|
Post by Acolyte on Jan 27, 2009 22:27:02 GMT
Were we through our knowledge of genetics etc, able to create a new species would that be an example of evolution or an act of creation? *grins* I think it would be an act of Creation but not original creation - after all the genes & cells already exist. I came back to say to the Evolution vs Creation antagonists... It takes a peculiar mindset to see Evolution & Creation as opposites on a line - in actuality they ahve nothing to do with each other. Leaving out the mistranslation that has led to the 7-literal-day creation story (yom is a period, non-specific in time) Creation is about how it all got started while Evolution is about how it continued on AFTER it got started. So to argue one against the other simply shows that someone has accepted a red herring instigated decades ago to make an argument - it isn't actually true & to continue on with it shows belief & not rational thought about the subject. If you want to have that particular argument (origins) go start a thread on Big Bang versus God - although even that is a non-argument it is at least getting close to the same spectrum of sides in the argument - ie. about origins. Evolution is NOT about origins, it's about a process that can only happen once life is present.
|
|
|
Post by jimg on Jan 28, 2009 1:11:16 GMT
A scientist goes before God and says "look" I can do what you do. I can take a pile of dirt and create life from it." My power now rivals yours. God looks the scientist over and says. "Wow. You certainly have grown in your knowledge and have become great. Please, show me how you do this." A little surprised at the answer, the scientist goes and gathers some dirt and begins his process. God says, "Hold on there. I thought you were going to use your own dirt."
|
|
|
Post by donmartin on Jan 28, 2009 6:16:46 GMT
jimg: brilliant
|
|
|
Post by poitsplace on Jan 28, 2009 10:13:02 GMT
Poits, you're rambling now. You're best quote: This is an incorrect assessment. Single mutations DO NOT result in entirely new organs or massive lifestyle changes. A single mutation usually results in a change to a single protein fragment (which is often used in numerous other proteins). Such changes may do something systemic like change the rate of an equilibrium shift that leads to the lengthening of appendages. It may cause changes in the density of muscle fibers. It MIGHT make the organism an inhospitable environment for parasites ...like sickle cell anemia, which affects the solubility of hemoglobin. Exactly my point! So, since it takes numerous mutations to generate one organ, why don't we have numerous organ-fragments/incomplete systems that haven't made it to full organ status? I explained, it's not unlike the advancement of technology. It's like asking why they weren't making solid slabs of silicon with thin film wires on them BEFORE they actually figured out how to make transistors in the first place. Mutations don't come together into half-complete, non-functioning organs just like technology doesn't come together into half-complete, non-functioning pieces of equipment. The eye is a perfect example...an eye spot is fully functional. It doesn't even need neurons to work, it could operate in a useful way by triggering the release of chemicals directly into the body to make the organism migrate away from light or to move until it reached enough light (depending on its needs). Some sort of rudimentary nervous system is functional in its own right. If a mutation makes nerves tend to grow into the spot and/or makes the spot produce chemicals that affect the nerves...there's added functionality with an immediate benefit (speed). If a mutation causes pits to form on an organism and it involves the eye spots PRESTO...added functionality, it can tell the direction of the light to within less than 90 degrees. Deeper pit, better directionality. A mutation that makes multiple eye spots form along the inside of the pit and you've got a single organ with the ability to determine direction of multiple sources of light. Eventually through minor tweaks in the construction it forms a more or less spherical, pin-hole camera. All the while any mutations that allow better use (processing) of that directional light information by the nervous system are also immediately beneficial. The very existence of the existing structures make mutations that refine their use more beneficial...and therefore more likely to be passed on. What you've been hung up on is some sort of assumption that the organism would form a chamber lined with a complex array of light sensitive cells...but with no connection to the nervous system...or for the nervous system to have some visual processing capability that forms in the absence of the eye. OBVIOUSLY this would never happen. Your objection to this sort of thing is perfectly reasonable...but since your objection is to something that the theory of evolution doesn't even hint at, it's a moot point.
|
|
|
Post by Acolyte on Jan 28, 2009 12:17:51 GMT
And so goes any attempt to have meaningful discussion about what might have caused life to become what it has.
Belief is a vile thing - it saps the brain & eats at the logic & turns rational people into mindless automatons, regurgitating the bleeding obvious, over & over, given the slightest excuse & with no regard to the actual topic nor the polite requests of the OP.
Derailment personified in the dogmatic beliefs of the prejudiced.
Hey thanks for nothing guys... You can go now - make your own thread & have your personal cruades in that instead OK. I've been polite & asked a number of times now take your beliefs & go elsewhere. In good Aussie terms, PTFO!
|
|
|
Post by jimg on Jan 29, 2009 5:50:37 GMT
Huh? What'cha talkin about mate?
|
|
|
Post by donmartin on Feb 7, 2009 7:47:23 GMT
"So much evidence pointing to evolution..." The theory of natural selection is attractive and seemingly rational. However, even Darwin devoted a great deal of attention in "The Origin" to the difficulty caused to his theory by the cambrian explosion of life forms as originally evidenced in the Burgess shale formations in Field, British Columbia. the earth exists for a period of 4 billion years with de minimus bacterial life forms (probably), and then suddenly we have the life forms with which are familiar today. Is it then reasonable to suppose that life forms are consequent to geological events and that adaptive life forms are of trivial importance in the great scheme of progenitation?
|
|
|
Post by socold on Feb 8, 2009 21:08:39 GMT
But once again socold, you are juxtaposing causation with correlation. A common theme in AGW theory. You are seeing something in nature and attributing a conclusion to that correlation. Although both critters have similar jaws, that is not a post-facto conclusion that one is an ancestor of the other. But it is a confirmed prediction of the theory. It's expected that such intermediate forms will be found in both their characteristics and in their age, for obvious reasons.
|
|
|
Post by socold on Feb 8, 2009 21:11:41 GMT
Ironically the thread eqautes the theory of evolution to the theory of AGW.
That's actually a big compliment to the theory of AGW. In fact too big than even I think it deserves. The theory of evolution is a far better theory than AGW, but then it's had longer to be developed.
|
|
|
Post by socold on Feb 8, 2009 21:16:43 GMT
What you describe may or may not produce new species, but it's a process that takes, as you say, millions of years. Where are the fossils? There are hardly any which combine characteristics of two lines - if the transitional process takes so long, we should be rolling in transitional fossils because over such time frames, the rarity problem goes away. The Punctuated Equilibrium idea came about to address precisely this issue - but they don't have mechanism. Find the mechanism that allows for the sudden spurts of species & genera & we will have an answer (probably) for how things came to be. The mechanism is the same - random mutation and selection, it's just that punctuated equillibrium suggests that early views that changes occured gradually at a near constant rate were wrong, and that in fact most of the time species don't change much but then change significantly in a short space of time (geologically speaking) due to selective pressures changing.
|
|
|
Post by crakar24 on Feb 12, 2009 5:41:55 GMT
And so goes any attempt to have meaningful discussion about what might have caused life to become what it has. Belief is a vile thing - it saps the brain & eats at the logic & turns rational people into mindless automatons, regurgitating the bleeding obvious, over & over, given the slightest excuse & with no regard to the actual topic nor the polite requests of the OP. Derailment personified in the dogmatic beliefs of the prejudiced. Hey thanks for nothing guys... You can go now - make your own thread & have your personal cruades in that instead OK. I've been polite & asked a number of times now take your beliefs & go elsewhere. In good Aussie terms, PTFO! Defenition of belief. I do not believe in cows for i have seen them, i know they exist. I do believe in little green men, i have not seen them, i do not know they exist. When i die cows will continue to exist, my beliefs will not as my beliefs will die with me. Now i will politely PTFO. Cheers Acolyte
|
|
|
Post by Acolyte on Feb 17, 2009 11:32:24 GMT
Defenition of belief. I do not believe in cows for i have seen them, i know they exist. I do believe in little green men, i have not seen them, i do not know they exist. When i die cows will continue to exist, my beliefs will not as my beliefs will die with me. Now i will politely PTFO. Cheers Acolyte nah, those willing to question are exempt - only those who seize any excuse to argue fixed beliefs should follow the last instruction. It is only a belief you have that when you die cows (or anything else) will continue to exist. As an option, if the slim clues we have as to what our Reality might really be are anywhere approximating truth, your beliefs may have greater longevity & more substance than the cows. It seems to me that in recent times there are at least 3 unquestionable 'truths' - which to me automatically removes them from the field of science. Evolution - as defined by the darwinians, (but not necessarily by Darwin himself) being the accumulation of tiny random changes in the gene structures being sole cause of the variety & multiplicity of life on Earth. It is unproven, relies on a logic not examined by experiment & seems unfalsifiable at present. It also fails to explain a number of things we know to have happened because of physical evidence. AGW - as defined by the true believers, this is that CO 2, by & of itself, is the Prime cause for Global Warming of such catastrophic proportions that we have to radically alter our lives, change our society, consign the poor to miserable lives & allow entire countries to fail so that our future can be assured. It is unproven, relies on computer models which struggle to tell us where it will rain tomorrow even when they ahve todays weather input, fails to account for natural processes known to radically alter climate over hundreds or thousands of years & is maintained by preference & corruption in both media & high levels of the science comunity. (you're not going to like this one) Passive smoking - as defined by the bodies that legislate against smokers, this is the inhaling of smoke from other people's burning tobacco. There is literally NO evidence it can cause lung cancer, no evidence it contributes to hospital bills for society & nothing to show it is harmful to anyone except those whose lungs are not yet fully developed - & given we are quite willing to deny advancement to millions of Africans who die before the age of 35 from lung disease related directly to having to inhale smoke from open fire cooking within the huts they have to live in, this would hardly seem to be a motivation for altering laws en masse. Note: there IS evidence that smoking can harm the smoker. Lung Cancer shows a direct correlation to smokers. But Passive Smoking, the Cause Celebre used to justify banning smokers from almost everywhere, has literally NO scientific backing. It is junk science, brought ot major status by political machinations. (look it up - google it & find out for yourself - try the ex-BMJ Editor from England as one who has something to say on the matter.) There are probably more - the treatment of Pons & Fleischman comes to mind - but on the backs of these events, Science is no longer Science - when the lack of evidence is ignored in favour of a political 'consensus' this is politics, not Science.
|
|