The ToE and common ancestry of all life forms did not come from looking at the evidence

[ragordon168]

Humans aren't primates. Or, do you consider human primates because humans like bananas?

do you actually listen to your own arguments?

person a likes bananas => person a is a monkey
person b doesnt like bananas => person b isnt a monkey

***? did you actually think that was a decent argument? or do you just like winding autoD and co up so much they rip their hair out?

we are related on a genetic level not eating habits. if we went solely on eating habits then humanity would have to be split into various sub-species depending on what they ate:

i.e) i am homo sapiens omnivorous my wife is homo sapiens vegetarian. we are not the same species therefore we cannot breed successfully.

do you ee the problem with your argument?

 

[MSizer]

do you ee the problem with your argument?

I can answer that for you if you like...

 

[Autodidact]

o.k. to explain what ToE says about how we get new species. (apologies to those of you who have heard this before.)

Let's use lizards, since we had an example of that. Let's say there's a specific species of lizard, Skitteri arendi. (pronounced "RND", get it?) It lives near the sea. It's around 3" long, brown with orange spots, lays around 15 eggs at a time, and grows to adulthood in around 90 days. It eats tiny bugs. With me so far?

Now, as you know, some of the arendi babies will be 2.9", and some will be 3.1". Some will have more orange spots, some lighter spots, etc. Some will be a little quicker, and some will have better resistance to different diseases. That's not controversial; we all know that. That's called "descent with modification." That means that offspring resemble their parents and each other, but not exactly. There's some variation.

Over time, the whole species may change a little, like say increase resistance to arendi fungus, but since a species is a reproductive population, any changes get stirred around in the gene pool and the whole population remains a single species.

With me so far?

But imagine that a few arendis crawl onto a boat, which sails to an island, and they climb off. So you have a group of arendis that are isolated from the main group. That group is also going to continue to change a little over time. On the island, there are different bugs, different diseases, different ecology, different predators. So the environment is going to lead to different traits surviving and getting the opportunity to reproduce. Say, for example, there's no natural predators, so there's no need for the fastest to survive. But there's a scarcity of food, so the one's that can survive on other bugs get to live, whatever.

Over time, the population of arendi2 is going to be a little different from arendi1. After say 1000 years, these creatures average 4" long, are brown with orange and yellow spots, lay around 40 eggs into holes in the sand, grow to adulthood in 4 months, and so forth. At the point when they can no longer breed with the main population, biologists call that a new species. We'll call them Skitteri yecii.

According to ToE, that's how we get new species.

That's the core of the theory.

Please let me know that you have read and understood this much, before I go on.

 

[Man of Faith]

o.k. to explain what ToE says about how we get new species. (apologies to those of you who have heard this before.)

Let's use lizards, since we had an example of that. Let's say there's a specific species of lizard, Skitteri arendi. (pronounced "RND", get it?) It lives near the sea. It's around 3" long, brown with orange spots, lays around 15 eggs at a time, and grows to adulthood in around 90 days. It eats tiny bugs. With me so far?

Now, as you know, some of the arendi babies will be 2.9", and some will be 3.1". Some will have more orange spots, some lighter spots, etc. Some will be a little quicker, and some will have better resistance to different diseases. That's not controversial; we all know that. That's called "descent with modification." That means that offspring resemble their parents and each other, but not exactly. There's some variation.

Over time, the whole species may change a little, like say increase resistance to arendi fungus, but since a species is a reproductive population, any changes get stirred around in the gene pool and the whole population remains a single species.

With me so far?

But imagine that a few arendis crawl onto a boat, which sails to an island, and they climb off. So you have a group of arendis that are isolated from the main group. That group is also going to continue to change a little over time. On the island, there are different bugs, different diseases, different ecology, different predators. So the environment is going to lead to different traits surviving and getting the opportunity to reproduce. Say, for example, there's no natural predators, so there's no need for the fastest to survive. But there's a scarcity of food, so the one's that can survive on other bugs get to live, whatever.

Over time, the population of arendi2 is going to be a little different from arendi1. After say 1000 years, these creatures average 4" long, are brown with orange and yellow spots, lay around 40 eggs into holes in the sand, grow to adulthood in 4 months, and so forth. At the point when they can no longer breed with the main population, biologists call that a new species. We'll call them Skitteri yecii.

According to ToE, that's how we get new species.

That's the core of the theory.

Please let me know that you have read and understood this much, before I go on.

Okay, I am with you so far, lizards can adapt and change over time depending on their environment. There are different colors, sizes, and shapes of lizards and if you want to call them different species, I am okay with that. If you want to say they are the same species just different breeds, I am okay with that also. I will of course call them the same kind of animal, a lizard. What's next?

 

[tumbleweed41]

Okay, I am with you so far, lizards can adapt and change over time depending on their environment. There are different colors, sizes, and shapes of lizards and if you want to call them different species, I am okay with that.

Really, does not matter if your OK with it. The fact is that a species is group of organisms capable of interbreeding and producing fertile offspring of both genders, and separated from other such groups with which interbreeding does not (normally) happen.

If you want to say they are the same species just different breeds, I am okay with that also.

That would be taxonomicly incorrect.

I will of course call them the same kind of animal, a lizard. What's next?

Yes, they are both lizards, just as you and the chimp are both mammals.

 

[Autodidact]

Okay, I am with you so far, lizards can adapt and change over time depending on their environment. There are different colors, sizes, and shapes of lizards and if you want to call them different species, I am okay with that. If you want to say they are the same species just different breeds, I am okay with that also. I will of course call them the same kind of animal, a lizard. What's next?

Not me, MoF, biologists. That's the biological definition of a new species.

I realize that you may consider this

and this

to be the same, but Biologists make a finer distinction.

The name for this process is "evolution." That's what evolution is. According to ToE, this is the process by which new species evolve. (which RND denies happening.)

So you agree with the core of ToE, now that you understand what it actually says. Now we'll wait for RND to catch up with us.

Do you have any questions so far?

 

[Autodidact]

RND: Do species sometimes go extinct? (Please don't make me repeat this ten times in increasingly large and gaudy fonts. Thanks.)

 

[Amill]

Okay, I am with you so far, lizards can adapt and change over time depending on their environment. There are different colors, sizes, and shapes of lizards and if you want to call them different species, I am okay with that. If you want to say they are the same species just different breeds, I am okay with that also. I will of course call them the same kind of animal, a lizard. What's next?

As you should still call them a lizard. You don't lose your ancestral classification. That's why we're mammals, that's why we're vertebrates.

Is this a lizard?

Tuatara

 

[Autodidact]

MoF. As I recall, unlike RND, you assert that new species do arise, frequently and rapidly. Does my description basically match how you think they arise?

 

[Smoke]

Would you have evidence of your great-grandmothers death if she died billions of years ago? That's what Darwin was doing, saying he knew how something happened billions of years ago.

I'm afraid you completely missed the point.

We have, in the 150 years since The Origin of Species was published, accumulated a lot more evidence for evolution than Darwin had. However, there was still plenty of evidence 150 years ago.

 

[Smoke]

It has nothing to do with being controversial or not. It has everything to do with expecting to learn anything of depth from TV.

Your ignorance about evolution is so nearly complete that a coloring book could take you to a greater depth than you've achieved so far. There's no reason to sneer at basic material if it would be an improvement on your present level of knowledge.

The only thing about evolution I'm interested in is proving how fallacious it is.

How do you expect to do that without understanding anything at all about it?

 

[Autodidact]

I assume that RND and MoF are getting their ideas from the same source: The Bible. Yet they believe opposite things about this extremely basic question: Do new species arise, or not. So The Bible, as a source of knowledge about the natural world, must inherently be useless or worse. Relying on it entirely, we have no idea what's going on. At a minimum, we can believe opposite things about basic questions that its readers believe it addresses.

 

[Smoke]

Humans aren't primates.

Statements like this make me wonder whether the writer is genuinely stupid or is just having a little fun pretending to be.

 

[nonbeliever_92]

Statements like this make me wonder whether the writer is genuinely stupid or is just having a little fun pretending to be.

Maybe they're having fun being genuinely stupid. Ignorance is bliss.

 

[OmarKhayyam]

Sadly you guys are both wrong.

They are neither stupid nor trying to be funny.

See #500

 

[Autodidact]

They DO know. They are NOT stupid. They know exactly what that graph shows. They fully realize and UNDERSTAND exactly what it presented there and what the implications are.

They simply choose NOT to accept it.

Listen to Ken Ham for example. He KNOWS what the science is. He KNOWS the facts. He simply doesn't care. These folks are the same. The evidence simply doesn't matter. They KNOW what it is and they KNOW what it means. It jus -don't -make- no- fracking -difference. God said it. I believe it. That settles it.

QED.

I agree, but why can't they just be honest and say, "We reject science in favor of the Bible. We realize that the Bible directly conflicts with most of modern science, and we choose the Bible." Why do they say they love science, and understand it, and know the evidence, and all those poor biologists guys are in denial?

 

[Nepenthe]

I agree, but why can't they just be honest and say, "We reject science in favor of the Bible. We realize that the Bible directly conflicts with most of modern science, and we choose the Bible." Why do they say they love science, and understand it, and know the evidence, and all those poor biologists guys are in denial?

Exactly. That's the most frustrating aspect- just accept that science can't be reconciled with a literal interpretation of the Bible and move on. It's this bizarre cognitive dissonance that allows them to accept chemistry when it comes to, say, healthcare, physics when it deals with their fuel combustion engine or computer or whatever, but any aspect of science that touches upon evolution is simply unacceptable.

 

[OmarKhayyam]

I agree, but why can't they just be honest and say, "We reject science in favor of the Bible. We realize that the Bible directly conflicts with most of modern science, and we choose the Bible." Why do they say they love science, and understand it, and know the evidence, and all those poor biologists guys are in denial?

Lady, when you find out tell me. We can BOTH win a Nobel.

 

[Autodidact]

Well, to answer my own question, it's kind of hard to write, "Science doesn't work," on your computer. Obviously you've got a little problem there. Everyone knows that science works, and uses it and relies on it all the time. It would seriously undermine their proselytizing if they say, "For our religion to be right, all of science must be wrong." So they obfuscate, make up something called "Creation Science," create lists of "scientists" who "question evolution," invent whacky new names like "Intelligent Design," all in a vain attempt to paste a thin veneer of scientific credibility on their ancient creation myth.

If you think about it, they betray their admiration for science and low opinion of religion every time they do this. I mean, you don't hear scientists trying to argue that their theory is really religion, and should be taught in church, do you?

 

[rojse]

I just read through twenty pages of this thread in one sitting. My brain has turned into a liquid mush and is slowly dribbling out of my ears. Thanks, all.

I would surmise that RND has selective vision from the results of this thread. I think that this is a serious problem, and should be examined by an experienced optometrist. RND is able to hone in on one snippet of a post \which he thinks will support his position, but will miss entire posts that ask short, seemingly simple questions, repeated several times in a row, and will also miss extremely long, detailed posts.