On the Impossibility of Evolution on Logical Grounds Alone

[Laika]

When scientists claim to make discoveries, their work is subject to review and test. While a discovery is still provisional, those who want to build upon it must rehearse the evidence and arguments for it when they write papers for the journals. As the discovery becomes more widely accepted, the amount of justification required for relying on it diminishes. After a while, referees start taking it for granted, and-- eventually-- reject papers that do not include the discovery (at least tacitly) or that argue against it. At that point, when acceptance has become obligatory, the discovery is established. Newer work which does not recognize it will be rejected as inadequate. In the extreme case, a scientist's persistent refusal to accept a discovery can result, not in the rejection of the discovery, but in the rejection of the scientist as aberrant in judgment.

When anyone makes a claim that a certain entity or relationship exists, they have the responsibility of supplying supporting evidence. Without such evidence, the claim is worthless. The fact that you know of no falsifying evidence is irrelevant. Those who claim that an entity or relationship does not exist do not need to supply evidence.

In science, the default position about any relationship is that it does not exist. This position is called the “null hypothesis“. For a claim to be accepted, the proposer must present sufficient real-world evidence for the null hypothesis to be rejected.

...

Reversing the burden of proof is a form of the argument from ignorance fallacy, in which it is argued that a claim must be taken as true if it hasn’t been shown to be false.

I've obviously made an error of judgement in equating the standards of political debate with scientific debate. the former being alot lower, more irrational and more open to logical fallicies than the latter. So, thanks for this; I will keep that in mind in the future.

 

[Curious George]

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.

This does not follow from this:

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.

Christifidelis

Viole did a fine job of explaining why.

The production of some "link" is not found in natural selection, but the reproduction.

 

[Revoltingest]

New to the thread, or new to ReligiousForums?

It's a rare bird, but I've spotted the Yellow Bellied Logicatcher on RF twice before.
You'd need patience & a good set of binoculars.

 

[Kilgore Trout]

When one's logic is incompatible with reality, one may want to reassess their approach to logic.

 

[Midnight Rain]

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 don't know what you mean by "self contained". When you have an organism that survives successfully it doesn't create a "line" of offspring but a shotgun spray of offspring. So for me and my line of heritage I can look up a single line of successful organisms that have survived. However I am not the only "line" of descendants. Its an expanding web.

 

[Shad]

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.

This is abiogensis not evolution thus is not relevant.

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.

Non-sequitur.

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.

Competition is at an individual level as well. Predator animals mark territory, fight off intruders and compete for mates. Those that can not maintain dominance have a lower chance of obtaining food and mates thus reproducing. Likewise for prey animals competition for food and water sources is a known fact. During Savanna droughts mass migrations occurs based on water sources. Individual members of herds and packs which are not capable of keeping pace are left behind as the need for water overrides the social instincts. The slow.weak indivudal dies thus can not reproduce. The capable/fit individuals survive to the next water sources then the sequence repeats. If an individual can not compete with individuals in the herd it dies. Survival is based on the individual not the group.

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.

Give the above misconception your conclusion is unsound. Again you conflate abiogenesis with evolution.You then inject an intelligent design without any arguments for it. Even if evolution were false this does not make ID correct, argument from ignorance.

 

[Valjean]

Intelligent design is magic. It's action without mechanism. It's God reaching down and selectively altering His laws of physics or chemistry to produce some effect.
If creationists are arguing from incredulity, how do they defend magic as more credible than observable mechanisms?

 

[Kirran]

On the discussion here r.e. religion being factual, please keep in mind that taking exclusivism as read is a strawman.

 

[Vishvavajra]

Intelligent design is magic. It's action without mechanism. It's God reaching down and selectively altering His laws of physics or chemistry to produce some effect.
If creationists are arguing from incredulity, how do they defend magic as more credible than observable mechanisms?

How do they do it? I don't know. But they do it, over and over again.

I think it has to do with a basic misunderstanding of the law of parsimony (i.e. Occam's Razor), by which they imagine that it's the simplest hypothesis that's to be preferred, with "simplest" defined in a very... well, simplistic way. After all, according to one view of the word "simple," there's nothing simpler than saying that something was done by magic. Boom, end of investigation, question solved.

Only, no, that just raises more questions and leads us to how "simple" was actually understood by Occam and others who have proposed some form of this precept, which is that the preferred hypothesis is the one that entails the fewest additional hypotheses—or, to put it in the ancient Indian manner, that one that entails the least possible reliance on unobservable phenomena. So while magic might seem "simple," it's actually the worst option from an investigative standpoint.

Seems obvious, right? Well, no, I've actually had a Philosophy prof get this one wrong, claiming that "God did it" was the most parsimonious hypothesis.

 

[Valjean]

"Goddidit" isn't even an explanation, it's just an assertion of agency.
Somehow this obviates the need for explanation?

 

[Christifidelis]

This is abiogensis not evolution thus is not relevant.



Non-sequitur.



Competition is at an individual level as well. Predator animals mark territory, fight off intruders and compete for mates. Those that can not maintain dominance have a lower chance of obtaining food and mates thus reproducing. Likewise for prey animals competition for food and water sources is a known fact. During Savanna droughts mass migrations occurs based on water sources. Individual members of herds and packs which are not capable of keeping pace are left behind as the need for water overrides the social instincts. The slow.weak indivudal dies thus can not reproduce. The capable/fit individuals survive to the next water sources then the sequence repeats. If an individual can not compete with individuals in the herd it dies. Survival is based on the individual not the group.



Give the above misconception your conclusion is unsound. Again you conflate abiogenesis with evolution.You then inject an intelligent design without any arguments for it. Even if evolution were false this does not make ID correct, argument from ignorance.

Thank you for your reply to my post.

I can see that I have engaged with someone who has an in-depth understanding of the theory of evolution and the issues concerning it.

I should first admit, I think, that I do not know exactly what abiogenesis is. This is not a word that I am very familiar with, though I think I have previously encountered it in my readings. I will be sure to look it up when I get the chance. In my post, I referred to the fact that any given individual has to have come into existence through the mating of its parents, and they through the matings of theirs, and so on. If this is abiogenesis, then I guess my point is precisely that it does not have anything to do with evolution, and that therefore evolution is not the force that is responsible for the coming into being of any individual; and that if it did not bring into being any single individual, then it cannot account for the coming into being of any group of creatures either, since these latter are composed only of separate individuals. Abiogenesis would have to be responsible for all lines of descent going back in time, no matter how much these would ramify as we went back into the remote past. I am speaking here of everything that would lead to the coming into existence of a given individual on the assumption that s/he or it is (or was) related to all other creatures by "blood".

But it is precisely against this assumption that I am in fact arguing. For it seems to me to require, in the last analysis, that one sort of creature can, at some point in its ongoing "history", give rise to another fundamentally different sort of creature without anything besides sexual reproduction, recombinations of genetic material, and random genetic mutations to account for the process. You have correctly stated that competition occurs on the level of individuals, and I am certainly not denying this. My point is that it can occur only between individuals who make up populations of creatures of whatever sort. Without co-existent populations of individuals, there can be none of the competition for food, water and mates that you have so well described - which competition is, I agree, a fact of natural existence. Yet such competition has no relevance to the ongoing processes of sexual reproduction that actually bring individuals into existence: competition does not occur between the various individual creatures who make up lines of descent that can be traced back into the past. This is what I had in mind when I referred to these as being "vertical" in nature, and opposed them to the "horizontal" processes that would involve everything that populations of animals or plants might be subject to - including natural selection.

I did, finally, end with a statement that I had produced no arguments for. This I freely admit. But I will attempt to support this contention with future posts. Am I confused as to what logic would really dictate in connection with this issue? Perhaps so. Let's continue to talk, and maybe you can enlighten me as to why I am confused on this issue.

Thank you again.

Christifidelis

 

[Shad]

Thank you for your reply to my post.

I can see that I have engaged with someone who has an in-depth understanding of the theory of evolution and the issues concerning it.

Not in-depth at all. I am not a biologist. I enrolled in a few biology courses as it complements my major and to cover my non-major credit requirement. Any decent university and even community collages has the courses I took.

I should first admit, I think, that I do not know exactly what abiogenesis is. This is not a word that I am very familiar with, though I think I have previously encountered it in my readings. I will be sure to look it up when I get the chance.

Abiogenesis is the field which covers how life emerged from non-life. Evolution covers life that already exists. Although covering the subject of life evolution does not require abiogenesis.

In my post, I referred to the fact that any given individual has to have come into existence through the mating of its parents, and they through the matings of theirs, and so on. If this is abiogenesis, then I guess my point is precisely that it does not have anything to do with evolution, and that therefore evolution is not the force that is responsible for the coming into being of any individual; and that if it did not bring into being any single individual, then it cannot account for the coming into being of any group of creatures either, since these latter are composed only of separate individuals. Abiogenesis would have to be responsible for all lines of descent going back in time, no matter how much these would ramify as we went back into the remote past. I am speaking here of everything that would lead to the coming into existence of a given individual on the assumption that s/he or it is (or was) related to all other creatures by "blood".

Mating and reproduction is under the scope of evolution not abiogenesis since both involve life which already exists and is capable of producing new life as part of its nature. Evolution covers all lines of decent not abiogenesis

But it is precisely against this assumption that I am in fact arguing. For it seems to me to require, in the last analysis, that one sort of creature can, at some point in its ongoing "history", give rise to another fundamentally different sort of creature without anything besides sexual reproduction, recombinations of genetic material, and random genetic mutations to account for the process. You have correctly stated that competition occurs on the level of individuals, and I am certainly not denying this. My point is that it can occur only between individuals who make up populations of creatures of whatever sort. Without co-existent populations of individuals, there can be none of the competition for food, water and mates that you have so well described - which competition is, I agree, a fact of natural existence. Yet such competition has no relevance to the ongoing processes of sexual reproduction that actually bring individuals into existence: competition does not occur between the various individual creatures who make up lines of descent that can be traced back into the past. This is what I had in mind when I referred to these as being "vertical" in nature, and opposed them to the "horizontal" processes that would involve everything that populations of animals or plants might be subject to - including natural selection.

This is not evolution. No form of life produces viable offspring which is radically different than itself. The only case in which a form of life does is in the case of hybrids, for example ligers. However ligers are infertile thus a dead end.

I understand your point about competition not existing between species that exist(ed) at different times. However your point is part of evolutionary theory thus is a point for it not against it. You should also consider species which are not in a direct line of decent but are part of branching evolution. So rather than a straight line from A to B to C we have a tree with the roots being A. A could produce B and C as different branches. B and C could produce it's own line of which can be in competition with other branches of A. Take sharks for example. There are many species of sharks, some are ancient while some are not. Many come from the same root of A but have branched out from B and C. These do compete for prey. Thus the continuation of species B (old) can be threatened by species P (new). Likewise some species form a niche, such a crocs and alligators thus have eliminated branches species. In both cases there is a point of competition in which species evolve, eliminate or become extinct due to competition at some point either in the past or present. It depends on which species you compare, how each evolved, if the ancestor died out, etc.

I did, finally, end with a statement that I had produced no arguments for. This I freely admit. But I will attempt to support this contention with future posts. Am I confused as to what logic would really dictate in connection with this issue? Perhaps so. Let's continue to talk, and maybe you can enlighten me as to why I am confused on this issue.

You pointed out a few arguments which attempt to point out issues with evolution. Although not a direct rebuttal against it these are still point trying to undermines the theory

I keep my points more educational then direct rebuttals so I hope you take it in the manner intended.

 

[Mohammad Nur Syamsu]

It can in no wise be conceived to be the creator of such living forms.

Looking at theory alone, then in the theory of evolution it is the randomness of the mutation which provides for "creation". But only if the "randomness" is interpreted that it can in fact turn out several different ways, that it is chosen, as choosing is the mechanism of creation. But evolutionists don't interpret the randomness of mutatins in the theory that way, they interpret randomness in terms of chaotically distributed factors forcing results, and not freedom.

Sometimes also the theory of evolution is formulated in regards to a "change" in environment. This change could also be interpreted in terms of freedom, and also considered as true origins. But again evolutionists generally oppose creationism, they generally deny that freedom is real, deny that things are chosen in the universe.

But I have a more vexing question for you.

Supposing we copy the zero. Now we get a new symbol, and the meaning this symbol is that it is a copy of zero, and we call this new symbol 1.

What would you consider the origin of the 1 then?

This is actual new mathematical theory.

 

[David M]

Looking at theory alone, then in the theory of evolution it is the randomness of the mutation which provides for "creation". But only if the "randomness" is interpreted that it can in fact turn out several different ways, that it is chosen, as choosing is the mechanism of creation. But evolutionists don't interpret the randomness of mutatins in the theory that way, they interpret randomness in terms of chaotically distributed factors forcing results, and not freedom.

This is complete and utter meaningless garbage. Random Mutation means, by its very definition, that things can turn out in different ways. After a mutation takes place things can also turn out different ways. Its simply his application of teh term "choosing" that he thinks makes a difference to those facts.

Mohammad uses his own weird definitions of words that do not match anything used in common discourse so every post he makes likes this adds nothing to any discussion, its just word-salad until he provides rigorous and meaningful definitions of his terms.

 

[Mohammad Nur Syamsu]

This is complete and utter meaningless garbage. Random Mutation means, by its very definition, that things can turn out in different ways. After a mutation takes place things can also turn out different ways. Its simply his application of teh term "choosing" that he thinks makes a difference to those facts.

Mohammad uses his own weird definitions of words that do not match anything used in common discourse so every post he makes likes this adds nothing to any discussion, its just word-salad until he provides rigorous and meaningful definitions of his terms.

That is one interpretation of statistical theory, that it is free, but the main interpretation of statistical theory is that there are chaotic factors forcing the result. This looks very similar to what results might be expected if there was actual freedom in the system.

And a decision is the word that refers to the act of making a possibility, which is in the future, the present or not. The word "chance" does not describe that act. Chance describes the coincedence of the results of at least 2 decisions. For example if somebody chooses to go to the supermarket, and a friend of his chooses to go to the same supermarket also, and they meet, then the meeting is by chance.

And since you said that things can turn out alternative ways, then that neccessarily means that choices have been made.

It is very clear what definition of choosing you use, which defintion is to sort out the best result. That is not happening in nature, there is no sorting out the best of anything occuring there, or at least, there is no evidence of it.

The definition of choosing that you use actually refers to first choosing what is good and bad, choosing the sorting criteria, and then sorting data with what you have chosen is good and bad, and then choosing again whether or not you like the result of the sorting process, etc. So it involves very many choices, while you wrongly use it as the fundamental definition of choosing.

The correct fundamental definition of choosing is in terms of spontaneity.

 

[David M]

That is one interpretation of statistical theory, that it is free, but the main interpretation of statistical theory is that there are chaotic factors forcing the result.

Another post of meaningless word salad.

Please provide a comprehensive defintion of "choosing" and "choice" where the words you use have their meanings as listed in English dictionaries.

 

[Mohammad Nur Syamsu]

Another post of meaningless word salad.

Please provide a comprehensive defintion of "choosing" and "choice" where the words you use have their meanings as listed in English dictionaries.

That was already the correct definition of choosing. To make a possiblity, which is in the future, the present or not. That is consistent with common discourse, choosing is anticipatory, it is relevant to the future.

Also one might define more practically, to make one of alternative futures the present. But it seems the more fundamental definition is to have 1 possiblitiy in the future, in stead of having 2 alternatives in the future.

You obviously have no idea what you are talking about at all.

 

[Guy Threepwood]

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 think that gets to the heart of the problem. Natural selection is a given, any designed line of products is subject to the same inevitable pressure where superior designs are favored over inferior ones, and so endure to be copied and improved further. This is why you can plot a tree of life identical to the evolutionary one for many consumer products. Cars are a good example, complete with branches, extinctions, a general trend towards complexity and superior function, and with large gaps; a notable lack of smooth transitional examples between certain fundamental wholesale design changes.

i.e. the 'fossil record' in a landfill or junkyard, or ancient river bed implies nothing in itself about each design change being accidentally introduced.

The reason we see fundamental unabridged gaps no matter how hard we search; is that design changes must be significant enough first to drive natural selection
The rare lucky random mutation that accidentally gives you 1% better eyesight, over the vastly greater number that would deteriorate it, will have no bearing on evolution if it does not directly bring about more reproduction, no natural selection of that mutation has taken place.


.

 

[Theweirdtophat]

There are still some holes in evolution theory. It doesn't bother to explian why creatures older than us like snakes crocodiles and various reptiles haven't evolved and become just as advanced or more advanced than us. Also if we come from apes, why are there still apes around? Shouldn't every ape have evolved into something more? Adaptation makes more sense than evolution.

 

[averageJOE]

There are still some holes in evolution theory. It doesn't bother to explian why creatures older than us like snakes crocodiles and various reptiles haven't evolved and become just as advanced or more advanced than us. Also if we come from apes, why are there still apes around? Shouldn't every ape have evolved into something more? Adaptation makes more sense than evolution.