• Welcome to Religious Forums, a friendly forum to discuss all religions in a friendly surrounding.

    Your voice is missing! You will need to register to get access to the following site features:
    • Reply to discussions and create your own threads.
    • Our modern chat room. No add-ons or extensions required, just login and start chatting!
    • Access to private conversations with other members.

    We hope to see you as a part of our community soon!

On the Impossibility of Evolution on Logical Grounds Alone

Status
Not open for further replies.

Christifidelis

New Member
I am not a "Scientific Creationist", but I believe I can demonstrate that large-scale or macro-evolution is impossible on logical grounds alone.

The first question that needs to be asked in this regard is not how any species or higher-level grouping of living creatures came into being, but how any single individual - whatever classifications s/he or it may fall under, did. According to the modern "scientific" theory of evolution, any such individual would have had to come into existence through a chain of matings (and asexual splittings in the remotest past) stretching back, through hundreds of millions of years, to the beginning of life itself. It is to natural selection, genetic variation and environmental change that any individual bacterium, frog, dog, or human being owes his, her, or its existence.

Were this the case, however, such chains of sexual or asexual procreations would be quite inaccessible to the pressure of natural selection, which is supposed to be the main driver of the evolutionary process. For the immediate cause of the coming into being of each "link" of any given chain would reside in the procreative activity of its parent(s), not in any competition for food, mates, or the like. Competition, or survival of the fittest, can concern only populations of living beings, not individuals. Ancestral chains of individuals, in other words, would be self contained, and therefore indifferent to natural selection, because by their very nature they would have to constitute unbroken or continuous series of creatures; they would be "vertical" phenomena, if one will, whereas a force like natural selection can operate only "horizontally", or on the level of groups of creatures co-existing in time.

It is for this reason, I think, that natural selection, while it has been demonstrated to be an operative force of nature, can only be a conservative one, that is, one that works to preserve pre-given living forms in optimal condition through differential survival and reproduction. It can in no wise be conceived to be the creator of such living forms. The hypothesis of large-scale transformative evolution would seem, therefore, to be based on a confusion between fundamental change and simple variation, with the latter being supposed to account somehow for the former, or to be continuous with it. The inescapable truth is that in none but the smallest scale changes can the creation of living forms have come about in any other way than "vertically" - by which I mean, this time, as a result of a creation which had ultimately to come from above.

I will explain more about what I mean by this last statement in the future.

Christifidelis
 

viole

Ontological Naturalist
Premium Member
I am not a "Scientific Creationist", but I believe I can demonstrate that large-scale or macro-evolution is impossible on logical grounds alone.

Of course you aren't. "Scientific Creationist" is an oxymoron, like "Married Bachelor".

I will let others to address the rest. Time to sleep here in Europe.

Ciao

- viole
 

Willamena

Just me
Premium Member
The first question that needs to be asked in this regard is not how any species or higher-level grouping of living creatures came into being, but how any single individual - whatever classifications s/he or it may fall under, did. According to the modern "scientific" theory of evolution, any such individual would have had to come into existence through a chain of matings (and asexual splittings in the remotest past) stretching back, through hundreds of millions of years, to the beginning of life itself. It is to natural selection, genetic variation and environmental change that any individual bacterium, frog, dog, or human being owes his, her, or its existence.

Were this the case, however, such chains of sexual or asexual procreations would be quite inaccessible to the pressure of natural selection, which is supposed to be the main driver of the evolutionary process. For the immediate cause of the coming into being of each "link" of any given chain would reside in the procreative activity of its parent(s), not in any competition for food, mates, or the like. Competition, or survival of the fittest, can concern only populations of living beings, not individuals. Ancestral chains of individuals, in other words, would be self contained, and therefore indifferent to natural selection, because by their very nature they would have to constitute unbroken or continuous series of creatures; they would be "vertical" phenomena, if one will, whereas a force like natural selection can operate only "horizontally", or on the level of groups of creatures co-existing in time.


It is for this reason, I think, that natural selection, while it has been demonstrated to be an operative force of nature, can only be a conservative one, that is, one that works to preserve pre-given living forms in optimal condition through differential survival and reproduction. It can in no wise be conceived to be the creator of such living forms. The hypothesis of large-scale transformative evolution would seem, therefore, to be based on a confusion between fundamental change and simple variation, with the latter being supposed to account somehow for the former, or to be continuous with it. The inescapable truth is that in none but the smallest scale changes can the creation of living forms have come about in any other way than "vertically" - by which I mean, this time, as a result of a creation which had ultimately to come from above.

I will explain more about what I mean by this last statement in the future.

Christifidelis

What do you imagine natural selection to be, that it's not generative of populations?

Say a lion gave birth to a purple cub. It would nurture it, care for it, and when it grew, it would pass on its purple gene to its offspring. If, then, the lions lived in an environment of purple flowers that hid them from prey, this would be a generative advantage of the natural selection type.
 

outhouse

Atheistically
I believe I can demonstrate that large-scale or macro-evolution is impossible on logical grounds alone.

You cannot.

Evolution is fact, and your lack of scientific knowledge limits your argument to something that makes it perfectly clear you don't understand what is actually taking place.


Evolution has not been up for debate for a very long time but recently has been deemed factual in all credible scientific academies.


Besides being observed, it is backed by fossil evidence, but most of all dna factual evidence.



Can you explain why it is taught as fact in every civilized country around the world, and viewed as higher education?
 

Willamena

Just me
Premium Member
It is for this reason, I think, that natural selection, while it has been demonstrated to be an operative force of nature, can only be a conservative one, that is, one that works to preserve pre-given living forms in optimal condition through differential survival and reproduction. It can in no wise be conceived to be the creator of such living forms.
Natural selection is just a tool of evolution. It wouldn't be until a new species is identified that evolution has taken place.

Evolution's only creator is us, through our ability to analyse the world. We are the ones for whom it makes a difference that there are tan lions surviving on trunda vs. purple lions surviving in fields of purple flowers.
 

Riverwolf

Amateur Rambler / Proud Ergi
Premium Member
Sharks have barely changed at all in about 400 million years.

Mammals have changed radically in just 65 million years.

Environments are constantly changing, and natural selection allows those which adapt most rapidly (i.e., evolve) to survive, while those which can't, to go extinct. Some species live in fairly constant environments, and so change very little over the years; consider the open ocean. Others live in rapidly changing environments, and so change rapidly even over relatively short time periods; consider jungles.

I recommend discarding concepts of "horizontal" and "vertical" when trying to visualize this, as I think it's just causing confusion. Evolution of all kinds (whether biological, technological, or otherwise) is best visualized as a Tree.
 

Jayhawker Soule

-- untitled --
Premium Member
I am not a "Scientific Creationist", but I believe I can demonstrate that large-scale or macro-evolution is impossible on logical grounds alone.
Thousands of the high quality scholars engaged in hundreds of thousands of hours of high quality, peer reviewed research and you presume yourself capable of falsifying this whole remarkable and imminently productive scientific endeavor. This is laughable hubris run amok.
 

Deathbydefault

Apistevist Asexual Atheist
I am not a "Scientific Creationist", but I believe I can demonstrate that large-scale or macro-evolution is impossible on logical grounds alone.

The first question that needs to be asked in this regard is not how any species or higher-level grouping of living creatures came into being, but how any single individual - whatever classifications s/he or it may fall under, did. According to the modern "scientific" theory of evolution, any such individual would have had to come into existence through a chain of matings (and asexual splittings in the remotest past) stretching back, through hundreds of millions of years, to the beginning of life itself. It is to natural selection, genetic variation and environmental change that any individual bacterium, frog, dog, or human being owes his, her, or its existence.

Were this the case, however, such chains of sexual or asexual procreations would be quite inaccessible to the pressure of natural selection, which is supposed to be the main driver of the evolutionary process. For the immediate cause of the coming into being of each "link" of any given chain would reside in the procreative activity of its parent(s), not in any competition for food, mates, or the like. Competition, or survival of the fittest, can concern only populations of living beings, not individuals. Ancestral chains of individuals, in other words, would be self contained, and therefore indifferent to natural selection, because by their very nature they would have to constitute unbroken or continuous series of creatures; they would be "vertical" phenomena, if one will, whereas a force like natural selection can operate only "horizontally", or on the level of groups of creatures co-existing in time.

It is for this reason, I think, that natural selection, while it has been demonstrated to be an operative force of nature, can only be a conservative one, that is, one that works to preserve pre-given living forms in optimal condition through differential survival and reproduction. It can in no wise be conceived to be the creator of such living forms. The hypothesis of large-scale transformative evolution would seem, therefore, to be based on a confusion between fundamental change and simple variation, with the latter being supposed to account somehow for the former, or to be continuous with it. The inescapable truth is that in none but the smallest scale changes can the creation of living forms have come about in any other way than "vertically" - by which I mean, this time, as a result of a creation which had ultimately to come from above.

I will explain more about what I mean by this last statement in the future.

Christifidelis

May I just say, as a kind of side note, that even if evolution were to be proven false, it would do nothing for creationists.
Scientists would simply adapt to new information and create a new theory.

If evolution were wrong it would not mean that creationism is right.
At this point, evolution has so much evidence that neither you nor I could read all of it within our lifetimes.
Creationism, in comparison, has virtually none.

So, if you want to logically disprove something, creationism is a much easier target to go after.
 

outhouse

Atheistically
Creationism, in comparison, has virtually none.

Not virtually none, it has not a single shred of evidence in support.

Creationism has absolutely no credible evidence in support, and has been deemed mythology and pseudoscience.


I know you know this, I just wanted to add to your fine opinion ;)
 

JRMcC

Active Member
I don't see any good answers here. Props to the poster (even though I do believe in evolution)
 

Parsimony

Well-Known Member
Ancestral chains of individuals, in other words, would be self contained, and therefore indifferent to natural selection, because by their very nature they would have to constitute unbroken or continuous series of creatures; they would be "vertical" phenomena, if one will, whereas a force like natural selection can operate only "horizontally", or on the level of groups of creatures co-existing in time.
Selection pressures are the very reason that those particular continuous series of creatures existed instead of some alternative continuous series of creatures.
 

outhouse

Atheistically
I don't see any good answers here. Props to the poster (even though I do believe in evolution)


When it comes to pseudoscience and imagination, do you expect time consuming replies?

What logical grounds did the OP actually even make?
 
Last edited:

Nietzsche

The Last Prussian
Premium Member
I am not a "Scientific Creationist", but I believe I can demonstrate that large-scale or macro-evolution is impossible on logical grounds alone.

The first question that needs to be asked in this regard is not how any species or higher-level grouping of living creatures came into being, but how any single individual - whatever classifications s/he or it may fall under, did. According to the modern "scientific" theory of evolution, any such individual would have had to come into existence through a chain of matings (and asexual splittings in the remotest past) stretching back, through hundreds of millions of years, to the beginning of life itself. It is to natural selection, genetic variation and environmental change that any individual bacterium, frog, dog, or human being owes his, her, or its existence.

Were this the case, however, such chains of sexual or asexual procreations would be quite inaccessible to the pressure of natural selection, which is supposed to be the main driver of the evolutionary process. For the immediate cause of the coming into being of each "link" of any given chain would reside in the procreative activity of its parent(s), not in any competition for food, mates, or the like. Competition, or survival of the fittest, can concern only populations of living beings, not individuals. Ancestral chains of individuals, in other words, would be self contained, and therefore indifferent to natural selection, because by their very nature they would have to constitute unbroken or continuous series of creatures; they would be "vertical" phenomena, if one will, whereas a force like natural selection can operate only "horizontally", or on the level of groups of creatures co-existing in time.

It is for this reason, I think, that natural selection, while it has been demonstrated to be an operative force of nature, can only be a conservative one, that is, one that works to preserve pre-given living forms in optimal condition through differential survival and reproduction. It can in no wise be conceived to be the creator of such living forms. The hypothesis of large-scale transformative evolution would seem, therefore, to be based on a confusion between fundamental change and simple variation, with the latter being supposed to account somehow for the former, or to be continuous with it. The inescapable truth is that in none but the smallest scale changes can the creation of living forms have come about in any other way than "vertically" - by which I mean, this time, as a result of a creation which had ultimately to come from above.

I will explain more about what I mean by this last statement in the future.

Christifidelis
I have some advice, which can be summed up thusly; Try harder.
 

NewGuyOnTheBlock

Cult Survivor/Fundamentalist Pentecostal Apostate
You're "logical explanation on why evolution can't be true" is obliterated by evidence stating emphatically that evolution IS true:

 

Kirran

Premium Member
Actually, you've made a mistake. Natural selection doesn't act upon populations, it acts upon individuals, upon the phenotype of an individual. Group selection only exists as a consequence of selection on genes, for example in kin selection. But let's not confuse evolution with selective pressure. Evolution acts on the gene, selective pressure on the individual.

So when you say that chains of procreation are inaccessible to natural selection, I don't think you've really read much about the subject. It's not the individual procreation event which is subject to natural selection. Things related to that which are subject to selective pressures include the fitness of the two organisms (or one organism) involved which enabled it/them to live long enough to reproduce, as well as to impress each other enough to mate (in many species) as well as their ability to actually reproduce (considering such things as gamete viability, genetic compatibility, sperm motility, etc) and to gestate and raise the resulting offspring.

Other evolutionary forces at play, outside of natural selection (which works only on existing variation) are genetic drift, mutation, migration and non-random mating. Mutation acts directly on the individual, while genetic drift, migration and I suppose non-random mating can be said to act at the level of the population.

EDIT: Additionally, we've seen the adaptation of insects to different fruit species upon introduction to the New World, which can hardly be said to be conservative. Remember, also, evolution is not a mechanism. Evolution is an emergent process, its mechanisms are natural selection etc. Although they could also be said to be emergent from physics and chemistry.

I am a biologist :D
 

Laika

Well-Known Member
Premium Member
I am not a "Scientific Creationist", but I believe I can demonstrate that large-scale or macro-evolution is impossible on logical grounds alone.

The first question that needs to be asked in this regard is not how any species or higher-level grouping of living creatures came into being, but how any single individual - whatever classifications s/he or it may fall under, did. According to the modern "scientific" theory of evolution, any such individual would have had to come into existence through a chain of matings (and asexual splittings in the remotest past) stretching back, through hundreds of millions of years, to the beginning of life itself. It is to natural selection, genetic variation and environmental change that any individual bacterium, frog, dog, or human being owes his, her, or its existence.

Were this the case, however, such chains of sexual or asexual procreations would be quite inaccessible to the pressure of natural selection, which is supposed to be the main driver of the evolutionary process. For the immediate cause of the coming into being of each "link" of any given chain would reside in the procreative activity of its parent(s), not in any competition for food, mates, or the like. Competition, or survival of the fittest, can concern only populations of living beings, not individuals. Ancestral chains of individuals, in other words, would be self contained, and therefore indifferent to natural selection, because by their very nature they would have to constitute unbroken or continuous series of creatures; they would be "vertical" phenomena, if one will, whereas a force like natural selection can operate only "horizontally", or on the level of groups of creatures co-existing in time.

It is for this reason, I think, that natural selection, while it has been demonstrated to be an operative force of nature, can only be a conservative one, that is, one that works to preserve pre-given living forms in optimal condition through differential survival and reproduction. It can in no wise be conceived to be the creator of such living forms. The hypothesis of large-scale transformative evolution would seem, therefore, to be based on a confusion between fundamental change and simple variation, with the latter being supposed to account somehow for the former, or to be continuous with it. The inescapable truth is that in none but the smallest scale changes can the creation of living forms have come about in any other way than "vertically" - by which I mean, this time, as a result of a creation which had ultimately to come from above.

I will explain more about what I mean by this last statement in the future.

Christifidelis

First off. good on you for trying to reason out your beliefs and objections. The willingness to question the conventional wisdom as well as your own beliefs is an admirable trait :)

second. "science says so!" is not proof.

I think this is what you're getting at is that;

a) evolution does not explian the origin of life itself [I think primordial soup is one theory].
b) evolution does not explain the process of mutation/adaption over the course of millennia leading to new speices- merely why pre-existing species survived and others did not.

fair enough. the question of the survival of species over geological time is adequately explained by evolutionary theory. A lack of a naturalistic explanations for other area does not imply the impossibility of a naturalistic explanation, merely insufficient knowledge to make one. it becomes a question as to whether a 'gap' in our knowledge necessitates a god of the gaps.
 

Bunyip

pro scapegoat
I am not a "Scientific Creationist", but I believe I can demonstrate that large-scale or macro-evolution is impossible on logical grounds alone.

The first question that needs to be asked in this regard is not how any species or higher-level grouping of living creatures came into being, but how any single individual - whatever classifications s/he or it may fall under, did. According to the modern "scientific" theory of evolution, any such individual would have had to come into existence through a chain of matings (and asexual splittings in the remotest past) stretching back, through hundreds of millions of years, to the beginning of life itself. It is to natural selection, genetic variation and environmental change that any individual bacterium, frog, dog, or human being owes his, her, or its existence.

Were this the case, however, such chains of sexual or asexual procreations would be quite inaccessible to the pressure of natural selection, which is supposed to be the main driver of the evolutionary process. For the immediate cause of the coming into being of each "link" of any given chain would reside in the procreative activity of its parent(s), not in any competition for food, mates, or the like. Competition, or survival of the fittest, can concern only populations of living beings, not individuals. Ancestral chains of individuals, in other words, would be self contained, and therefore indifferent to natural selection, because by their very nature they would have to constitute unbroken or continuous series of creatures; they would be "vertical" phenomena, if one will, whereas a force like natural selection can operate only "horizontally", or on the level of groups of creatures co-existing in time.

It is for this reason, I think, that natural selection, while it has been demonstrated to be an operative force of nature, can only be a conservative one, that is, one that works to preserve pre-given living forms in optimal condition through differential survival and reproduction. It can in no wise be conceived to be the creator of such living forms. The hypothesis of large-scale transformative evolution would seem, therefore, to be based on a confusion between fundamental change and simple variation, with the latter being supposed to account somehow for the former, or to be continuous with it. The inescapable truth is that in none but the smallest scale changes can the creation of living forms have come about in any other way than "vertically" - by which I mean, this time, as a result of a creation which had ultimately to come from above.

I will explain more about what I mean by this last statement in the future.

Christifidelis
Macro evolution is observed fact, has been for more than a century.
 

viole

Ontological Naturalist
Premium Member
Were this the case, however, such chains of sexual or asexual procreations would be quite inaccessible to the pressure of natural selection, which is supposed to be the main driver of the evolutionary process. For the immediate cause of the coming into being of each "link" of any given chain would reside in the procreative activity of its parent(s), not in any competition for food, mates, or the like. Competition, or survival of the fittest, can concern only populations of living beings, not individuals. Ancestral chains of individuals, in other words, would be self contained, and therefore indifferent to natural selection, because by their very nature they would have to constitute unbroken or continuous series of creatures; they would be "vertical" phenomena, if one will, whereas a force like natural selection can operate only "horizontally", or on the level of groups of creatures co-existing in time.

Of course it can concern individuals.

Suppose you are a tree. You live in a forest where you and your buddies have all the same height, so that you all get your share of sunlight.

Now suppose that a mutation on one of your kids-trees makes it slightly higher than the ones around it. Now, that tree will steal all the sunlight from its neighbors which might be unable to get fit enough to easily reproduce because of that. Now, your kid tree will be able to reproduce and generates more kid trees with the same advantage.

Those kid trees will then steal the sunlight from their friends, who will then have the same problem to reproduce and so on.

How high will the trees in that forest be after some runs of these process, in your opinion? By the way, that is why trees can be pretty high (macro-evolutionary high), or do you think that there is a creative designer that decides, for some reason, to periodically increase the size of all trees at once?

So, your dichotomy between horizontal and vertical evolution is a false dichotomy. Things can run diagonally. And they do so, in fact.

Ciao

- viole
 
Last edited:
Status
Not open for further replies.
Top