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Recommended reading for evolution?

sayak83

Veteran Member
Staff member
Premium Member
Careful with the use of the word 'fact,' because using it this way it is a trip wire of an IED for Creationists, and not really accurate. It is best to use facts as properly defined as pieces of objective verifiable evidence that support science in this case the science of evolution

It is best to say that the science of evolution has been falsified 'beyond a reasonable doubt, and there is no comparable hypothesis that can explain the evidence.
validated beyond reasonable doubt.
 

Revoltingest

Pragmatic Libertarian
Premium Member
The best book I've ever read about evolution wasn't about evolution at all.
Probabilistic Systems Analysis (I forget the author...might be Breipohl)
It's also especially useful to see how to approach abiogenesis.
Of course, one can't calculate anything about it, but one can understand
the importance of time, & potential number of paths of emergence.
And it provides a basis for seeing faults in the many claims of probability
calculations, ie, watch the premises.

Btw, it's not light reading, but the math is so basic that even an engineer
can handle it.
 

shunyadragon

shunyadragon
Premium Member
The best book I've ever read about evolution wasn't about evolution at all.
Probabilistic Systems Analysis (I forget the author...might be Breipohl)
It's also especially useful to see how to approach abiogenesis.
Of course, one can't calculate anything about it, but one can understand
the importance of time, & potential number of paths of emergence.
And it provides a basis for seeing faults in the many claims of probability
calculations, ie, watch the premises.

Btw, it's not light reading, but the math is so basic that even an engineer
can handle it.

Is this the book?

Statistical Theory of Reliability and Life Testing: Probability Models, by
Barlow,Richard E ; Proschan,Frank

Excellent book, but does not apply well when referenced alone to the science of evolution.

It was referenced book in my advanced statistics class The math is basic statistics
 
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jonathan180iq

Well-Known Member
I was raised with Creationism at a religious school and that's all I know, but I haven't believed the doctrine in years. It never really bothered me much that I didn't really know the science behind evolution before, but now I have a preachy person in my life and I'm hearing arguments that I feel are wrong but I don't know why they're wrong (e.g. I have no knowledge of the science to back it up). Not for the sake of debate with said person but more for my own peace of mind, what books can you recommend to me that come back at common creationist arguments with science-based evolutionary ones? Thanks.
"But the story book sages filled their pages, hiding from the warming Sun.
Limitless distractions give no pause to distort their precious delusion."


Dedicate your life to studying and questioning. That's all Science is, really.

Links on the internet are great if you want quick rebuttals - but reading actual books by people who actually do field work is your best bet.

This will cover your preachy friend...
An Index to Creationist Claims

Lots of first-hand field experience with good insight into the difficulty of finding anything worth talking about.
2265347.jpg


An interesting look at the modern similarities between humans and the other great apes.
068814862X.jpg


A long and winding book about the history or life moving on the surface on the Earth. It starts with the earliest known organisms, their paths fossilized into a couple of hillsides, and ends with the expansion of the Appalachian Trail. (It is one of my favorite reads of all time.)
on-trails-9781476739212_lg.jpg


This isn't very good - but it's not bad either.
51mO40ibCqL._SX258_BO1,204,203,200_.jpg


Also:
51ip6tOBjIL._AC_UL320_SR254,320_.jpg
 

Revoltingest

Pragmatic Libertarian
Premium Member
Is this the book?

Statistical Theory of Reliability and Life Testing: Probability Models, by
Barlow,Richard E ; Proschan,Frank

Excellent book, but does not apply well when referenced alone to the science of evolution.

It was referenced book in my advanced statistics class The math is basic statistics
Different title from the one I posted.
 

David T

Well-Known Member
Premium Member
A dog is an evolutionist. Someday you might want to go direct to the source of the debate nature itself. Since you continue to "believe" books are determining i would say thats pretty normal.
 

shunyadragon

shunyadragon
Premium Member
Wouldn't you agree that hearing both sides of the issue would be advantageous ? Because there are scientists who support ID, with science.

Very few scientist remotely support ID. None have developed a falsifiable hypothesis giving ID any scientific credibility. The futile attempt by ID proponents to misuse science has been dominated by the fallacious 'arguments from ignorance.'

So after you read the information mentioned above, you should honestly consider Dr. Stephen Meyer's "Signature In The Cell"; "Darwin's Black Box", by Prof. Michael Behe; and "Undeniable", by Biologist Douglas Axe. "Icons of Evolution" by Jonathan Wells, is enlightening, as well. IMO.

Glad you made it your opinion, because none have presented a falsifiable hypothesis giving any validity to ID. The problem is also the religious agenda motivating ID.

Just be open-minded.

Take care.

I am, and I believe in God! . . . and still waiting for a falsifiable hypothesis that uses science to give ID validity.
 
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Deeje

Avid Bible Student
Premium Member
Creationism isn't "balanced" with evolution. The process of evolution is an observed, established, scientific fact.

I'm sorry, but that is just not true. It is presented as if it was established fact but as Shunyadragon has pointed out there are no "proofs" in science. They have "evidence" that has been interpreted by those who want to support the theory....not exactly unbiased.

That is a lie. Macro-evolution has been directly observed multiple times.

References please. Minor adaptations cannot be classified as macro-evolution. These remain within one family of creatures, like Darwin's examples. All were clearly part of the same families as their mainland cousins.

Macro-evolution is not adaptation....so show us these "direct observations" that took a species and turned it into something else outside its own taxonomy.
Evolution's favorite example is whale evolution but as has been discussed many times....its a joke.

You're not providing balance

But I am. There is something that is verifiable by science as well as the Bible.....most people who want God to disappear won't even listen to it. If all the OP has heard about is "creationism" then I am not surprised that she might lean towards evolution, especially when it is presented as verifiable fact. There are no facts....just suggestion about how things "might have" or "could have" happened.

you're providing bias by spuriously insinuating about indoctrination and conspiracies. You haven't presented facts, just uncertainties that you spin into narratives.

I could say the same about evolutionary science.
 

Valjean

Veteran Member
Premium Member
I'm sorry, but that is just not true. It is presented as if it was established fact but as Shunyadragon has pointed out there are no "proofs" in science. They have "evidence" that has been interpreted by those who want to support the theory....not exactly unbiased.
There are no "proofs," but there are theories, and facts -- not arrived at through faith.
Science doesn't want to support any particular theory. It accumulates evidence, proposes interpretat, and tests them. Trying to disprove one's theorems is a fundamental step in science, as is peer review. In this, it's methods are the opposite of religious apologetics.
References please. Minor adaptations cannot be classified as macro-evolution. These remain within one family of creatures, like Darwin's examples. All were clearly part of the same families as their mainland cousins.
You've been given references in previous posts. There are more below.
Macro evolution is just accumulated micro evolution. Small changes accumulate. Large changes are just an accumulation of small ones.
How would the succession of micro changes know when to stop, to avoid becoming macro change?

Macro-evolution is not adaptation....so show us these "direct observations" that took a species and turned it into something else outside its own taxonomy.
Evolution's favorite example is whale evolution but as has been discussed many times....its a joke.
An adaptation is a type of change, it may be large or small. Accumulated change must eventually lead to big changes-- 'outside of their own taxonomy."

Speciation. Read:
Observed Instances of Speciation
Some More Observed Speciation Events
CB910: New species
Macro/micro evolution. Read:
CB902: Microevolution vs. Macroevolution
29+ Evidences for Macroevolution: Part 5

... If all the OP has heard about is "creationism" then I am not surprised that she might lean towards evolution, especially when it is presented as verifiable fact. There are no facts....just suggestion about how things "might have" or "could have" happened.
No! How can you say there are no facts? If all we had was speculation the ToE would not be a theory at all.
The ToE is a verifiable fact, with mountains of evidence -- which you are apparently unfamiliar with. As other posters have pointed out, there are no other rational or empirically evidenced explanations -- none! Creationism and ID are unsupported, religious pleadings.
I could say the same about evolutionary science.
If you're unaware of the mountains of constantly accumulating evidence, from a dozen different fields, you really aren't qualified to comment on this subject.
 
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ImmortalFlame

Woke gremlin
I'm sorry, but that is just not true. It is presented as if it was established fact but as Shunyadragon has pointed out there are no "proofs" in science.
Not "proof", "facts". Facts are observed phenomena - in this case, the fact is that species change and diversify over time (a process we label "evolution").

They have "evidence" that has been interpreted by those who want to support the theory....not exactly unbiased.
You have yet to demonstrate any such bias.

References please. Minor adaptations cannot be classified as macro-evolution. These remain within one family of creatures, like Darwin's examples. All were clearly part of the same families as their mainland cousins.
Observed Instances of Speciation
Some More Observed Speciation Events

Macro-evolution is not adaptation....so show us these "direct observations" that took a species and turned it into something else outside its own taxonomy.
That's not what macro-evolution is, nor is it something that even can happen according to evolutionary theory. Nothing evolves outside its own taxonomy. Everything evolves within variations of its own taxonomy.

Macro-evolution refers to evolutionary change at or above the level of species, I.E: a single species diversifying into two distinct species. This has been observed in the examples given above.

But I am. There is something that is verifiable by science as well as the Bible.....most people who want God to disappear won't even listen to it. If all the OP has heard about is "creationism" then I am not surprised that she might lean towards evolution, especially when it is presented as verifiable fact. There are no facts....just suggestion about how things "might have" or "could have" happened.
Only a sith deals in absolutes.

Honest people use qualifiers. I suggest you get used to it.

I could say the same about evolutionary science.
That's exactly what you are saying, which was my point. You're taking examples of scientists expressing honest uncertainty and weaving a narrative that paints evolution as entirely fanciful. Yet you know as well as I do that such language is used by honest people when talking about complex issues. I very much doubt you would be more inclined to believe them if they removed all of their uncertainties and say "definitely did" or "is certainly". If you're more inclined to believe something because the people asserting it use such terminology, you're just gullible.

Tell me, who is more honest: the person who is willing to say "It may have happened this way", or the person who says "It definitely did happen this way"?
 

Rational Agnostic

Well-Known Member
I was raised with Creationism at a religious school and that's all I know, but I haven't believed the doctrine in years. It never really bothered me much that I didn't really know the science behind evolution before, but now I have a preachy person in my life and I'm hearing arguments that I feel are wrong but I don't know why they're wrong (e.g. I have no knowledge of the science to back it up). Not for the sake of debate with said person but more for my own peace of mind, what books can you recommend to me that come back at common creationist arguments with science-based evolutionary ones? Thanks.

Why Evolution is True by Jerry Coyne is an excellent one, and very easy to understand. Dawkins' works are good too, but less accessible to laypeople IMO.
 

Deeje

Avid Bible Student
Premium Member
Hmmmm....is the fact that you chose to respond to my post twice, betraying a kind of desperation on your part?....any challenge to evolution (especially if it is reasonable) seems to elicit a sort of knee jerk response from some responders...twice even. LOL :p Its like I have committed blasphemy or something!

There are no "proofs," but there are theories, and facts -- not arrived at through faith.

On the contrary...if there are theories then these are speculations called "hypotheses". (sounds better than just an idea, doesn't it?) These are not facts however. They cannot be turned into facts without proof....and because there is no proof for macro-evolution, regardless of the protestations, it is still just an unprovable idea that a lot of people subscribe to... (for obvious reasons) If you had no "faith" in the musings of human scientists, then you would not cling so tenaciously to something that cannot be possibly proven.

Science doesn't want to support any particular theory.

You must be kidding. o_O When you see the 'religious' fervor with which this theory is defended by scientists...it is clear that they want to support the one thing that apparently makes them the smartest of the intelligent creatures In existence. Egos, money and recognition drive science, not intellect. Supposition is the basis of macro-evolution, not scientific facts.

It accumulates evidence, proposes interpretat, and tests them. Trying to disprove one's theorems is a fundamental step in science, as is peer review. In this, it's methods are the opposite of religious apologetics.

Peer review is a joke.
Peer review: a flawed process at the heart of science and journals

You've been given references in previous posts. There are more below.

Seen them all before.....they are all the same.....no proof, just suggestions couched in jargon ,masquerading as facts. Adaptation is provable.....macro-evolution that takes us from amoebas to dinosaurs...is not. That has no basis in facts, it's just an idea that is promoted as if it were fact. A classic example of the power of suggestion in action.

The ToE is a verifiable fact, with mountains of evidence -- which you are apparently unfamiliar with. As other posters have pointed out, there are no other rational or empirically evidenced explanations -- none! Creationism and ID are unsupported, religious pleadings.

Ah there is that word..."rational"....what does that imply? That those who can clearly see intelligent design in nature are somehow "irrational"? And what "empirical evidence" would that be? This is evidence derived through observation and experimentation, not on guesswork by those with biased leanings with an agenda to uphold.
Evidence needs interpretation which is why there is so much debate about this topic. If there was all this overwhelming evidence, there could be no debate.

Those "mountains of evidence" are nothing but molehills of suggestion. If you read through your own "evidence" through a lens that can make the distinction between suggestion and actual facts, then you would begin to see how gullible so many science "believers" really are.

If you're unaware of the mountains of constantly accumulating evidence, from a dozen different fields, you really aren't qualified to comment on this subject.

If you read the info in your links, how many of them are recent?.....so where is the "constantly accumulating evidence"?
It doesn't take a genius to spot a snow job. :confused:

Please go through the links you posted and see how old some of that information actually is.
 

Deeje

Avid Bible Student
Premium Member
An adaptation is a type of change, it may be large or small. Accumulated change must eventually lead to big changes-- 'outside of their own taxonomy."

Speciation. Read:
Observed Instances of Speciation
Some More Observed Speciation Events
CB910: New species
Macro/micro evolution. Read:
CB902: Microevolution vs. Macroevolution
29+ Evidences for Macroevolution: Part 5

Now this deserves a response all by itself....it always leaves me wondering if evolutionists actually read the links they post. Take the evolutionary glasses off, and these links are actually funny.
171.gif


Let me pick just a few references...

From "Observed Instances of Speciation"....."A discussion of speciation requires a definition of what constitutes a species. This is a topic of considerable debate within the biological community. Three recent reviews in the Journal of Phycology give some idea of the scope of the debate (Castenholz 1992, Manhart and McCourt 1992, Wood and Leatham 1992). There are a variety of different species concept currently in use by biologists. These include folk, biological, morphological, genetic, paleontological, evolutionary, phylogenetic and biosystematic definitions.". . .

So if a definition is difficult for scientists, then what hope do the non scientific community have? o_O

"The literature on observed speciations events is not well organized. I found only a few papers that had an observation of a speciation event as the author's main point (e.g. Weinberg, et al. 1992). In addition, I found only one review that was specifically on this topic (Callaghan 1987). This review cited only four examples of speciation events."....

"I asked about two dozen graduate students and faculty members in the department where I'm a student whether there were examples where speciation had been observed in the literature. Everyone said that they were sure that there were. Next I asked them for citings or descriptions. Only eight of the people I talked to could give an example, only three could give more than one. But everyone was sure that there were papers in the literature."


Oh dear! :eek:

Now, what about "New Species"?

"New species have arisen in historical times. For example:

  • A new species of mosquito, isolated in London's Underground, has speciated from Culex pipiens (Byrne and Nichols 1999; Nuttall 1998).
  • Helacyton gartleri is the HeLa cell culture, which evolved from a human cervical carcinoma in 1951. The culture grows indefinitely and has become widespread (Van Valen and Maiorana 1991).

    A similar event appears to have happened with dogs relatively recently. Sticker's sarcoma, or canine transmissible venereal tumor, is caused by an organism genetically independent from its hosts but derived from a wolf or dog tumor (Zimmer 2006; Murgia et al. 2006).
  • Several new species of plants have arisen via polyploidy (when the chromosome count multiplies by two or more) (de Wet 1971). One example is Primula kewensis (Newton and Pellew 1929)."
So what are these "new species" of exactly? If you read the whole thing it becomes very clear that "new species" actually means a different species of the same organism. The mosquitoes remained mosquitoes and the plants remained plants and the bacteria and viruses all remained in the same family of organisms. Nothing new really....adaptation just produced slightly altered varieties of the same creatures. :oops:

"Microevolution verse Macroevolution"

"Microevolution and macroevolution are different things, but they involve mostly the same processes. Microevolution is defined as the change of allele frequencies (that is, genetic variation due to processes such as selection, mutation, genetic drift, or even migration) within a population. There is no argument that microevolution happens (although some creationists, such as Wallace, deny that mutations happen). Macroevolution is defined as evolutionary change at the species level or higher, that is, the formation of new species, new genera, and so forth. Speciation has also been observed."

Creationists have created another category for which they use the word "macroevolution." They have no technical definition of it, but in practice they use it to mean evolution to an extent great enough that it has not been observed yet. (Some creationists talk about macroevolution being the emergence of new features, but it is not clear what they mean by this."


What they mean by this is that there is no way to prove that any creature morphed into another completely different creature. Scientists observed creatures adapting to new environments and food sources but never did they observe them changing into anything else....nor is there any proof that they ever can. Mutations for example, are almost always detrimental to the creature and the defect soon dies out. Nature's own way of handling defects.

Google beneficial mutations in humans and see how many there are and how important they are to our continued existence.....

Now 29 Evidences for Macroevolution"...I loved this one....

"Macroevolution requires that organisms' morphologies have changed throughout evolutionary history; thus, we should observe morphological change and variation in modern populations.

Confirmation:
There have been numerous observations of morphological change in populations of organisms (Endler 1986). Examples are the change in color of some organ, such as the yellow body or brown eyes of Drosophila, coat color in mice (Barsh 1996), scale color in fish (Houde 1988), and plumage pattern in birds (Morton 1990). Almost every imaginable heritable variation in size, length, width, or number of some physical aspect of animals has been recorded (Johnston and Selander 1973; Futuyma 1998, p. 247-262). This last fact is extremely important for common descent, since the major morphological differences between many species (e.g. species of amphibians, reptiles, mammals, and birds) are simple alterations in size of certain aspects of their respective parahomologous structures". . . .

"The oldest rocks we find on the earth are about 4 Bya (billion years ago), and they are devoid of any life. The oldest potential fossil evidence for life are fossil bacteria from the Apex Chert of Australia (3.46 Bya), though these fossils are currently embroiled controversy and may not represent traces of life. The next oldest fossils are well-accepted fossil bacteria and bacterial mats (stromatolites) from South Africa that date to 3.4 Bya. Thus, the oldest fossil prokaryotes date to 3.4 to 3.5 Byr. For nearly the next billion years, rocks from the Archean have no multicellular life at all, just prokaryotes. The oldest eukaryote fossils are acritarchs dating to about 1.75 Byr. For another 1000 million years, there is still no evidence of multicellular life.


Near the Precambrian/Cambrian transition, only 580 Mya, in the Ediacaran and Burgess shale faunas we finally find the first fossils of multicellular animals. However, they are very unusual, mostly small, soft-bodied metazoans, and most are superficially unlike anything found today. Precisely as we would expect from the standard phylogenetic tree, the earliest fossils of multi-cellular life are very simple sponges and sea anemone-like organisms (sea anemones and jellyfish are both cnidarians). Around 20 million years later, we find the first evidence of simple mollusks, worms, and echinoderms (organisms similar to starfish and sea cucumbers). Another ~15 million years later, the very first vertebrates appear, though most people would strain to recognize them as such. They are small worm-like and primitive fish-like organisms, without bones, jaws, or fins (excepting a single dorsal fin)."


So what do we have here? Please keep in mind that the creation account in Genesis begins with sentient creatures, not single celled micro-organisms or even multi-cellular organisms. The first living creatures to be mentioned in the creation account are the sea creatures....followed by flying creatures. This was long before the land dwellers. So it seems that Genesis and science blend here....though they might disagree slightly on timing of appearances.

The Bible and true provable science are quite compatible. Those who have bothered to check it it out with their eyes open can see it quite clearly.....macro-evolution is a figment of scientific imagination.....and "creationism" is easily dismissed because it flies in the face of what science can know without doubt. Both are flawed IMO. There is something where the Bible and science meet.......Intelligent Design.

The "facts" apply to adaptation...they do not apply to what falls outside of that. Imagination takes over and before we know it, life pops into existence somehow and transforms itself with no intelligent direction at all, into all life forms that inhabit this planet....and you think religious people are gullible! :rolleyes:

Seriously.....
 
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Deeje

Avid Bible Student
Premium Member
Tell me, who is more honest: the person who is willing to say "It may have happened this way", or the person who says "It definitely did happen this way"?

The honest person does not say "even though I have no proof for anything outside of adaptation....evolution is an established fact" This is what I hear from many evolutionists....

Richard Dawkins

“Evolution is a fact. Beyond reasonable doubt, beyond serious doubt, beyond sane, informed, intelligent doubt, beyond doubt evolution is a fact...That didn't have to be true. It is not self-evidently, tautologically, obviously true, and there was a time when most people, even educated people, thought it wasn't. It didn't have to be true, but it is....Evolution is the only game in town, the greatest show on earth.”

Richard Dawkins, The Greatest Show on Earth: The Evidence for Evolution

Those qualifiers in the language of some scientists (though obviously not all) mean that their version of events is not supported by anything verifiable, so its only supposition and educated guesswork, and should be taught as such, NOT as established fact. It should not be presented to children from a young age as if there was no doubt about any of it. That is what honest people do. o_O
 

Sapiens

Polymathematician
Dawkins is writing in popular style, not scientific style, and using the popular definitions, he is spot on.
 

ImmortalFlame

Woke gremlin
The honest person does not say "even though I have no proof for anything outside of adaptation....evolution is an established fact" This is what I hear from many evolutionists....
Because evolution IS a fact - species DO change over time. The THEORY of evolution is another matter.

Richard Dawkins

“Evolution is a fact. Beyond reasonable doubt, beyond serious doubt, beyond sane, informed, intelligent doubt, beyond doubt evolution is a fact...That didn't have to be true. It is not self-evidently, tautologically, obviously true, and there was a time when most people, even educated people, thought it wasn't. It didn't have to be true, but it is....Evolution is the only game in town, the greatest show on earth.”

Richard Dawkins, The Greatest Show on Earth: The Evidence for Evolution

Those qualifiers in the language of some scientists (though obviously not all) mean that their version of events is not supported by anything verifiable, so its only supposition and educated guesswork, and should be taught as such, NOT as established fact. It should not be presented to children from a young age as if there was no doubt about any of it. That is what honest people do. o_O
I find it very telling that you elected to ignore the entire rest of my post and instead hinge your entire argument on one quote from one scientist saying something that doesn't even contradict anything I've written and weaving a completely fictitious narrative about it.

So, I guess you admit then that you were extremely wrong about micro and macro-evolution, and the observed instances I cited have left you with no actual defense of your position.

Immortalflame: 57, Deeje: 0.
 
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