Scientific Evidence for Universal Common Descent

ImmortalFlame said:

This is wrong. Life started in the oceans around a billion years ago, and the first vegetation appeared around 470-520 million years ago.
SOURCES
Complex Life Emerged from Sea Earlier Than Thought
Land plants arose earlier than thought—and may have had a bigger impact on the evolution of animals

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So much speculation, assumption, and assertion. Lots of 'maybe' and 'probably!', qualifiers, but no evidence that ANY of the assumptions are even possible. They just assume common ancestry and pitch the approved propaganda.

Is there no critical thinking or skepticism in the current mandated beliefs of common ancestry?

Everybody justs nods like bobbleheads at any propaganda assertion that fits with their Indoctrination?

This is an editorial piece, with no science or study that even suggests common ancestry. Yet, the constand pounding of the propaganda drum never misses a beat.

And you have the gall to declare, 'Wrong!', based on speculation and belief?

Polymath257 said:

Do you want me to go into detail about those methods? Or can I just provide a link to show how, for example, Rb-Sr dating is self-correcting? Or how Pb in the original zircon

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Do you wish to present ancient dating methods as a key component in common ancestry? If so, then evidence will need to be presented, not just assertions and assumptions, bluffed as 'settled science!'

1. How can you assume the starting point of any compound?
2. How can you assume uniform decay rates, in a multi billion year universe, under constantly changing, unknown conditions?
3. Show the science, for your dating beliefs. Merely asserting them is either bluff, bleat, or belief.

usfan said:

So much speculation, assumption, and assertion. Lots of 'maybe' and 'probably!', qualifiers, but no evidence that ANY of the assumptions are even possible. They just assume common ancestry and pitch the approved propaganda.

Is there no critical thinking or skepticism in the current mandated beliefs of common ancestry?

Everybody justs nods like bobbleheads at any propaganda assertion that fits with their Indoctrination?

This is an editorial piece, with no science or study that even suggests common ancestry. Yet, the constand pounding of the propaganda drum never misses a beat.

And you have the gall to declare, 'Wrong!', based on speculation and belief?

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Okay.

I did have you on ignore, but when I saw you'd responded to this post, I thought I'd give a crack back.

1) This post doesn't mention common ancestry - it was a response specifically to a poster's claim that life in the ocean appeared after vegetation. Nothing Else.

2) The articles I linked to, while editorial, do contain links to relevant scientific studies in peer-reviewed journals.

3) Use of qualifiers is a tactic used to express honest skepticism. As the articles themselves show, conclusions in science are always tentative. If you only want articles which include no qualifiers and only assert absolute certainty, you will not find them from any credible scientific source. Since you wish to debate science, surely you understand this.

4) According to your definition, this entire post is an ad hom that doesn't actually address any of the arguments or evidence provided in my post.

usfan said:

Do you wish to present ancient dating methods as a key component in common ancestry? If so, then evidence will need to be presented, not just assertions and assumptions, bluffed as 'settled science!'

1. How can you assume the starting point of any compound?

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Element, actually. Because some elements don't become parts of certain types of crystal. That means that we can know what is there when the crystal formed.

In other cases, like Rb/Sr, the comparison between the daughter isotopes and the related stable isotopes can give the initial amounts required for dating.

2. How can you assume uniform decay rates, in a multi billion year universe, under constantly changing, unknown conditions?

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Because we have extensively investigated the conditions to change rates of radioactive decay. Again, unless you are talking about temperatures of millions of degrees or neutron fluxes enough to leave other evidence, this just hasn't happened.

If you disagree, please give evidence for *any* condition that changes the rates of *any* of the standard isotopes used for radioactive dating that is compatible with, say, the existence of liquid water.

Creationists like to claim that radioactive dates are problematic but fail to give any actual reasons for thinking that is the case.

In fact, the rates of decay do not change under an incredible range of pressure, temperature, chemical environment, other radiation, etc. that is precisely why they are so useful.

3. Show the science, for your dating beliefs. Merely asserting them is either bluff, bleat, or belief.

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Look at the methods themselves and the aspects involved in dealing with precisely the issues you raise.

Polymath257 said:

What do you mean it hasn't been measured? While it is true we don't understand the process for how the poles flip, we do know that they have flipped many times because we have the geological data for such flips.

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1. The claim of 'no measured half life', is yours, not mine.
2. 'Flipping magnetic poles!' is believed and asserted, not shown to be possible, or even evidence by hard data. Plates shift all the time, and determining the exact orientation during their formation is impossible and a speculation.

Polymath257 said:

The Earth's magnetic field doesn't have a half-life. It *does* flip irregularly

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You asserted this earlier, yet pretend to be an expert in geothermal mechanics? And you try to mock my knowledge and grasp of the material?

usfan said:

1. The claim of 'no measured half life', is yours, not mine.
2. 'Flipping magnetic poles!' is believed and asserted, not shown to be possible, or even evidence by hard data. Plates shift all the time, and determining the exact orientation during their formation is impossible and a speculation.

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Then how do you explain the bands of different magnetic directions in the spreading sea floor?

You asserted this earlier, yet pretend to be an expert in geothermal mechanics? And you try to mock my knowledge and grasp of the material?

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Huh? The fact that the Earth's magnetic field flips is common knowledge and is well established. So the rate of decay (and movement) of the magnetic field now is evidence we are in such a flip, not that the magnetic field has a half-life in the usual sense.

The theory of evolution begins its story with the first replicators. These are simple life forms; strands of genetic material, that can replicate its DNA or RNA and make new copies. The theory assumes these first replicators mutated, got more complex, and evolved to the present. If this was true these simple replicators define our the common ancestry.

The problem with this theory is connected to another branch of science called Abiogenesis. Abiogenesis deals with the earliest events, hundred of millions of years before the replicators, where simple molecules like water, ammonia, methane, etc., reacted and gradually increase complexity, until the first replicators finally appear.

Where evolution goes wrong is it assumes, that Abiogenesis ends when evolution begins, as though these preliminary chemical processes and mechanism of change, which perfected over hundreds of millions of years, suddenly not longer apply. A more reasonable approach is to assume that the underlying biogenetic push, that led to the first replicators, remained in affect, and still operated along side the changes in the replicators. It even participated in these changes.

The Abiogenesis aspect is connected to chemical evolution and mechanisms at the nanoscale; micro scale. While Darwinian Evolution is more about the changes at the macro scale; life forms.The common ancestors are really the small molecules and some unique laws of science associated with life processes.

For example, when proteins are manufactured by cells they fold into exact shapes based on their amino acid composition. This folding is controlled by the water. Water is the majority component of life and seeks to lower its free energy and surface tension. It does this by folding the protein into a minimal energy shape. This action still occurs. It also occurred even before the first replicators. It is one of many continuing processes that gives the 3-D character of life in the macro world. Water is the common ancestor of all life on earth, with water able to replicate the collective shapes of protein to give form to life; life forms.

The DNA is like the hard drive which has all the data. Water is like the processor. If you installed a different processor; different solvent, and used a DNA hard drive, nothing will work and the shapes of things will be different.

usfan said:

Plates shift all the time, and determining the exact orientation during their formation is impossible and a speculation.

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Polymath257 said:

Then how do you explain the bands of different magnetic directions in the spreading sea floor?

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It was in the very post you quoted. Do we have to play this game?

The FACTS are:
1. The half life of the earth's magnetic field has been calculated, based on measurements over the last couple of centuries.
From wiki:
Barnes claimed to calculate the half-life of the earth's magnetic field as approximately 1,400 years based on 130 years of empirical data.
2. 'Flipping magnetic fields!' is speculative, unevidenced, and promoted as a cop out for the REAL PROBLEM of the earth's measured half life.

usfan said:

Nice link.. your point?

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My point is that you might be beating a dead horse. It looks to me now like the universal common ancestor dogma died ten years ago or more. What we’re seeing here is people behind the times circling their anti-creation wagons around its dead body.

Jim said:

My point is that you might be beating a dead horse. It looks to me now like the universal common ancestor dogma died ten years ago or more. What we’re seeing here is people behind the times circling their anti-creation wagons around its dead body.

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This may be true, in actual reality, but the PERCEPTION of most people, indoctrinated in progressive institutions, is that Common Ancestry is 'settled science!', and is clung to with religious devotion.

You will not get any of the True Believers here to admit what you said, but they will defend their beliefs to the death!

My defense is for True Science, and sound reason, from which all our technological advances have sprung.

I've got to go, now, to use scientific principles to make people's lives easier and better..

Refrigeration, climate controlled homes, potable water, and functional waste systems are hallmarks of modern civilization. Few of us can dispense with them for long..

usfan said:

It was in the very post you quoted. Do we have to play this game?

The FACTS are:
1. The half life of the earth's magnetic field has been calculated, based on measurements over the last couple of centuries.
From wiki:
Barnes claimed to calculate the half-life of the earth's magnetic field as approximately 1,400 years based on 130 years of empirical data.

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And we *expect* the field to decay if it is undergoing a flip! This is the rate of decay of such a flip.

2. 'Flipping magnetic fields!' is speculative, unevidenced, and promoted as a cop out for the REAL PROBLEM of the earth's measured half life.

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Wrong. The flipping of the magnetic filed is documented in the spreading of the sea floor (as well as many other places). We *know* that the magnetic field of the sun flips every 11 years or so, so it is far from unreasonable to expect the Earth's field to flip also. And, in fact, the evidence we have shows that it does.

You just claim this is speculation, but fail to explain why it is a wrong conclusion based on the evidence.

Really old article: https://courses.seas.harvard.edu/cl...nd-magnetic-reversals/more/Cox-Doell-1964.pdf

Here's one that talks specifically about the characteristics of the fields while they undergo the flips:
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Also, the recent dipole moment for the magnetic field has been unusually high lately (last few thousand years), so is expected to decrease. This study suggests that we may NOT be in a flip, but just a re-adjustment to the normal strength of the field:

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0012821X0600269X

This, in any case, shows the falsehood that the magnetic fields are simply steadily decreasing, which shows that there is no contradiction to an old earth.

Jim said:

My point is that you might be beating a dead horse. It looks to me now like the universal common ancestor dogma died ten years ago or more. What we’re seeing here is people behind the times circling their anti-creation wagons around its dead body.

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You seem really confused. Exactly what happened at the very start of life is very difficult to investigate - however the current evidence is clear that all life is related. Whether the start was a single individual or population or a population with HGT, really doesn't affect the overall conclusion.

The wiki article on LUCA gives some of the options and how the picture has changed over time.

Absolutely none of this has anything to do with literal biblical creationism which has been falsified in countless ways and across multiple disciplines.

ratiocinator said:

Absolutely none of this has anything to do with literal biblical creationism.

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Some people in evolution research seem to think that it does.

The practice of classification and the theory of evolution, and what the demise of Charles Darwin's tree of life hypothesis means for both of them

There is a natural impulse for evolutionists to circle their wagons in making common cause against the creationists.

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Jim said:

Some people in evolution research seem to think that it does.

The practice of classification and the theory of evolution, and what the demise of Charles Darwin's tree of life hypothesis means for both of them

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You're missing the point. This (out of date) article does not, in any way at all, support anything remotely like literal biblical creationism.

Jim said:

Some people in evolution research seem to think that it does.

The practice of classification and the theory of evolution, and what the demise of Charles Darwin's tree of life hypothesis means for both of them

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What does that article say about literal Biblical creationism?

ratiocinator said:

You're missing the point. This (out of date) article does not, in any way at all, support anything remotely like literal biblical creationism.

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I think you missed my point, in my quote from the article.

There is a natural impulse for evolutionists to circle their wagons in making common cause against the creationists.

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ImmortalFlame said:

What does that article say about literal Biblical creationism?

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There is a natural impulse for evolutionists to circle their wagons in making common cause against the creationists.

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Do you not understand the question?

usfan said:

That is all based on assumptions and speculation. There is no accurate, testable way to arrive at dating methods beyond a few thousand years. C-14 is haphazard, and cannot go 'millions!'. Isotope dating is fraught with assumptions. Strata dating is circular reasoning.
1. The starting 'strength' of the original is unknown.
2. It is unprovable to assume a constant rate under cosmic forces that contain myriads of unknown variables.
3. There is no verifiable way to measure dating methods without unproved assumptions.
4. Extrapolations of light speed, or expanding universe theories are still based on unverifiable assumptions.
5. Uniformitarianism of strata layers is speculation, with nothing to corroborate it. There are myriads of aberrations that conflict with the contrived dating assumptions in strata dating.

Other problems with the 'millions of years!' beliefs and assumptions:
1. Geothermal and cosmic forces mix rocks and formations at unknown times, and by unknown forces. Speculations and theories are the basis for all ancient dsting guesses.
2. Conflicts with measured rates of other dates do not support the 'millions and billions of years!' belief. Helium isotopes in the atmosphere and the earth's magnetic half life are examples.

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These are all false claims. This is something that I do understand fairly well and if you like to discuss this we can.

Jim said:

I think you missed my point, in my quote from the article.

There is a natural impulse for evolutionists to circle their wagons in making common cause against the creationists.

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What is says is:

"There is a natural impulse for evolutionists to circle their wagons in making common cause against the creationists. I think we should resist it. Evolutionary theory itself evolves, but creationists attack it as a dogma of a revealed religion of which Darwin was the prophet, celebrating debate within the field as evidence for doctrinal weakness. In fact, it is evidence for disciplinary strength. At the end of this essay I will argue that many of us have been defending a too-narrow form of neo-Darwinism, and that accepting a more pluralistic view of evolutionary pattern as well as evolutionary process will put us in a better position to defend ourselves against the forces of unreason, as well as advancing our science."

Zero support for literal creationism.