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| Evolution. and The Flying Spaghetti Monster
Posted: 9/2/2009 5:39:40 PM | you could try answering these questions: what do you mean by scientist? what is a scientist? Are you a scientist?
or, what i'd really appreciate is if you presented your case for proposition X and the mechanism of proposition X like I asked you to earlier.
I listed the book, it's authors, it's edition, it's publisher, and made a reference to the addentum that I quoted from. I figured that you'd be able to google the rest.
I'm not digging through the last 30 pages of thread stuff to find it. I did however, find the book via google, looked at the chapter about cells. Seems fine for introductions.
I checked out your links... i can't accuse you of cherry picking or quote mining, because the stuff you quoted has no bearing on the argument you're making. All those quotes did is make me want to read more about the given article... | |
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| Evolution. and The Flying Spaghetti Monster
Posted: 9/2/2009 5:47:23 PM | This is another evolutionist genius in here arguing that I cited a a "newspaper source" without reading it himself. This "newspaper source" is directly quoting a respected evolutionary biologist who has said the same thing on different occasions.
I even provided the link to the article so it's easy enough to check and see that it's not a case of "cherry picking" or "quote mining".
Why would anyone waste their time answering questions like this, when the question answers itself? And you have the gall to quote and follow with this comment in response to a message which goes on to call you for cherry picking / quote mining. Do you posess a SHRED of credibility?
And I don't think anyone here considers themselves an 'evoutionary genius'. The topic is way too complex for any single person to grasp the entire picture of evolution and all its complexities. Maybe some come off as rather strident, but perhaps that is a reaction to your heavy-handed and authoritative stance on a topic you clearly know little about and are clearly unwilling to learn about.
I don't remember the theory of Gravity changing much between highschool and college You learned about General Relativity in high school?- or do you just not remember anything you learned? | |
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late™
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Joined: 1/9/2005
Msg: 1153 | |
| Evolution. and The Flying Spaghetti Monster
Posted: 9/2/2009 5:50:46 PM |
None of the authors have a background in evolution. Yeah, those textbooks are usually written by people who know nothing about the subject.
the fundamentals of Evolution that's being taught in U.S. highschools is different than the science being taught in college?
There are regional differences from school board to school board, not to mention private schools and some of the less fortunate home schooled, before you even start to compare with colleges.
This does seem to be more of a problem in regions where people conflate science and religion due to paralogism. | |
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| Evolution. and The Flying Spaghetti Monster
Posted: 9/2/2009 5:57:08 PM |
Yeah, did you also see where it's being used by year1 and 2 college students too, and is endorsed by National Geographic?
There are "developmental" (high school level) biology courses offered at community college. Students who haven't taken or failed high school biology must take these courses to move onto college level biology. | |
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| Evolution. and The Flying Spaghetti Monster
Posted: 9/2/2009 6:26:57 PM | | rockondon So your position is NOBODY cast a spell every so often to create new organisms. Genetic engineering by chance sounds like voodoo to me! I think the ID position is that we are not the highest intelligences in the universe. Life existed outside of "material" bodies before atoms even existed. Because for space time to accidentally create itself and govern energy in such a way to make atomic structure possible an intelligence would be required. Yes intelligence, because in an absense of intelligence this would be mathematically impossible. Infact for the universe to exist the way it does at all, entropy either worked backwards for a very long time, or a being who has access to large amounts of dynamic energy and the imperical know how to guide it created the space/time plarform we live within, and brought it to a nice balance. Gravity, electro magnetism, strong nuclear, and weak nuclear forces are perfectly balanced in proportion to one another for producing a universe where life as we know it could exist. I think it is unscientific to take the laws of physics for granted. Extreme mathematical precision tranforming huge amounts of energy into something which is beautiful, and enables the production of heaveir elements for terrestrial planets in stars can not be an accident in terms of likely hood. Some how this already looks very much to me like a signal to let us know someone else knows how to do math, and has a sense of asthetics. If a theory is formed almost entirely of improbable (if not out right impossible!) coincidences at what point does a thinking open minded person discard it? | |
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late™
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Joined: 1/9/2005
Msg: 1156 | |
| Evolution. and The Flying Spaghetti Monster
Posted: 9/2/2009 6:39:21 PM |
Apparently I'm not making a strawman here argument at all
The term "macroevolution" frequently arises within the context of the evolution/creation debate, usually used by creationists alleging a significant difference between the evolutionary changes observed in field and laboratory studies and the larger scale macroevolutionary changes that scientists believe to have taken thousands or millions of years to occur. They may accept that evolutionary change is possible within species ("microevolution"), but deny that one species can evolve into another ("macroevolution")
~ Matzke, Nicholas J. and Paul R. Gross. 2006. Analyzing Critical Analysis: The Fallback Antievolutionist Strategy. In Eugenie Scott and Glenn Branch, Not in Our Classrooms: Why Intelligent Design is Wrong for Our Schools, Beacon Press | |
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| Evolution. and The Flying Spaghetti Monster
Posted: 9/2/2009 8:13:34 PM |
You're attempting to discredit a mainstream Biology textbook that is currently being used in the U.S. educational system because some "molecular biologist" called it a travesty.
So who is this angry molecular biologist, Richard Dawkins? lol
I've had some serious stinking lousy textbooks over 22 years of education... and you're holding up a lousy, stinking, piece of crap MIDDLE SCHOOL, EARLY HIGH SCHOOL textbook as your "authority in the field?" Only a moron would accept that as a valid source. Could you do us all a favor and find something less smelly?
As for who, do you mean this guy? (David L. Jameson) Here's a few papers he's written. (from PubMed) What have you written in the field? Just curious.
An evaluation of the zygomatic arch for separating juvenile from adult cotton rats (sigmodon hispidus).
Green A, Jameson DL.
J Mammal. 1975 May;56(2):534-5. No abstract available.
PMID: 167088 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]
Related Articles
11:
Solutions to Environmental Problems.
Jameson DL.
Science. 1970 Dec 4;170(3962):1118-1119. No abstract available.
PMID: 17777834 [PubMed - as supplied by publisher]
Related Articles
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Better research--better teachers.
Jameson DL.
Science. 1968 Jun 21;160(834):1291. No abstract available.
PMID: 5651889 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]
Related Articles
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COLOR POLYMORPHISM IN PACIFIC TREE FROGS.
RESNICK LE, JAMESON DL.
Science. 1963 Nov 22;142:1081-3.
PMID: 14068230 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]
Related Articles
Oh, and let's not forget this ACTUAL COLLEGE TEXTBOOK of which Jameson is one of the authors:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0763773646 most recent edition (5th, 2009)
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0763735272 4th edition (2006)
You're embarrassing yourself in public, Sign. I'm sure it's only the anonymity of the Internet that makes you so stupidly brave. Oh wait, that sounds like a definition for "troll." How peculiar. | |
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| Evolution. and The Flying Spaghetti Monster
Posted: 9/2/2009 9:09:55 PM | rodregas, thanks for the reply.
rockondon So your position is NOBODY cast a spell every so often to create new organisms. You're absolutely right. Life can create new organisms on its own without the need for divine intervention - it wasn't God that god my mom pregnant, it was my dad. I suspect you meant new 'species' instead of new organisms. In which case I must add that speciation has been observed many times during the last century and even young earth creationists admit speciation occurs. Answersingenesis (http://www.answersingenesis.org/home/area/feedback/2006/0908.asp) claims that Noah brought 8,000 'kinds' of animals which speciated to the innumerable number of species we see today. Considering that microevolution is about change within a species and macroevolution is about change between species, they are unwittingly admitting to macroevolution. And why not - admitting microevolution and denying macroevolution is akin to admitting that a person can clap their hands once but they can't do it ten times - macroevolution is nothing more than a lot of microevolution.
Genetic engineering by chance sounds like voodoo to me! It sounds like voodoo to me too! But then again, since I accept evolution, the last thing I would believe is that we evolve by chance.
I think the ID position is that we are not the highest intelligences in the universe. The ID position seems to be that there is a creator out there that is a complete moron. He makes animals with eyes that don't work, he fills us with genes that do nothing, he gives us an appendix which can kill us if we leave it in but we're fine when we remove it, and so on.
Gravity, electro magnetism, strong nuclear, and weak nuclear forces are perfectly balanced in proportion to one another... blah blah blah none of this affects the validity of evolution - you're refuting nothing. If there is no god then evolution is true, if god made the universe then evolution is true, so there's no point bringing it up. Anyone who thinks you can't believe in evolution and a god at the same time is an idiot. How many people believe both these things these days - billions? | |
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| Evolution. and The Flying Spaghetti Monster
Posted: 9/3/2009 5:55:13 AM |
Of course I can connect undeniable variation with undeniable differences in the possibility of reproduction. But I've studied what happens with these connections, and they don't automatically lead to the most obvious conclusions. One of the first things we covered in stochastic processes was an example of a positive population growth that results in the death of the population. When we do the maths, selection pressures do NOT directly relate to dominance. Second, we have to consider ALL the factors in those selection pressures, and many of them are non-obvious, yet are often far more powerful than the ones we see. I doubt anyone 100 years ago, considered that destruction of habitat would be far more powerful of a selection pressure than eating species to extinction. Other selection pressures, such as the way starfish reproduce from single limbs, and their competition for feeding with fish, were not considered as to how they would be affected by a decrease in the Triton population. There are MANY cases when not all the factors were considered, or that they were not estimated in correct proportion of their actual effects, even in the effects that were as short as a few years.
There's a lot of words, but not much sense here. Yes, positive population growth can result in the death of the population, or rather, a large number of individuals in the population. This is well known and is nothing to do with the specific case of peppered moths that I gave as an example. Particular selection pressures in this case include, but are not exclusively: increasing competition for resources, destruction of habitat (in retrospect, the unintended consequences of a particular evolutionary path), parasites etc. What you are effectively describing are the many and varied ways in which natural selection can act on a population. It's good that you've conceeded the point.
But I'll humour you. I just fully expect you to not accept the answer. Humans DID replace nature in the last 10,000 years with a group of wolves, more specifically, the wolves in the UK, over the last 10,000 years. But let's not be too narrow. Let's consider all the animals in the UK, like lions, which were found in the UK several centuries ago. The English wiped the lion population out almost completely, and the same with wolves. There are now almost no wolves to speak of in England. However, other species which have had numerous attempts to wipe them out, such as rats, and c0ckroaches, still thrive in huge numbers. What we've seen, is that despite humans taking over where nature left off, things went quite differently than we expected. Animals that are not so easy to find, or so easy to kill, have been much easier to eliminate. Animals that are easy to find, and easy to kill, have not. It turns out that extinction of species has had far more to do with human land usage, than the human desire to eradicate them. This is because the actual selection pressure to eradicate a population is not dependent on the factors that drive those pressures at all. It's entirely dependent on if the actual selection pressures have been inversely proportional to entirely indifferent factors that could have increased independently of the system, such as human population size. In lions and wolves, they were inversely proportional to human population size, and in rats and c0ckroaches, their selection pressures are proportional to human population size.
Firstly, there were no lions in the United Kingdom over the last few centuries. Pre-post ice-age the Sabre Toothed Cats (relatives of modern big cats) became extinct (around 10,000 years ago). Secondly, yes, the Wolves were destroyed by the local population over time, either through hunting or competition for resources, alongside the destruction of habitat caused directly or indirectly by Humans. But this is all to prove the point I am making about selection. Some animals survive because they are able to either avoid the attentions of their competitors (cockroaches) or potential predators, or because they enter into some kind of symbiotic relationship with them, or because their own reproductive habits are enough to ensure their species survives despite predation (Rodents, Rabbits, etc.). Examples of symbiotic relationships with Humans include Cattle, Dogs (Wolves), Grasses (Wheat, Barley, Corn, etc.) and Yeast.
So, what is your point? The theory plays out in all cases exactly as predicted. We do not know which particular variant will be successful a-priori, only after the fact, because we obviously have little or no predictive power with our present ability to model these processes. Evolution by Natural Selection has enormous explanatory power however, and it is in this sense that you should accept it as fact.
Basically, the last few hundred years have shown us that it's the topology of an ecological system that determines which species are eradicated, and which species thrive, not the actual factors and selection pressures that we can see. When humans change the toplogy of one part, the rest of the system's topology changes to match, and it's those parts of the topology that were previously crests or plateaus, that have now changed to be deep troughs, that represent those species that have disappeared.
What is the Topology of a system if it is not the sum of its parts? The individual characteristics and behaviors of individual organisms, all interacting in various ways (some known, some unknown) constitute the topology. | |
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| Evolution.
Posted: 9/3/2009 8:50:06 AM |
This is what I think also. I don't see anything wrong with teaching evolution in schools. However, I don't see anything wrong parent's teaching their kids theology.
i couldnt have said it better. Evolution, be definition, must be taught in schools because its the backbone of biology. You can not accurately teach biology without it. And religion should be left out of the schools. Leave that to the discretion of the parents, just like you said. | |
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| Evolution.
Posted: 9/3/2009 10:16:14 AM | Its interesting that the ones who deny evolution continually refuse to offer an alternative explanation for what the ToE so elegantly explains.
In the fossil record the oldest (deepest) layers contain simple cells followed by more complex cells followed by invertebrate animals then the first fish, then amphibians, then reptiles then birds then mammals. Between these groups we find transitional fossils (fossils that retain traits from their ancestors). We find innumerable fossils with features of fish and amphibians, amphibians and reptiles, and dinosaurs and birds. In essence, we see growing complexity in the fossil record from the simple cells of old to complex animals of today.
So what does it mean when, for example, every animal in the world is a fish then many years later there are fishlike amphibians then years later there are amphibians? - it means that species are changing over time. Unless you're a creationist, in which case it means that a god made fish, then killed them, then made fish-amphibians, then killed them, then made amphibians, then killed them, etc. Decide for yourself which makes more sense.
One nice example of a transitional species is the Tiktaalik, a fish with wrist and finger bones and lungs. This creature, an intermediate form between fish and tetrapods (which is essentially the precursor to amphibians and other 4-legged animals) was not found by chance. Research showed that vertebrates first invaded land about 375 million years ago from Canada and spread out from there. Thus, paleontologists went to Canada and searched rock layers that were about 375 million years old and found exactly what they expected to find and they confirmed what evolution predicted - the Tiktaalik, a 'fish' that could support itself on land and breathe air. And what's the creationist view on this I wonder - perhaps God deceives us by putting these seemingly transitional fossils in the right depth and the right location to fool us? If you replace the word 'Tiktaalik' with pikaia (invertebrate to fish), hylonomus (amphibian to reptile), archaeopteryx (dinosaur to bird), or a thousand other transitional forms you'll reach the same conclusions - either God is fooling us or species are changing over time. And when we're talking hundreds of millions of years, those changes add up to create vastly different forms of life.
The fossil record was more than enough to settle the issue of common descent (at least to those whose brains weren't destroyed by being religious fundamentalists) a century ago and yet it is not even the strongest evidence of evolution - that title likely belongs to genetics. | |
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late™
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Joined: 1/9/2005
Msg: 1162 | |
| Evolution.
Posted: 9/3/2009 10:34:36 AM |
Its interesting that the ones who deny evolution continually refuse to offer an alternative explanation for what the ToE so elegantly explains
It's pretty simple, it happens when ever science threatens a theological world view, confirmation bias requires that they deny science, the source of the denial isn't scientific, it's fear and doubt.
"If it's true, maybe my entire concept of everything is wrong"
"Maybe there's no afterlife"
It doesn't require an alternate explanation, just a large enough constituency of "faithful" to project their faith-based doubt and fears on science –which is already inclusive of a mechanism to deal with "doubt", which doesn't recognize explanations that aren't falsifiable.
Hence, denial rooted in intellectual dishonesty. | |
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| Evolution.
Posted: 9/3/2009 12:02:35 PM | Force is science, energy is science, where it comes from nobody knows beyond reasonable doubt!
Good and bad are thought's which are energy which is said to be evolutionary, thoughts , the brain lot's of things are known. But to balance that out there is a lot unknown. | |
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| Evolution.
Posted: 9/3/2009 1:19:49 PM | I want the "Truth" to be taught in schools, and in home's around the world without mis - interpretation without one ruler in the seat of power man or woman.
Science also to be taught in schools, no suppression of facts I am not against evolution, what i am against is the division it causes. As do many churches/organised religions cause divison. A questioning mind allways weigh's the pro's and con's and keeps searching for the answers. Keep's searching for the "Truth" | |
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late™
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Joined: 1/9/2005
Msg: 1165 | |
| Evolution.
Posted: 9/3/2009 1:28:23 PM | interelatedness of all things.
Yet another topic.
I want the "Truth" to be taught in schools, and in home's around the world without mis - interpretation without one ruler in the seat of power man or woman.
Science has never claimed to be an arbiter of "truth", it lacks that particular arrogance, unlike many who press their faith/theological based ideas onto a frame of reference that doesn't even involve faith/theology.
Science also to be taught in schools, no suppression of facts I am not against evolution, what i am against is the division it causes.
There is no division caused in science, that's the point. If there was, one ought to be able to find a peer reviewed article refuting the facts or theory of evolution. So far, in 150 years, the only aspects refuted have served to progree the theory, not deny it, ...genetics comes to mind, which is why prevailing theory is often denoted as:
neo-Darwinian
adjective - Biology
~ of or relating to the modern version of Darwin's theory of evolution by natural selection, incorporating the findings of genetics.
A questioning mind allways weigh's the pro's and con's and keeps searching for the answers. Keep's searching for the "Truth"
Which is part of the definition of "science", if you substitute "truth" with "knowledge" ...but sadly, not this is not a feature of religious "faith".
in order to believe in evolution
Evolution is a fact, it's an observed fact, the theory describing how it works is a theory, in science (the topic of this forum) it's not a question of "believing" it's a question of accepting or refuting. Conflating evolution with other scientific avenues of study is a fallacious "means to an end", ...a red herring. | |
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late™
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Joined: 1/9/2005
Msg: 1166 | |
| Evolution.
Posted: 9/3/2009 1:59:15 PM |
I think the religious oppose just about anything that threatens their teachings.
To be fair this only applies to fundamentalists and literalists.
it is ALWAYS religion who must yield, and ammend their thinkging....NEVER science.
From a science perspective.
Because the frames of reference do not interact or compliment each other.
Theology has as much impact on science as pastry recipes have on architecture. | |
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| Evolution.
Posted: 9/3/2009 8:29:24 PM | not all creationists are that way, AND adaptation gets confused with "evolution".
thanks. | |
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| Evolution.
Posted: 9/3/2009 8:33:34 PM |
adaptation gets confused with "evolution".
For the umpteenth time... adaptation (observed beneficial genetic mutations) over an extended period of time IS evolution. | |
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| Evolution.
Posted: 9/4/2009 2:53:20 AM | Off Topic Posting removed. Address the topic
DO NOT ADDRESS OTHER POSTERS/INSULT/FLAME/BAIT etc
Do NOT change the topic and hijack threads.
'Hijacking' simply means changing and detracting from the Topic or Subject under Discussion, as set out by the initial Post on any given Thread.
Thanks to those who remained on topic.
Why do you suppose that the volumes of facts and data in support of evolution have been repressed in public schools. I know that religious leaders are opposed, but they aren't enough to persuade the boards to not teach the theory.
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| Evolution.
Posted: 9/4/2009 3:41:10 AM |
Why do you suppose that the volumes of facts and data in support of evolution have been repressed in public schools. I know that religious leaders are opposed, but they aren't enough to persuade the boards to not teach the theory.
Bottom line I just think some people don't want to admit that they are related to animals.
Hell, they don't even want to admit that they ARE animals, albeit highly intelligent (supposedly) ones.
Religion of course plays its part. Man, being related to the animals, kinda messes up his place in the Universe. But this is a moot point really because now, thanks to modern cosmology, our place in the universe is virtually meaningless. Earth does NOT lie at the centre of the cosmos and if we were to blow ourselves up tomorrow, it would not affect the grand scheme of things one iota.
It's taken most mainstream religions a long, long time to accept modern cosmology (if indeed they really have), because it knocks Man firmly off his “cosmic” pedestal. It's going to take even longer for mainstream religions to accept evolution wholeheartedly because then, that knocks Man off the pedestal of being "God's chosen".
Personally, I think it's great that ALL Life on this planet, shares a deep connection, a deep bond, and that in turn makes me feel even MORE special and connected to this planet to be honest. So I really don't understand why people feel threaten by Evolution.
But yeah... Bottom line it's Fear... Fear of losing some kind of status. | |
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late™
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Joined: 1/9/2005
Msg: 1171 | |
| Evolution.
Posted: 9/4/2009 3:30:49 PM |
Bottom line I just think some people don't want to admit that they are related to animals.
Especially it seems, that we are primates.
But yeah... Bottom line it's Fear... Fear of losing some kind of status.
Fear, and maybe arrogance.
Evolution implies that we are special in that we evolved to our particular environmental niche (which makes all living things "special"), and not that we were "chosen" by some kind of divine intervention to have "special" bestowed on us – what other emotions does the denial of evolution because of this aspect suggest?
The most frightening aspect of the anti-evolution agenda is; what do we then replace eovolution with that leads to more knowledge, better solutions to biological problems and a better quality of life?
There hasn't been one single post by an anti-evolution proponent that addresses this question (or in any of the Creationist/ID websites and publications), even though it is asked on almost every page of this thread. Why should doubt be cast on a paradigm that produces results in favour of one that hasn't/doesn't? | |
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| Evolution.
Posted: 9/4/2009 4:00:27 PM |
Evolution implies that we are special
Well, in a sense, we are special. The improbability of you existing, I mean you personally, based on the fact that all of your ancestors have survived up until now, from the first protazoans and even before, is a pretty special thing in itself. The most amazing thing to me, in terms of understanding Evolution, was the realisation that every creature alive today is a cousin of mine, although mostly very many hundreds of thousands or millions of times removed! | |
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late™
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Joined: 1/9/2005
Msg: 1173 | |
| Evolution.
Posted: 9/4/2009 4:46:40 PM | Perhaps if one could explain this kind of "special" to the religious fundamentalist constituency who follow their leader's fallacy filled denials of science, they could see that they can have a creator (albeit an insentient one) and a designer (albeit an insentient one), in the form of an awe inspiring (albeit insentient) being (in the sense of "to be") called nature (no need for an upper-case "N").
Nature keeps secrets, and gives them up grudgingly, but it gives them up nonetheless, provided one applies the innate curiosity humans have, to an epistemological method; in order to be enlightened to what we are and where we exist and how it all came to be.
Evolution is a result of the application of an epistemological method (science), that needs to be explained, learned and defended from those who would promote what would inevitably result in an intellectual dead-end. And, potentially in the very least, regions of society confronted with a "Dark Age" in regards to understanding, knowledge and progress. | |
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| Evolution.
Posted: 9/4/2009 5:10:47 PM | Late:
What you have stated in your last post does resonate logic and reason, and can be backed up materially. In my heart i still feel so strongly connected too nature and cannot forget my creator, or that it is unfeeling, for such detail and care was given us.
I just hope that the knowledge we have is used correctly. Evolution can show some of how things change. In certain enviroment's but not all has yet been revealed. But things change. | |
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| Evolution.
Posted: 9/4/2009 5:42:08 PM |
Fear, and maybe arrogance.
You hit the nail on the head there mate... The Arrogance of Man.
Well... Such folly is being eroded even as we speak. Some will resist of course, as some are doing now, but their Enlightenment will come sooner or later. One cannot deny the Truth forever… It’s all simply a matter of Time… And the Universe has plenty of that. | |
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