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Re: Science and Creation
[Re: Marco_Grubert]
#68881
04/05/06 23:13
04/05/06 23:13
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Joined: Jun 2002
Posts: 3,682
Coppell, Texas
Ran Man
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@ ALL The topic of this thread is "Science and Creation", so knowledge of "evolution" is not required, because that is only a theory and not science.  Anyways, consider the following scenario in arguments for a "creator" : THE GAMESTUDIO FRAMERATE SCENARIO! This is true Btw... Yes, I have this lovely "Gamestudio A6" engine made by JCL and Marco that I'm using to create large outdoor terrain environments with. But, if I make to much visible all at once, then my computer framerate starts to drop badly.  So then, I must LIMIT what is viewed on the screen to help it.  Okay, so we can all agree that my 1.6 GHz computer is made by "Hewlett Packard" and also that the software, <GAMESTUDIO A6> is made by JCL, MARCO and DOUG. They CREATED it right?! Okay, but why is it when I'm traveling in an airplane or out on the beach, that I can see for very LARGE distances and tons of objects and entities and my brain is still working great? Now, WHY IS THAT?  So, we are eager to accept that Marco and JCL made something great with gamestudio, but we struggle with the concept that our brains and bodies are not made by a creator? This is simply illogical, yes?  Why is the complicated gamestudio CREATED, but the more complex brain and body was not created, huh ???
Last edited by Ran Man; 04/05/06 23:15.
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Re: Science and Creation
[Re: Marco_Grubert]
#68882
04/06/06 00:36
04/06/06 00:36
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Joined: Feb 2004
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Wisconsin
Irish_Farmer
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You guys are getting to be too much to handle. I don't mind clashes of logic, but having to deal with three of you is getting to be too much. But since I'm going to ignore one of them anyway, that leaves only two. A little bit easier to handle. Quote:
Besides your objections against the origin of life - which I think are illogical, see my previous post
It seems obvious you want to drop this subject. Just let me point out one thing. I'm not the one who even said this was a failed experiment in the first place. Scientists, even the one who performed it, said it was a failure. I just took the conclusion to the next logical step.
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As far as I understand - please correct me if I'm wrong - you accept that a species can change by modifying or loosing information of their DNA - which you call 'devolution'. However you do not accept the possibility of adding new information to the DNA that gives a species, for instance, a new organ - that would be a 'good mutation'.
Well...let me try and reword it and see if that gets us closer to the same page. I'm saying that within a species there is natural genetic variance. I'm assuming you're still with me on this point, because this is a well known genetic fact (or at least I've heard it to be, and not from creationists but from probably evolutionist geneticists (it was on an evolution-based website (if a website can be said to be based off evolution))). What I'm saying is that, the variety (and similarity) of some species, for instance the finches, wasn't brought about by these birds gaining any new traits. Instead, what I'm saying is the more obvious conclusion is that at one point all of these genetic traits were more generalized within a smaller number of species, maybe within even only one species. However, because even on an island there are different requirements for surviving, certain genes of this species seperated and formed their own species, albeit with less genetic variance.
My evidence for this was, for one, certain physical or behavioral characteristics carried over between species even if not much else was similar. Sure, this could be called common ancestry, but it could go either way. The other was that animals have been shown to lose genetic data when it is beneficial to them (a rare case where nature selects for a loss, hiding, or corruption of data because having the data is actually harmful in the first place). For instance, the fish with scars instead of eyes were able to grow their eyes back when a lens was implanted in early life from the same species outside the cave that still had the eyes.
This shows that evolution does happen. No one is arguing that. The fish had to change to lose the eyes, and change is evolution. However, the fish did NOT gain the eyes. And this is an important distinction. The mutation of losing the eyes was good, in that it kept the fish from dying from infection when it bumped up against the walls. But not 'good' in the sense that it gained anything new. I understand I'm not being clear on what constitutes a good mutation and a 'good' mutation. However, would you not agree that this distinction is important to the future of evolution, where for instance this fish is required to slowly gain, for instance, legs? My point is that we do see evolutionary 'shifts' in animals, but only in the sense that they are flexible enough to survive on earth, but are restricted by the bounds of the original data. This isn't change enough to grow new organs like legs and become new animals.
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But denying this possibility is just an opinion - obviously biologists have a contrary opinion.
Fair enough, but geneticists do not (maybe it could be said that geneticists are just more specialized biologists). A lot of biology is steeped in evolution, so biologists at this point are only looking for more proof of materialist evolution (forgive my use of the word materialist, I simply don't know any other way to put it, and there is an important distinction). Its ok, even from my creationist viewpoint, that biologists are only trying to find evidence of materialist evolution. As I've said, I'm all for anything that leads to a better understand of life. However, when they find evidence that contradicts their viewpoint, it should be presented FAIRLY to the public, not in a manner that misleads the layman.
However, geneticists have been trying for a LONG time to find some working mechanism for a change in kinds of animals. They haven't found it. And they've also found that there is something stopping these 'positive' or 'new' mutations from occuring. My hypothesis was that this is because the original genetics are in place and they are the standard upon which mutations find themselves unable to compete with. Which is why we don't see mutations that change what an animal essentially is to begin with except by confusing or hiding or completely losing that data altogether. Which is expressed in the creature through mutations that usually lead to a general loss of fitness.
If mutations are so good for creatures to become something else, why do cells have natural defense mechanisms (albeit, defenses that don't work 100%) to reverse or prevent these mutations? I'm seriously just asking, I'm not really sure myself. I'd like to say that these mechanisms show mutations are always bad, but I can't draw that conclusion at this time.
Your equation was great and all, but where are you getting these numbers from? edit: I shouldn't say that, because it makes me sound ignorant. What I mean is that your idea of what constitutes the chances is highly askew. For instance, if I say a positive mutation might occur once every ten mutationts (for instance), and we cause 400+ mutations in one species alone and not one of them is positive then I might have to re-evaluate my equation.
Furthermore, you're not adding in all of the variables. Your equation might work if all of the nucleotides were just sitting in a big pool, but they're organized into acids and so on up the chain, and so you have to take into account what mutations can effect, and how much of these groupings they can affect at once.
I'm not going to blather on about mutations, I'd rather use some helpful examples.
sickle-cell disease The replacement of A by T at the 17th nucleotide of the gene for the beta chain of hemoglobin changes the codon GAG (for glutamic acid) to GTG (which encodes valine). Thus the 6th amino acid in the chain becomes valine instead of glutamic acid.
So, if the amino acids spell out sentences (genes), it could be said (based on the evidence) that all of these words have to make some kind of metaphorical 'grammatical' sense or it affects the gene. You're talking about the difference between order and disorder. Changing an amino acid causes disorder, because we're not dealing simply with nucleotides, we're dealing with a pre-existing order of sentences and this order goes up and up. I'm simply saying that you have to look at the big picture to understand why these mutations can't physically (as in physics) be good. Because in turn these genes lead to proteins, and thousands of these proteins must be working correctly at the same time in order for the cell to function properly. So on the level of nucleotides, yeah we can create just about anything, but when you order enough 'just about anythings' into a an arrangement that makes sense, and then add a 'just about anything' in there that wasn't meant to fit into the larger picture it causes a conflict with the original genetic data.
So my assumption of the probibility of a mutation that causes a gaining of efficiency in a function or physical trait (I'm assuming that these cells weren't originally photo sensitive, and that they never contained this data in the first place so it wasn't hidden or corrupted) is zero. Because you have to affect more than just nucleotides, or I should say you have to affect nucleotides on a large scale (all at once nonetheless) to get that data to appear in the first place. This mechanism has yet to be discovered.
My conclusion then is that mutations simply don't do enough work even to cause a change such as this. This is why a mutation affecting red blood cells (sickle cell anemia) doesn't completely change what the red blood cells are. It just causes a crippling of the original purpose of the red cells. If mutations worked on a large enough scale to do this, then the effect on red blood cells would simply be more widespread (or the effect on anything by mutations). Technically, they're still red blood cells just with a handicap.
Sure, mutations can effect an entire wing, but this can happen on a small scale by corrupting the data that causes these wings to grow at all. It doesn't have to completely manipulate the entire data of the wing.
So mutations have two hurdles to cross (and I know these two hurdles exist because they were evidenced in the fly experiment and because we both know something about genetics).
1). They don't work on a large enough scale to do enough 'random mixing' to make it even statistically possible for a mutation to occur. Even when mutations are crammed together in a short period of time (fruit flies) they still work on too small of a scale to affect enough genetics to produce these new organs we're always hearing about, but never see.
I understand why you think animals can gain new data, especially if snakes have legs (normally I would just call these lizards) but assumptions based on fossils are no match for the observable truth. You can cook up any equation you want, but the the observable truth never lies.
2). They conflict with the original genetic material, which causes negative effects in the creature.
I don't care who you are, you don't want sickle cell anemia. And if the only way evolution can change a creature (even for the better) is by causing bad things to happen to that creature, then this still fits within the creationist model of evolution because no matter how many times you pile bad things on to a creature, it'll never stop being that creature.
At this point, I have to pass the corn picture to get down to Marco's post. Its been a while since anything's gotten me to giggle like a school girl, like that.
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If you define it as difference in life span or procreation rate of the new organism compared to its predecessor then you have a usable biological definition.
Not necessarily. We can compare efficiency, fitness, etc. It takes into account a lot of different things. For a new mutation to avoid being 'bad' it doesn't have to not be less efficient, or cause less fitness, etc. Those things help, but it has to create something that wasn't there. I should say the argument isn't about whether or not mutations can cause good or bad things to happen, but whether or not this comes at a price to the original genetic code. Ok, you don't die of malaria, but you had to cripple your red blood cells in the process. This didn't create any new data, so how does that show that a human can become a dragon?
Of course, I should explain that too. You can have 'new' data in the form of a new amino acid, or shorter or longer genes (more or less amino acids), but because we are already dealing with a well ordered creature, these changes can't lead to anything that is better relative to what already existed. Which is why sickle cell anemia caused a 'new' amino acid to appear on a gene, but still caused something to become 'out of order'. The red blood cells don't do their job as well, wouldn't you agree? They die faster, they aren't pliable enough to squeeze through vessels. This may not always kill the victim, but it certainly doesn't help.
I just....I get what you guys are saying about mutations, and I think half of it has to do with miscommunication mostly on my part, but the other half is perspective. We're not really disagreeing about what can happen, but about what the outcome is here and exactly why these outcomes are reached.
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Yes, if there were no mitigating circumstances then this would indeed be bad. But in this case the mitigating circumstances are quite clear: you are more likely to have health complication due to sickle cell deformation but much less likely to die from Malaria.
This is what I mean by miscommunication. I need to find a different way to say this. Nucleotides are organized into amino acids. These amino acids are further organized into genes. These genes then produce proteins. You can have a mutation help you out, that's not what we disagree on. That's why I brought up the example of the fish in the first place. What we disagree on is the process by which the mutation becomes helpful in the first place. If I lived in a cave all my life and never had eyes and then left the cave. Its one thing to say that I could grow new eyes and that's a positive mutation, but its a positive mutation into something new. If on the other hand I go into this cave and lose my eyes, that's also a positive mutation. Who, in their right mind, would want to die from an eye infection? However, the process by which both of these adaptations took place is very distinct and very important in finding out if not only is creationist evolution true, but whether or not materialist evolution is true.
In the latter example, either the data for the eyes had to be hidden, outright lost, or unable to be useful because the device that caused them to grow in the first place got turned 'off.' These are what I mean by bad mutations. They may lead to good outcomes, but they lead to a general breakdown of the overall structure of DNA. Because, if you combine enough of these mutations, eventually the animal will become completely unfit to live on earth. Would you disagree with that?
In the first example, we randomly remixed our amino acids to gain eyes (assuming for a moment that mutations worked on a larger scale than they do). However, this kind of mutation could be considered 'good' because it not only lead to data that never existed before, but it lead to data that never existed before that lead to a brand spanking new creature. There may be a me that exists without those eyes back in the cave, but I'm still a new creature because I grew eyes without the aid of previous genetic material.
Which example occurs in nature? Yes, good and bad mutations can be said to occur, but like I said my argument isn't against evolution. I believe mutations cause change, and that this change can be said to be good (its all part of evolution). But good isn't good enough. It has to lead to data that never existed, not just work on the original data by crippling or reducing this data. Otherwise you still have a long way to go in showing how materialist evolution is possible.
This is the kind of bait and switch tactic is used on the public. We're shown this change, and that it can lead to good things, but we're not shown the basis of this change and how it can't lead one creature to become another and never has before.
I need a new hobby. Its just, I think we're very close to meeting each other on this whole idea of evolution. Maybe I'm wrong and you guys have something else up your sleeve. Who knows? At least I know things'll be interesting.
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Yes, if there were no mitigating circumstances then this would indeed be bad. But in this case the mitigating circumstances are quite clear: you are more likely to have health complication due to sickle cell deformation but much less likely to die from Malaria. If sickle cell anemia suddenly appeared in a population and remained in the genepool even though there were no deaths from malaria then you would even have evidence against evolution. But that's not the case.
And besides, in this example all you've shown is how even bad mutations (reduction of genetics) can be used to protect our species. So on the other side of this mutation we still have humans, its just that sickle cell anemia managed to protect our DNA. My point is that its misleading to call these types of mutation 'evolution.' They are evolution, but they're going to lead people to believe that this proves some primitive ape eventually became man. Which is why I always make it a point to make a distinction between what level of evolution I'm talking about here.
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I don't follow you. 80 million compared to 3000 million is rather a low. What are you trying to say?
I'm saying that in ratio form it sounds low, but the difference is pretty big on a smaller level.
That and this 'junk' dna has been found to have a purpose before. It may not be expressible, but it has to do with mitosis and passing of genetic information.
Sure, there is real junk DNA that does absolutely nothing (that we know of so far), but some of it is required in the process of replicating our current DNA
edit: possibly all of it actually in which case that would explain why the 'junk' dna of monkey and man is so similar. They have similar DNA because they look the same, and they have similar junk DNA because their expressible DNA is so similar and it indirectly requires the use of this junk DNA.
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Back to junk DNA: if there are identical base sequences in organism A and B that can not be transcribed into proteins, thus are meaningless to the organism
Introns are useless to the creature? Mutations show they aren't, since mutations on the intron cause problems with imprinting. I'll assume you know what imprinting is in this context? I don't want to patronise you. Anyway, this can result in different diseases and cancer.
The very idea of junk DNA in the first place is kind of a problem. You say junk DNA is junk because at our current understanding we don't know what this junk DNA is yet (or what it does). To say that its inability to create protein proves its uselessness is kind of a loaded argument. I can't prove you wrong because we don't know 100% of everything about genetics. Just like introns were first thought to be 'vestigial', and like some organs were first thought to be vestigial: things change.
"While many scientists assume much of this sequence is probably an evolutionary artifact that serves no present-day purpose, some or all of it may function in ways that are not currently understood. In fact, recent studies have suggested functions for certain portions of what has been called junk DNA. -- The "junk" label is therefore recognized as something of a misnomer, and many would prefer the more neutral term "noncoding DNA"."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Junk_DNA
I purposely left out a phrase about evolution from that quote. Because I'm brainwashing you. Actually this is the phrase if you want to read it, I just didn't think it was entirely relevant.
"Moreover, the conservation of some "junk" DNA over millions of years of evolution may imply an essential function."
So I think it would be fair not to jump to conclusions just yet. We have a lot to learn. We includes me of course because I'm learning as this discussion goes along too.
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That's probably a road to disaster We do not have the complete genome for chimpanzees but we do have the genome for parts of it and can compare the nucleotides to that of humans divide the number of variations by the genome length and you have the percentage of difference. And since this is science you (or any creationist in a biochem lab) could disprove it by showing that there are more variations then have been observed. Until then it's wishful thinking.
Do I still need to respond to this?
I have to say you guys (I know you won't see it this way entirely) but you guys are a God send. I'm the type of person who can't just believe something, I have to know why I believe something and I have to know and understand this proof. Some call it overanalytical, and that may be true, but frankly I'm grateful for it. Anyway, the point is that I've never had as much faith in creationism as I have had since these discussions with you guys. Facts on the internet are one thing, but putting my faith to the test against you guys has been a great experience. You've tempered my thinking and beliefs in a way that nothing else ever could and I'm grateful for that.
Thanks. I hope I've been a worthy opponent thus far.
Now, its off to my friend's house until I have to go to sleep.
Last edited by Irish_Farmer; 04/06/06 04:50.
"The task force finds that...the unborn child is a whole human being from the moment of fertilization, that all abortions terminate the life of a human being, and that the unborn child is a separate human patient under the care of modern medicine."
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Re: Science and Creation
[Re: Irish_Farmer]
#68883
04/06/06 04:42
04/06/06 04:42
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Joined: Feb 2004
Posts: 718
Wisconsin
Irish_Farmer
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Wisconsin
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Ran, please stop. You're going to convert me to the other side.
No offense. I'm just saying, it almost seems like you're trying to convince them that they're right.
edit: All I'm saying is that you're playing into their hands. You can't argue on that basis. Not that you can even argue on a scientific basis either, but at least that one isn't SO bad.
Last edited by Irish_Farmer; 04/06/06 04:58.
"The task force finds that...the unborn child is a whole human being from the moment of fertilization, that all abortions terminate the life of a human being, and that the unborn child is a separate human patient under the care of modern medicine."
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Re: Science and Creation
[Re: Irish_Farmer]
#68884
04/06/06 08:28
04/06/06 08:28
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Joined: Sep 2003
Posts: 3,236
San Diego, CA
Marco_Grubert
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Quote:
It seems obvious you want to drop this subject. Just let me point out one thing. I'm not the one who even said this was a failed experiment in the first place. Scientists, even the one who performed it, said it was a failure. I just took the conclusion to the next logical step.
I think this statement was about the Miller-Urey experiment. It was not a failure at all because it showed that organic molecules can spontaneously form from anorganic ones. What is in doubt is the exact composition of an early atmosphere. The Miller experiment has been repeated in various forms over the past decades with different atmospherical conditions and even conditions underwater. Some of these experiments created amino acids, others did not.
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Instead, what I'm saying is the more obvious conclusion is that at one point all of these genetic traits were more generalized within a smaller number of species, maybe within even only one species. However, because even on an island there are different requirements for surviving, certain genes of this species seperated and formed their own species, albeit with less genetic variance.
Okay, let's assume that the finches have a large variance in their traits and some environmental conditions cause them to have distinct populations. Why should their descendants lose any of that variance? Basically if you were to transport one of the finches back into a different ecological niche, so to speak, they could easily adapt due to their variance. I think you are trying to reinvent Lamarckism here, where body features gained during the lifetime of an individual gets passed on to offspring- doesn't work that way.
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Fair enough, but geneticists do not (maybe it could be said that geneticists are just more specialized biologists). A lot of biology is steeped in evolution, so biologists at this point are only looking for more proof of materialist evolution (forgive my use of the word materialist, I simply don't know any other way to put it, and there is an important distinction). Its ok, even from my creationist viewpoint, that biologists are only trying to find evidence of materialist evolution. As I've said, I'm all for anything that leads to a better understand of life. However, when they find evidence that contradicts their viewpoint, it should be presented FAIRLY to the public, not in a manner that misleads the layman.
If you talk to biologists you will find out that they are not out "looking for more proof of evolution". For biologists (and most every other scientist in the life sciences) evolution is factual. An astronomer does not look for "proof of gravity" when investigating a new planet, instead he looks for how the theory of gravitation (assumed to be correct) explains the position of that planet and what future motion might be expected. Similarly a biologist looking at a previously unknown organism looks for how the theory of evolution (assumed to be correct) explains the morphology of that organism and what other organisms are to be expected in its lineage. If the evidence contradicts the theory, our scientist will publish a paper about that, argue with his colleagues for a couple of years, then revise the theory and get a handful of prizes.
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However, geneticists have been trying for a LONG time to find some working mechanism for a change in kinds of animals. They haven't found it.
Again, biologists (not just geneticists) will disagree with your claim. The changes in kind are recorded in the fossil record. However, they can not be reproduced in a laboratory.
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And they've also found that there is something stopping these 'positive' or 'new' mutations from occuring.
You have claimed this before. No geneticist claims that there is such a mechanism and you have not backed up your claim that there is by showing how it might work. Merely repeating the claim does not strengthen it.
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If mutations are so good for creatures to become something else, why do cells have natural defense mechanisms (albeit, defenses that don't work 100%) to reverse or prevent these mutations? I'm seriously just asking, I'm not really sure myself. I'd like to say that these mechanisms show mutations are always bad, but I can't draw that conclusion at this time.
This is the example that JCL was talking about earlier. A mutation is far more likely to be harmful than to be beneficial. If you pick to 2 letters from our alphabet there are ca. 660 possible combinations. How many of these are English words (an, in, of, on, etc.) ? Maybe 20 ? Thus out of 660 character "mutations" only 20/660= 3% create "good" mutations.
Biologists do not disagree that mutations are mostly harmful, however, you are wrong to assume that therefore all mutations must be harmful. Some are completely neutral (because of codon redundancy as mentioned previously) and some are beneficial.
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So my assumption of the probibility of a mutation that causes a gaining of efficiency in a function or physical trait (I'm assuming that these cells weren't originally photo sensitive, and that they never contained this data in the first place so it wasn't hidden or corrupted) is zero.
In that case I recommend reading up on probability theory as well. You are also ignoring translocations here which allow completely new proteins to be created without having to change every base individually by simply appending half of an existing gene from one spot onto another gene at another spot.
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Because you have to affect more than just nucleotides, or I should say you have to affect nucleotides on a large scale (all at once nonetheless) to get that data to appear in the first place. This mechanism has yet to be discovered.
See above, this mechanism is known as translocation or cross-over.
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This is why a mutation affecting red blood cells (sickle cell anemia) doesn't completely change what the red blood cells are. It just causes a crippling of the original purpose of the red cells.
Because that's the fastest way to "deal" with malaria. We could imagine a rather complicated mutation that adjusts the immune system to deal with this disease, but switching a single nucleotide apparently does an acceptable job.
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I know these two hurdles exist because they were evidenced in the fly experiment
I remember from your lengthy post that you referenced some early 20th century experiments. If you want to do more research please look at the fly experiments performed in the last 4 decades.
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I understand why you think animals can gain new data, especially if snakes have legs (normally I would just call these lizards) but assumptions based on fossils are no match for the observable truth. You can cook up any equation you want, but the the observable truth never lies.
I know you would like some biologist to turn a fish into a lizard, but that's just not how it works. We are talking about millions of years with selection pressure. All that can be done in a lab is make bacterias resistant to their antagonists and show adaptation to their environment in fruit flies.
To come back to the theory of gravity: we can see and measure it in the small but it also causes galaxies to spin. Can we measure the gravity exerted on a galaxy? Can we reproduce it in a laboratory? Should we thus discount gravity on large scale object? No, those are reasonable extrapolations and as long as the facts match the theory and there is no better explanation we accept the theory.
Creationism as a theory (using the word in its non-scientific sense) claims that complete animals can be created out of thin air. We do not have any evidence to back up this claim. We can't even extrapolate because nobody has seen even a tiny bacteria materialize out of thin air.
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then this still fits within the creationist model of evolution because no matter how many times you pile bad things on to a creature, it'll never stop being that creature.
This is called "shifting the goal post". Usually creationists talk about a vague "kind" that is never clearly defined. This is why the modern definition of "species" is used by biologists. If creatures from population A can not produce fertile offspring with creatures from population B then they are of different species. Compare this to a vague notion of "no matter how often I change it it still stays basically the same".
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You can have 'new' data in the form of a new amino acid, or shorter or longer genes (more or less amino acids), but because we are already dealing with a well ordered creature, these changes can't lead to anything that is better relative to what already existed.
You are still claiming that there must be some process that prevents improvements to an existing organism without explaining what such a process might be.
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Which is why sickle cell anemia caused a 'new' amino acid to appear on a gene, but still caused something to become 'out of order'.
That's messed up. It should be: a nucleotide on a gene got changed which caused a different amino acid to appear which in turn causes sickle cell anemia.
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They die faster, they aren't pliable enough to squeeze through vessels. This may not always kill the victim, but it certainly doesn't help.
On average it helps them to live longer. What's the point of having a baby with excellent blood cells that dies within a few months due to malaria infection ?
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This is what I mean by miscommunication. I need to find a different way to say this. Nucleotides are organized into amino acids. These amino acids are further organized into genes. These genes then produce proteins.
Nope. Nucleotides are bases which make up part of the DNA. Depending on the level of abstractions you can organize these into exons or genes. Genes when translated cause amino acids to be created which when attached to each other form proteins.
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In the first example, we randomly remixed our amino acids to gain eyes (assuming for a moment that mutations worked on a larger scale than they do). However, this kind of mutation could be considered 'good' because it not only lead to data that never existed before, but it lead to data that never existed before that lead to a brand spanking new creature. There may be a me that exists without those eyes back in the cave, but I'm still a new creature because I grew eyes without the aid of previous genetic material.
I have adressed most of this above. Large scale mutations occur and you use a very subjective notion of "creature". An organism that has completely different blood cells you do not consider to be a new creature, but an organism that has its skin cells changed so that they are photo sensitive you do consider to be a new creature. I know what you are tring to say, but "I know it when I see it" ain't good enough in science.
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This is the kind of bait and switch tactic is used on the public. We're shown this change, and that it can lead to good things, but we're not shown the basis of this change and how it can't lead one creature to become another and never has before.
If you want large scale changes you have to look into fossils, and of course you'll find lots of uninformed laymen saying that those fossils are all made up and professional paleontologists stating how they relate to each other. Take your pick as to who you trust. I have never been interested in old bones, so I can not help you with that.
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The very idea of junk DNA in the first place is kind of a problem. You say junk DNA is junk because at our current understanding we don't know what this junk DNA is yet (or what it does). To say that its inability to create protein proves its uselessness is kind of a loaded argument. I can't prove you wrong because we don't know 100% of everything about genetics. Just like introns were first thought to be 'vestigial', and like some organs were first thought to be vestigial: things change.
Again, basic science: you can't prove a negative. Thus the burden of proof is on you to show that junk DNA is not actually junk. Some experiments have been done with mouse DNA where junk sequences were removed and the phenotype remained the same.
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So I think it would be fair not to jump to conclusions just yet.
So.. in a case where current evidence contradicts your basic assumption and clearly shows that humans and apes have a common ancestor it's not fair to jump to conclusion and we have to wait? Yet when chemists are trying to find models for abiogenesis but have not been successful in describing every step along the way it's fair to conclude that evolution is untenable??
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Re: Science and Creation
[Re: Marco_Grubert]
#68885
04/07/06 04:57
04/07/06 04:57
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Joined: Feb 2004
Posts: 718
Wisconsin
Irish_Farmer
User
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User
Joined: Feb 2004
Posts: 718
Wisconsin
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What experiments in fruit flies have changed in the last four decades. I'd be interested in learning.
Anyway, you've outlasted me. I can't keep doing this for several hours a day, I have hobbies and work, etc. I just don't have the energy or the determination to keep this going. It probably doesn't help that I wore myself out to begin with.
We'll have to go our seperate ways on this one, I think. I just can't keep doing this anymore. Its starting to interfere with my hobbies.
Thanks again, its been fun in the meantime anyway.
"The task force finds that...the unborn child is a whole human being from the moment of fertilization, that all abortions terminate the life of a human being, and that the unborn child is a separate human patient under the care of modern medicine."
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Re: Science and Creation
[Re: Scramasax]
#68887
04/07/06 16:55
04/07/06 16:55
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Anonymous
Unregistered
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Anonymous
Unregistered
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"Ran, please stop. You're going to convert me to the other side. No offense. I'm just saying, it almost seems like you're trying to convince them that they're right." I see that point of view. I'd have to "lower" myself down to their level to continue. They are so "high minded", esteemed and evolved creatures that they cannot understand the easy nor understand the "simple" logic of the world. They have put themselves on a high Pedestal, with modern science as their god. They also thumb their little noses at people like me, like the snobs that they are. I would urge you, however, to not fall into the ideals and like-mindedness of these mental midets. There is a higher calling and it certainly is not on these forums I suppose. Bye...
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Re: Science and Creation
[Re: Marco_Grubert]
#68889
04/11/06 17:53
04/11/06 17:53
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Joined: Feb 2004
Posts: 718
Wisconsin
Irish_Farmer
User
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User
Joined: Feb 2004
Posts: 718
Wisconsin
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So...you basically just repeated what I've been saying all along. Animals can speciate. Speciation is essential to the creationist model of life too. Without speciation, the number of animals that would have gone extinct would be far greater than it is. I skipped over everything but the fruit fly part, so maybe I need to dig deeper, but I'm still not seeing evolution in action. At least not the kind of evolution you're speaking of.
Furthermore, this also shows the amount of confusion caused by trying to define animals by species. Fertile hybrids are constantly produced from seperate species (more and more so as time goes on), thus not making them seperate species in the first place (depending on which definition of species is most convenient for scientists at the time). In fact, the more you allow these different phenotypes to mate without selective pressure, the closer they'll get to the phenotype of the 'master species' I was talking about. Zeedonk or liger, anyone?
Selective pressure simply specializes the genes (through speciation even) based on the environment, etc, showing how one general kind of animal can lead to many different species. So, since this could either be evidence of creation or evolution, tell me why I should accept evolution on faith? Especially when the only answer that that faith has to offer me is that I'm nothing more than an animal and my life is meaningless, and is meant to end in nothing more than death.
People have a huge misunderstanding of creationism. They think speciation occuring disproves the Genesis account. Which on the surface it seems to, but people don't understand that selective pressure wasn't on the animals in the beginning. They didn't even hunt each other, and there was no death, so God wouldn't have created all the variety of species we see today. He would have created a more general Kind, and when the fall occured, these animals were able to speciate, or specialize in other ways based on new pressures to create new species that are able to interbreed back towards the more general kind (although some cannot (if A and C can interbreed and B and C can, but A and B can't doesn't mean they weren't from the same kind) or won't produce fertile offspring, but that's due to non-evolutionary changes in chromosomes as we like to call it). It is interesting to note when these barriers don't exist, that hybrids tend to take up a more generalized phenotype, though, showing that our model of biology isn't as quack as some people would like it to be.
Maybe I'm reading the paper wrong, but you've given my argument a leg up here.
"The task force finds that...the unborn child is a whole human being from the moment of fertilization, that all abortions terminate the life of a human being, and that the unborn child is a separate human patient under the care of modern medicine."
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Re: Science and Creation
#68890
04/11/06 19:17
04/11/06 19:17
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Joined: Sep 2002
Posts: 8,177
Netherlands
PHeMoX
Senior Expert
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Senior Expert
Joined: Sep 2002
Posts: 8,177
Netherlands
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Quote:
"Ran, please stop. You're going to convert me to the other side.
No offense. I'm just saying, it almost seems like you're trying to convince them that they're right."
I see that point of view. I'd have to "lower" myself down to their level to continue.
They are so "high minded", esteemed and evolved creatures that they cannot understand the easy nor understand the "simple" logic of the world.
They have put themselves on a high Pedestal, with modern science as their god.
They also thumb their little noses at people like me, like the snobs that they are.
I would urge you, however, to not fall into the ideals and like-mindedness of these mental midets. There is a higher calling and it certainly is not on these forums I suppose. Bye...
This world is far from simple, if you think that it's simple then there are plenty of things around us that would proof you wrong. Indeed your solution of divine intervention is rather simplistic, but as long as there is no proof for any influence of God, then how can you expect us to believe at all? I often hear that religious people refer to us as 'poor souls' or 'lost souls', but considered the evidence which points really quite clearly into the more obvious evolution theory-direction, I'd say they are kinda lost. I don't want to be offending, but I'm just honest when I say don't take anyone serious who still thinks the evolution theory is a myth without evidence.
Oww and who is talking about us thinking about ourself as being 'higher' and perfectly right? You are the one stating you don't wish to 'lower' yourself to our level. So basically you are stating yours ís higher. At least we have evidence, at least we don't rule out other possibilities (like divine intervention for example! science does not exclude religion, eventhough I personally don't like the Intelligent Designer-like approaches, but still), religious people on the contrary are afraid of changes to their ideology, because basically that's all there is to it, they try to maintain ancient beliefs that unfortunately are quite outdated. Don't get me wrong, God might exist (and hell no, I'm not afraid for that possibility either), but the genesis-creation 'theory' seems rather highly unlikely.
Cheers
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