the rear portion of the elytra of the beetle Aphenops cronei, which is found only in some limestone caves in southern France. Larvae of the fly Psilopa petrolei develop in seepages of crude oil in California oilfields; as far as is known they occur nowhere else. This is the only insect able to live and feed in oil, and its adult can walk on the surface of the oil only as long as no body part other than the tarsi are in contact with the oil. Larvae of the fly Drosophila carciniphila develop only in the nephric grooves beneath the flaps of the third maxilliped of the land crab Geocarcinus ruricola, which is restricted to certain islands in the Caribbean.
Is there an explanation, to make intelligible to reason this colossal diversity of living beings? Whence came these extraordinary, seemingly whimsical and superfluous creatures, like the fungus Laboulbenia, the beetle Aphenops cronei, the flies Psilopa petrolei and Drosophila carciniphila, and many, many more apparent biologic curiosities? The only explanation that makes sense is that the organic diversity has evolved in response to the diversity of environment on the planet earth. No single species, however perfect and however versatile, could exploit all the opportunities for living. Every one of the millions of species has its own way of living and of getting sustenance from the environment. There are doubtless many other possible ways of living as yet unexploited by any existing species; but one thing is clear: with less organic diversity, some opportunities for living would remain unexploited. The evolutionary process tends to fill up the available ecologic niches. It does not do so consciously or deliberately; the relations between evolution and environment are more subtle and more interesting than that. The environment does not impose evolutionary changes on its inhabitants, as postulated by the now abandoned neo-Lamarckian theories. The best way to envisage the situation is as follows: the environment presents challenges to living species, to which the later may respond by adaptive genetic changes.
An unoccupied ecologic niche, an unexploited opportunity for living, is a challenge. So is an environmental change, such as the Ice Age climate giving place to a warmer climate. Natural selection may cause a living species to respond to the challenge by adaptive genetic changes. These changes may enable the species to occupy the formerly empty ecologic niche as a new opportunity for living, or to resist the environmental change if it is unfavorable. But the response may or may not be successful. This depends on many factors, the chief of which is the genetic composition of the responding species at the time the response is called for. Lack of successful response may cause the species to become extinct. The evidence of fossils shows clearly that the eventual end of most evolutionary lines is extinction. Organisms now living are successful descendants of only a minority of the species that lived in the past and of smaller and smaller minorities the farther back you look. Nevertheless, the number of living species has not dwindled; indeed, it has probably grown with time. All this is understandable in the light of evolution theory; but what a senseless operation it would have been, on God’s part, to fabricate a multitude of species ex nihilo and then let most of them die out!
There is, of course, nothing conscious or intentional in the action of natural selection. A biologic species does not say to itself, "Let me try tomorrow (or a million years from now) to grow in a different soil, or use a different food, or subsist on a different body part of a different crab." Only a human being could make such conscious decisions. This is why the species Homo sapiens is the apex of evolution. Natural selection is at one and the same time a blind and creative process. Only a creative and blind process could produce, on the one hand, the tremendous biologic success that is the human species and, on the other, forms of adaptedness as narrow and as constraining as those of the overspecialized fungus, beetle, and flies mentioned above.
Antievolutionists fail to understand how natural selection operates. They fancy that all existing species were generated by supernatural fiat a few thousand years ago, pretty much as we find them today. But what is the sense of having as many as 2 or 3 million species living on earth? If natural selection is the main factor that brings evolution about, any number of species is understandable: natural selection does not work according to a foreordained plan, and species are produced not because they are needed for some purpose but simply because there is an environmental opportunity and genetic wherewithal to make them possible. Was the Creator in a jocular mood when he made Psilopa petrolei for California oil fields and species of Drosophila to live exclusively on some body-parts of certain land crabs on only certain islands in the Caribbean? The organic diversity becomes, however, reasonable and understandable if the Creator has created the living world not by caprice but by evolution propelled by natural selection. It is wrong to hold creation and evolution as mutually exclusive alternatives. I am a creationist and an evolutionist. Evolution is God’s, or Nature’s method of creation. Creation is not an event that happened in 4004 BC; it is a process that began some 10 billion years ago and is still under way.
[/B]
Unity of Life
The unity of life is no less remarkable than its diversity. Most forms of life are similar in many respects. The universal biologic similarities are particularly striking in the biochemical dimension. From viruses to man, heredity is coded in just two, chemically related substances: DNA and RNA. The genetic code is as simple as it is universal. There are only four genetic "letters" in DNA: adenine, guanine, thymine, and cytosine. Uracil replaces thymine in RNA. The entire evolutionary development of the living world has taken place not by invention of new "letters" in the genetic "alphabet" but by elaboration of ever-new combinations of these letters.
Not only is the DNA-RNA genetic code universal, but so is the method of translation of the sequences of the "letters" in DNA-RNA into sequences of amino acids in proteins. The same 20 amino acids compose countless different proteins in all, or at least in most, organisms. Different amino acids are coded by one to six nucleotide triplets in DNA and RNA. And the biochemical universals extend beyond the genetic code and its translation into proteins: striking uniformities prevail in the cellular metabolism of the most dirverse living beings. Adenosine triphosphate, biotin, riboflavin, hemes, pyridoxin, vitamins K and B12, and folic acid implement metabolic processes everywhere.
What do these biochemical or biologic universals mean? They suggest that life arose from inanimate matter only once and that all organisms, no matter now diverse, in other respects, conserve the basic features of the primordial life. (It is also possible that there were several, or even many, origins of life; if so, the progeny of only one of them has survived and inherited the earth.) But what if there was no evolution and every one of the millions of species were created by separate fiat? However offensive the notion may be to religious feeling and to reason, the antievolutionists must again accuse the Creator of cheating. They must insist that He deliberately arranged things exactly as if his method of creation was evolution, intentionally to mislead sincere seekers of truth.
The remarkable advances of molecular biology in recent years have made it possible to understand how it is that diverse organisms are constructed from such monotonously similar materials: proteins composed of only 20 kinds of amino acids and coded only by DNA and RNA, each with only four kinds of nucleotides. The method is astonishingly simple. All English words, sentences, chapters, and books are made up of sequences of 26 letters of the alphabet. (They can be represented also by only three signs of the Morse code: dot, dash, and gap.) The meaning of a word or a sentence is defined not so much by what letters it contains as by the sequences of these letters. It is the same with heredity: it is coded by the sequences of the genetic "letters" the nucleotides in the DNA. They are translated into the sequences of amino acids in the proteins.
Molecular studies have made possible an approach to exact measurements of degrees of biochemical similarities and differences among organisms. Some kinds of enzymes and other proteins are quasiuniversal, or at any rate widespread, in the living world. They are functionally similar in different living beings, in that they catalyze similar chemical reactions. But when such proteins are isolated and their structures determined chemically, they are often found to contain more or less different sequences of amino acids in different organisms. For example, the so-called alpha chains of hemoglobin have identical sequences of amino acids in man and the chimpanzee, but they differ in a single amino acid (out of 141) in the gorilla. Alpha chains of human hemoglobin differ from cattle hemoglobin in 17 amino acid substitutions, 18 from horse, 20 from donkey, 25 from rabbit, and 71 from fish (carp).
Cytochrome C is an enzyme that plays an important role in the metabolism of aerobic cells. It is found in the most diverse organisms, from man to molds. E. Margoliash, W. M. Fitch, and others have compared the amino acid sequences in cytochrome C in different branches of the living world. Most significant similarities as well as differences have been brought to light. The cytochrome C of different orders of mammals and birds differ in 2 to 17 amino acids, classes of vertebrates in 7 to 38, and vertebrates and insects in 23 to 41; and animals differ from yeasts and molds in 56 to 72 amino acids. Fitch and Margoliash prefer to express their findings in what are called "minimal mutational distances." It has been mentioned above that different amino acids are coded by different triplets of nucleotides in DNA of the genes; this code is now known. Most mutations involve substitutions of single nucleotides somewhere in the DNA chain coding for a given protein. Therefore, one can calculate the minimum numbers of single mutations needed to change the cytochrome C of one organism into that of another. Minimal mutational distances between human cytochrome C and the cytochrome C of other living beings are as follows:
It is important to note that amino acid sequences in a given kind of protein vary within a species as well as from species to species. It is evident that the differences among proteins at the level of species, genus, family, order, class, and phylum are compounded of elements that vary also among individuals within a species. Individual and group differences are only quantitatively, not qualitatively, different. Evidence supporting the above propositions is ample and is growing rapidly. Much work has been done in recent years on individual variations in amino acid sequences of hemoglobin of human blood. More that 100 variants have been detected. Most of them involve substitutions of single amino acids – substitutions that have arisen by genetic mutations in the persons in whom they are discovered or in their ancestors. As expected, some of these mutations are deleterious to their carriers, but others apparently are neutral or even favorable in certain environments. Some mutant hemoglobins have been found only in one person or in one family; others are discovered repeatedly among inhabitants of different parts of the world. I submit that all these remarkable findings make sense in the light of evolution: they are nonsense otherwise.
Comparative Anatomy and Embryology
The biochemical universals are the most impressive and the most recently discovered, but certainly they are not the only vestiges of creation by means of evolution. Comparative anatomy and embryology proclaim the evolutionary origins of the present inhabitants of the world. In 1555 Pierre Belon established the presence of homologous bones in the superficially very different skeletons of man and bird. Later anatomists traced the homologies in the skeletons, as well as in other organs, of all vertebrates. Homologies are also traceable in the external skeletons of arthropods as seemingly unlike as a lobster, a fly, and a butterfly. Examples of homologies can be multiplied indefinitely.
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Embryos of apparently quite diverse animals often exhibit striking similarities. A century ago these similarities led some biologists (notably the German zoologist Ernst Haeckel) to be carried by their enthusiasm as far as to interpret the embryonic similarities as meaning that the embryo repeats in its development the evolutionary history of its species: it was said to pass through stages in which it resembles its remote ancestors. In other words, early-day biologists supposed that by studying embryonic development one can, as it were, read off the stages through which the evolutionary development had passed. This so-called biogenetic law is no longer credited in its original form. And yet embryonic similarities are undeniable impressive and significant.
Probably everybody knows the sedentary barnacles which seem to have no similarity to free-swimming crustaceans, such as the copepods. How remarkable that barnacles pass through a free-swimming larval stage, the nauplius! At that stage of its development a barnacle and a Cyclops look unmistakably similar. They are evidently relatives. The presence of gill slits in human embryos and in embryos of other terrestrial vertebrates is another famous example. Of course, at no stage of its development is a human embryo a fish, nor does it ever have functioning gills. But why should it have unmistakable gill slits unless its remote ancestors did respire with the aid of gills? It is the Creator again playing practical jokes?
Adaptive radiation: Hawaii’s Flies
There are about 2,000 species of drosophilid flies in the world as a whole. About a quarter of them occur in Hawaii, although the total area of the archipelago is only about that of the state of New Jersey. All but 17 of the species in Hawaii are endemic (found nowhere else). Furthermore, a great majority of the Hawaiian endemics do not occur throughout the archipelago: they are restricted to single islands or even to a part of an island. What is the explanation of this extraordinary proliferation of drosophilid species in so small a territory? Recent work of H. L. Carson, H. T. Spieth, D. E. Hardy, and others makes the situation understandable.
The Hawaiian Islands are of volcanic origin; they were never parts of any continent. Their ages are between 5.6 and 0.7 million years. Before man came there inhabitants were descendants of immigrants that had been transported across the ocean by air currents and other accidental means. A single drosophilid species, which arrived in Hawaii first, before there were numerous competitors, faced the challenge of an abundance of many unoccupied ecologic niches. Its descendants responded to this challenge by evolutionary adaptive radiation, the products of which are the remarkable Hawaiian drosophilids of today. To forestall a possible misunderstanding, let it be made clear that the Hawaiian endemics are by no means so similar to each other that they could be mistaken for variants of the same species; if anything, they are more diversified than are drosophilids elsewhere. The largest and the smallest drosophilid species are both Hawaiian. They exhibit an astonishing variety of behavior patterns. Some of them have become adapted to ways of life quite extraordinary for a drosophilid fly, such as being parasites in egg cocoons of spiders.
Oceanic islands other than Hawaii, scattered over the wide Pacific Ocean, are not conspicuously rich in endemic species of drosophilids. The most probable explanation of this fact is that these other islands were colonized by drosophilid after most ecologic niches had already been filled by earlier arrivals. This surely is a hypothesis, but it is a reasonable one. Antievolutionists might perhaps suggest an alternative hypothesis: in a fit of absentmindedness, the Creator went on manufacturing more and more drosophilid species for Hawaii, until there was an extravagant surfeit of them in this archipelago. I leave it up to you to decide which hypothesis makes sense.
Oceanic islands other than Hawaii, scattered over the wide Pacific Ocean, are not conspicuously rich in endemic species of drosophilids. The most probable explanation of this fact is that these other islands were colonized by drosophilid after most ecologic niches had already been filled by earlier arrivals. This surely is a hypothesis, but it is a reasonable one. Antievolutionists might perhaps suggest an alternative hypothesis: in a fit of absentmindedness, the Creator went on manufacturing more and more drosophilid species for Hawaii, until there was an extravagant surfeit of them in this archipelago. I leave it up to you to decide which hypothesis makes sense.
Strength and Acceptance of the Theory
Seen in the light of evolution, biology is, perhaps, intellectually the most satisfying and inspiring science. Without that light it becomes a pile of sundry facts some of them interesting or curious but making no meaningful picture as a whole.
This is not to imply that we know everything that can and should be known about biology and about evolution. Any competent biologist is aware of a multitude of problems yet unresolved and of questions yet unanswered. After all, biologic research shows no sign of approaching completion; quite the opposite is true. Disagreements and clashes of opinion are rife among biologists, as they should be in a living and growing science. Antievolutionists mistake, or pretend to mistake, these disagreements as indications of dubiousness of the entire doctrine of evolution. Their favorite sport is stringing together quotations, carefully and sometimes expertly taken out of context, to show that nothing is really established or agreed upon among evolutionists. Some of my colleagues and myself have been amused and amazed to read ourselves quoted in a way showing that we are really antievolutionists under the skin.
Let me try to make crystal clear what is established beyond reasonable doubt, and what needs further study, about evolution. Evolution as a process that has always gone on in the history of the earth can be doubted only by those who are ignorant of the evidence or are resistant to evidence, owing to emotional blocks or to plain bigotry. By contrast, the mechanisms that bring evolution about certainly need study and clarification. There are no alternatives to evolution as history that can withstand critical examination. Yet we are constantly learning new and important facts about evolutionary mechanisms.
It is remarkable that more than a century ago Darwin was able to discern so much about evolution without having available to him the key facts discovered since. The development of genetics after 1900 especially of molecular genetics, in the last two decades has provided information essential to the understanding of evolutionary mechanisms. But much is in doubt and much remains to be learned. This is heartening and inspiring for any scientist worth his salt. Imagine that everything is completely known and that science has nothing more to discover: what a nightmare!
Does the evolutionary doctrine clash with religious faith? It does not. It is a blunder to mistake the Holy Scriptures for elementary textbooks of astronomy, geology, biology, and anthropology. Only if symbols are construed to mean what they are not intended to mean can there arise imaginary, insoluble conflicts. As pointed out above, the blunder leads to blasphemy: the Creator is accused of systematic deceitfulness.
One of the great thinkers of our age, Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, wrote the following: "Is evolution a theory, a system, or a hypothesis? It is much more it is a general postulate to which all theories, all hypotheses, all systems much henceforward bow and which they must satisfy in order to be thinkable and true. Evolution is a light which illuminates all facts, a trajectory which all lines of though must follow this is what evolution is." Of course, some scientists, as well as some philosophers and theologians, disagree with some parts of Teilhard’s teachings; the acceptance of his worldview falls short of universal. But there is no doubt at all that Teilhard was a truly and deeply religious man and that Christianity was the cornerstone of his worldview. Moreover, in his worldview science and faith were not segregated in watertight compartments, as they are with so many people. They were harmoniously fitting parts of his worldview. Teilhard was a creationists [sic], but one who understood that the Creation is realized in this world by means of evolution. [/B]
LOL? and this is the one who refuses to find a logical explanation for anything i post, instead posting site upon sight, which i take little bits of and rebut. kk. your a retard.
lol? I know who kepler is, and i was specifying that darwin said that a bird had a common anscestor as a banana because their beaks were similar, and that's how his whole book started?
lmaololololmfaowutaretardhahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahah
I am so sorry about that... SO you are saying that the first, most primitive lifeform in history came to existence in a freezing, wet world with no food?
do you want your links from evolution supporting sites so its not outside your comfort zone? this is sarcasm depicting the irony of how you said all of my sites were biased.
lols wtf? and yet all you have is a bunch of text to offer me with no documented hard evidence. No transitional forms... no new ideas... just repeating the same thing over and over.
But hey, let's pwn your ass with some image sources:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/dd/Horseevolution.png
http://missinguniversemuseum.com/Exhibit4.htm
http://www.stephenjaygould.org/ctrl/gould_leviathan.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Equus_simplicidens_mounted_02.jpg
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Basilosaurus_hind_limb.gif
sure... people have challenged and researched origin of the species. These people are called creationists.
And it would be wise not to throw around insults in a purely intellectual debate.
lol? are you? No. you are a fat, angst little kid slamming other people's ideas into a keyboard.
why are you quoting insults? These insults are (yet again) someone else's work, they do not apply (have you disproved my deluge theory?
did you disprove my radioactive granite theory? did you disprove my pictures of an actual archeological dig?
No. you copy/pasted links into a forum. I'm sorry, there is no backing to anything you are saying. [/B]
Sorry, forgot you're an idiot.
Originally posted by truejedi
which ancestor? what was it called? you need to provide more than your say-so to make me believe that.
http://www.livescience.com/health/060325_ap_ethiopia_herectus.html
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why not? 😕
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that borders on the absurd... they teach it in classrooms, so it must be true? please tell me you didn't just say that. They have taught fallacies in classrooms forever. We've been talking about how science suppositions have been changing for years, based on new discoveries. What they teach in classrooms is as near to the truth as they can conceive of.
People who blindly believe what they are taught in classrooms without looking into for themselves are sheep. Nothing more.
[B]creationism is science as well, not a religion.
You said there are many christians who believe in evolution. There are also many non-christians who believe in creationism.
[B]I believe it was 180 days before the waters "subsided"
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again, your interpretation of "actual science" is the only thing you are accepting as a possibility to be "actual science" . That's more than a bit biased towards a pre-conceived notion.
Until then? I'm finding all the other evidence on the evolution side far better. want me to post all of it?
i'm not going to read your links if you dismiss out of hand the accuracy of any sources put forth by this side of the argument. What's the point? You've got a link that says one thing, i can find a link that says the opposite. Links on websites FAIL as any sort of evidence. Every website is biased one way or the other. I read every link you posted earlier about the peppered moth, and you denied i read them. Why should i waste my time?
what's happening here is that neither side is actually reading the other sides sources (which would be a MASSIVE drain on time,) that i frankly am unwilling to put forth. Summarize your source, then give a direct link to that source so we can check the accuracy if we want. You post it in textbook form, i've got enough textbooks to read that i'm not going to bother reading yours.
Originally posted by truejedi
i'm not going to read your links if you dismiss out of hand the accuracy of any sources put forth by this side of the argument.
What's the point? You've got a link that says one thing, i can find a link that says the opposite.
Links on websites FAIL as any sort of evidence.
Every website is biased one way or the other. I read every link you posted earlier about the peppered moth, and you denied i read them. Why should i waste my time?
Really, you're starting to look silly
Originally posted by Lightsnake
Give me a break. The ONLY places you can find portions of his arguments or the pictures are the siutes he posts.Credibility? Substantiation? Evidence? Reason used?
The evidence they use do not.
Because you posted two minutes after I put them up, displayed no understanding of them when the websites explained the questions you raised...why should I bother posting the evidence of people who've only made the study of evolution a life's work...
Really, you're starting to look silly
i'm afraid you are the one that posts without an ounce of credibility, yet maintains an attitude of superiority, and infallibility. You not only do that in this particular debate, but you have done so in numerous debates over these forums.
You should truly get it right, i believe i posted 9 minutes after your post, and i already explained why it didn't take very long. What you mean by my "not understanding them" is that i didn't suddenly agree with you. I already told you to summarize your own sources, not expect me to read your sources. Debates don't consist of: now we are going to take 40 minutes while side A reads everything that side B has read in preparing for this debate. That's ridiculous.
An Essay IS NOT EVIDENCE. when are you going to figure that out? An essay is intepretation of available evidence. You presenting an essay as evidence just shows you are ABSOLUTELY unwilling to do your own research and intepretation. Knightfall has repeatedly posted a synopsis of what he is trying to say BEFORE posting a link, and if you want an ounce of credibility, you'll do the same.
