Not even intelligent hard core evolutionist are so set on Darwin

quote:

Originally posted by Sofa King:

quote:

Originally posted by Henhouse Prowler:
Your comments require one to accept that science, using the scientific method and inductive reasoning, has proven evolution as the origin of man. It has not, and you know it.

Hen,

Can you give me an honest answer to this? Do you believe that man evolved from a lump of clay and woman evolved from the rib of the man?

Sorry Sofa, I've been away for a few days. To answer your question, no I do not believe that.

quote:

Originally posted by gbrk:

quote:

Originally posted by Sofa King:
GB,

One thing at a time. I note interest (as I assumed you would) that you chose to completely ignore my direct question concerning transitional fossils. Would you care to answer that?

My "incremental transitional" or incremental transitions I just simply mean an almost countless number of changes from primary state to complex, finished, or current advanced state.

I always gets this exact same reaction whenever I ask this question of anyone that is educated just enough to know the trap. GB, you will not answer me directly because you know I will produce almost exactly what you describe. I know that. You know that. You are fooling no one. In order to avoid answering the question you will enforce an obviously impossible requirement by asking me to privide "countless" examples.

As I stated from the beginning, your stance is dishonest. I know it. At least a part of you knows it. I admit to the possibility that you may not have admitted the truth even to yourself so while one side of you insists you are being truthful, there is that little voice that says, "Are you really being 100% honest?" I know this feeling. I've had it before during my personal struggles with my faith and science.

Now, you are intelligent enough to know that I cannot produce "countless" transitional fossils. The existing fossil evidence is enough to satisfy that vast, overwhelming majority of people who are actually educated on this subject but fossils are note even the tip of the iceberg for evidence for our ancestory. The molecular evidence in the form of DNA is almost infinitely more compelling and much more complete than the fossil evidence. Yes, GB, this evidence stands all on its own for proving beyond any "rational" doubt that all life on this planet shares a common ancestor. We can "mine" our own DNA and compare it to the DNA of other animals and predict almost to the day exactly when our species branched off from the previous ancestor.

Sadly, if you can't even grasp the significance of the fossil evidence and refuse to understand why all "transitional" life forms no longer exist, then there is no hope of you grasping the DNA evidence.

For the record, though, here is a list of fossils that are thought to be ancestors of man:

Sahelanthropus tchadensis
Orrorin tugenensis
Ardipithecus ramidus
Australopithecus anamensis
Australopithecus afarensis
Kenyanthropus platyops
Australopithecus africanus
Australopithecus garhi
Australopithecus sediba
Australopithecus aethiopicus
Australopithecus robustus
Australopithecus boisei
Homo habilis
Homo georgicus
Homo erectus
Homo ergaster
Homo antecessor
Homo heidelbergensis
Homo neanderthalensis
Homo floresiensis
Homo sapiens sapiens

quote:

Originally posted by Henhouse Prowler:

quote:

Originally posted by Sofa King:

quote:

Originally posted by Henhouse Prowler:
Your comments require one to accept that science, using the scientific method and inductive reasoning, has proven evolution as the origin of man. It has not, and you know it.

Hen,

Can you give me an honest answer to this? Do you believe that man evolved from a lump of clay and woman evolved from the rib of the man?

Sorry Sofa, I've been away for a few days. To answer your question, no I do not believe that.

So we know what you do NOT believe. You do not believe the science is sufficient to explain the evidence. So what scientific hypothesis do you actually accept for the origin of Humans?

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Now, where is your scientific proof for creationism or ID?

There have been many court rulings on this issue. Both sides have presented their best experts and proof. Creationism and ID have failed every time. Creationism or ID have no place in our public education system. You are free to teach your own children what ever you like. However I have to tell you that my son, who is attending Auburn had a young man in his micro-biology class that was home schooled and taught creationism. He was woefully behind and very confused by what the professor was discussing. Its sad really. His parents should be ashamed of themselves for depriving him of a real science education. He is now paying for his lack of learning, the hard way.

I think that you are just repeating talking points that you have either read on religious sites supporting creationism and ID or have been taught by your church. You should really read for yourself and perhaps ask a real biologist to explain to you how evolution is the basis for all biology today. Without it we would not have the cures and treatments for many many illnesses. Without evolution many people who are alive today would not be if they had relied on creationism for their survival.

First, just as cases where the existence or non-existance of God is openly or formally debated, just as in courts there is the impossibility to prove, or disprove something that is beyond comprehension or understanding.

God and God's Realm is Spiritual which is beyond and outside the physical realm. Science can only recognize, measure, and accept that which it can touch, feel, measure, or see which consist of items within the physical realm. The Spiritual realm, from where Creationist believe the Physical creation came from, is beyond the abilities of Science. Likewise no court can examine that which is not placed before it in a tangible, visible, or material way. Again the Spiritual is outside that realm yet still is recognized and accepted by those whom know it to be real and know it's power and force.

It's very similar to the analogy of memories or thoughts to the brain itself. The brain can be measured, viewed, touched, and categorized yet from within come thoughts, ideas, Love, emotions, memories etc which are real and undeniable to the one that experiences them and has them yet there is no possible way to prove that they exist. No tangible evidence. Some might say that the actions of an individual can prove that love exist or that the actions an individual performs are evidence that they believe what they are thinking for they act upon it. Likewise Christians lives are changed daily and people's lives are changed as a result of a Spiritual rebirth or Spiritual encounter with God.

There are things that are beyond measuring and beyond the physical that you can see and touch but never the less are very real and exist.

Failure to consider these just because you cannot touch, quantify, or see them is to the detriment of the one who refuses to acknowledge such.

Just because a court rules against those seeking to admit Creationism into the field of discussion because they use the argument that it is against the principal of separation of Church and state or because it advances one religion over another is a cop out for a much more basic explanation. Simply their chosen theory of their own belief cannot stand up to the scrutiny of a conflicting argument when there exist so little material or evidence to actually defend ones position upon.

There is a Spiritual realm outside of the capabilities of Science just as there are memories, thoughts, and emotions within the physical brain that are just as much a part of an individual as the physical matter that the brain exist of and even though they cannot be seen or touched they are known certainly to exist.

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Assumptions are made because I am religious that my arguments against evolution are from a religious base when they are not.

GB,

This is a lie. You are lying for your religion. That makes you a liar. dishonest. You are defending God by insisting on ignorance. That is NOT the way to compel others to see the light sir.

quote:

Originally posted by Sofa King:
But I will start with this: We found a fish in rock strata dated to about 375million years ago. Not just any fish but a fish with legs. That's not even the most important part of this. About a decade ago, a young paleontologist was wondering where the predecessors of amphibians might be found. He deduced that IF evolution was correct and that amphibians came from fish, then there ought to be fossil remains of them. He deduced that the only strata that was exposed to exploration was located in a very few parts of the word. He further deduced that if he were to explore some of that strata carefully, he wold likely fins an intermediate example of a fish that was 100% fish yet was in the process of evolving legs that would eventually allow that fish to walk over land.

So searched for years in a Canadian wilderness and, you guessed it, he found it.

I find it interesting that evolutionists like you and Deep can not discuss your beliefs without insulting the intelligence of anyone who might dare to reach a different conclusion than you. Unfortunately that exact same thing happens in the Christian religious world on matters of doctrine where, like evolution, some matters require assumption and presumption to deduce. It's a scourge on the religious world and the evolutionary world as well.

What you wrote above is a terrific example of what I wrote earlier about the belief in evolution requiring the presence of a presumption and using deductive reasoning to search for evidence to support the presumption. He presumed that amphibians must've evolved from fish b/c of his belief in evolution, and he went looking for anything anywhere that could be "deduced" (your word) to support his presumption. That is Deductive Reasoning, not Inductive Reasoning.

Here's an example of why I don't believe in evolution:

Somewhere along the way, a simple un-evolved organism must've had the idea to design and implement eyesight. Of course this simple little brain had to come up with the very idea of vision in the first place, a remarkable feat, but then this one organism had to think up how to do what we can't do today - how to create eyes (presumably without hands or tools at that point) out of nothing, using nothing, with no ability to see what he was doing. He just thought about vision, thought he'd like to have it (even though it didn't exist at the time), and BOOM...just by thinking about he was able to design functioning eyes and make them appear. That's one incredible organism.

Hey, how come a simple little old organism could do that back then, but we can't today? Did we evolve ourselves too far, out of the ability to evolve at all?

Humans have been trying to fly for centuries, but there are no humans who are evolving the ability to fly are there? Why not? If a fish can think it would be cool to walk on land, then magically give himself the ability to breathe oxygen and grow legs (that's one brilliant fish!) then why can't we evolve the ability to breathe under water like a fish, or to fly like a bird? In fact according to evolutionists we once had that ability when we were fish, but instead of keeping the gills and adding the ability to breathe oxygen from the air, our ancestors STUPIDLY traded one ability for another. I guess the fish who stayed fish watch us trying to swim underwater now and LAUGH LAUGH LAUGH LAUGH LAUGH. "Ha, good thing our ancestors knew better than to follow after that dork that traded his gills for legs!"

Doesn't make sense.

quote:

Originally posted by Sofa King:

quote:

Originally posted by Henhouse Prowler:

quote:

Originally posted by Sofa King:

quote:

Originally posted by Henhouse Prowler:
Your comments require one to accept that science, using the scientific method and inductive reasoning, has proven evolution as the origin of man. It has not, and you know it.

Hen,

Can you give me an honest answer to this? Do you believe that man evolved from a lump of clay and woman evolved from the rib of the man?

Sorry Sofa, I've been away for a few days. To answer your question, no I do not believe that.

So we know what you do NOT believe. You do not believe the science is sufficient to explain the evidence. So what scientific hypothesis do you actually accept for the origin of Humans?

Maybe I should've specified a little further. I do not believe what you wrote, that man evolved from a lump of clay and woman evolved from man's rib. I don't know anyone who believes that, and I have never heard anyone suggest it as a belief.

I believe in the creation story as stated in the Bible. That man was created by intelligent design at the hand of and in the image of God. And that woman was created by God from a rib taken from the first man.

Creation, not evolution.

quote:

As I stated from the beginning, your stance is dishonest. I know it. At least a part of you knows it. I admit to the possibility that you may not have admitted the truth even to yourself so while one side of you insists you are being truthful, there is that little voice that says, "Are you really being 100% honest?" I know this feeling. I've had it before during my personal struggles with my faith and science.

Now, you are intelligent enough to know that I cannot produce "countless" transitional fossils. The existing fossil evidence is enough to satisfy that vast, overwhelming majority of people who are actually educated on this subject but fossils are note even the tip of the iceberg for evidence for our ancestory. The molecular evidence in the form of DNA is almost infinitely more compelling and much more complete than the fossil evidence

Sofa, let me get this straight. I'm being dishonest or my stance is dishonest only I don't realize it or I know it I only don't realize it yet. ... WOW Very profound. Can't just admit that from the beginning I had a problem with Evolution based upon lack of any factual evidence actually backing it up.

I see your list of fossils, thought to be ancestors of man, that is convincing enough to provide you with full unequivocal proof that is enough for you to be so certain that this is how everything got where it is today.

My point again is where are each of these today, living, walking around for us to reach out and touch and see? If evolution IS in fact true and factual there is nothing that prohibits that very process from playing out today the same as it is asserted it did throughout the years. The same basic elements exist .. the primordial soup if you will and we have a very beneficial environment to enable life on earth yet somehow evolution knew somehow it was finished and just stopped? The primordial soup now is content to remain in it's most basic form. No I don't think so. IF evolution is factual then it should be before is, EVERY STEP today just as it is alleged to have done years ago backed up by the fossils you cite. It has no intelligent basis therefore it should still be in the process of happening and demonstrative at each state along from most basic to most advanced.

We know a butterfly comes from a caterpillar as we see it playing out as it has all along. The same with other species and reproduction .. each of it's own kind. Evolution to be valid has to be reproducible and observable given that all the elements exist for it to happen, which they do, if it was a legitimate theory. Problem is it's not reproducible and observable because as a theory (at least of how all life got here) it's bogus.

Regarding common ancestors or DNA one question. IS it not possible, just possible, that a God or Intelligent Creator placed within it's creation of various and diverse life forms common elements or commonalities? Would one not expect this to possibly be the case? Common points within all life is not a defining evidence of evolution as it is for Creation or Intelligent design it is a fact that life, as we know it, does have various items in common. All animals have blood in common which is necessary for life just as I'm sure there are commonalities within the plant kingdom and insect kingdom yet those commonalities are not the same from one species to the next.

quote:

Maybe I should've specified a little further. I do not believe what you wrote, that man evolved from a lump of clay and woman evolved from man's rib. I don't know anyone who believes that, and I have never heard anyone suggest it as a belief.

I believe in the creation story as stated in the Bible.

Hen,

You are posting in a religion group that is filled with people who insist upon exactly that. That is, after all, what the bible says.

So if you believe in the creation story as stated in the bible, then you must also accept that man was manufactured from a lump of clay and woman from the rib of man. That is, after all, why men have one less rib that women, don't you know.

The Bible says absolutely nothing about "intelligent design" anywhere in the pages. Of you are going to infer that, then you may as well infer what our sensees and sciences and logic tell us: that man evolved from lower animals.

So your stance seems quite shaky from a logical standpoint. Personally, I believe in a Creator who started the process and the plan more or less is described as best it can be by primitive men who lived in the desert long ago. If the bible were written inspired by God and written by men today, it would look much more sciency. That is, at least, what my faith informs me.

IN any case, to simply outright deny THE foundation of all of modern biology in favor of anti-science and demonstrable superstition is not an intellectually honest proposition.

quote:

I see your list of fossils, thought to be ancestors of man, that is convincing enough to provide you with full unequivocal proof that is enough for you to be so certain that this is how everything got where it is today.

NO!

The fossils merely planted the foundation of evolution starting 150 years ago. Fossils are beautiful. You can touch and feel them. The fossils were the very first rudimentary, concrete bits of evidence that man and all other life evolved from more primitive forms. They were such great examples that even the most uneducated of men could grasp the basics just from studying the fossils.

It was not until the discovery of DNA that the study of evolution really took off. When Watson and Crick first described DNA, it became the glue that solidified all the fossils together into one enormous picture of our genetic history. Right there in the genes of the lowly chick are leftover genes that, if manipulated properly, can turn a chicken into a full-blown dinosaur (see http://www.physorg.com/news170426405.html).

Similarly, we can see the DNA leftover from our simian ancestry right there in the genetic code. There is a gene that will grow a tail. One that will cause a small brain. One for pronounced brow. It's all still there, GB. Genes from our ancestors residing right there in your body.

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My point again is where are each of these today, living, walking around for us to reach out and touch and see?

BECAUSE THEY DIED! This is not a difficult concept, GB. I once explained why we do not see Model T Fords any more. It actually is the EXACT same concept.

Look, right now, this very minute, we are in the midst of one of the largest mass extinctions this planet has ever witnessed. To take one single example, there probably will not be any more polar bears living in the wild in a few more decades. Their envoronment is changing and they may no longer be able to support themselves without our direct intervention.

So while the polar bear may die, his relatives, the Brown Bear, Black Bear and Grisly will continue to live on. It is the same way with evolution. Populations get divided by environmental conditions. One of the divided populations may survive and adapt to new conditions ("adaptation" is one of the defining characteristics of "life"). Those that can adapt sill survive. Those populations that cannot adapt in time will die.

That happened to Neanderthal. According to his bone density, Neanderthal needed about 2500 calories per day to survive. That was fine when there wasn't a whole lot of competition and he had the entire fringes of the retreating ice shelf to feed from. But when things started to get warmer and drier and food became more scarce, his competition, we Homo Sapiens, had the advantage. We only need about 1500 calories per day to survive. So Neanderthal is now but a footnote in history. We humans adapted and we survived.

GB, it's not a difficult concept. You are speaking from profound and embarrassing ignorance. It does not have to be this way. You do not have to be scared of killing your faith. You, too, can educate yourself as I have.

Study the term "speciation" if you want to find out why your question is so demonstrably ignorant. I can't spoon feed the whole story to you.

Sofa, you didn't read your words or mine very carefully. You said "evolved from a lump of clay" and "evolved from a man's rib". I don't believe that and have never heard anyone claim that, based on the key word EVOLVED. The creation story in Genesis does NOT state that man evolved from clay or anything else, it says man was created by God. "Created from the dust of the ground" is entirely different than "evolved from a lump of clay". One is creation, one is evolution. It's not that complicated.

The main issue I see with what you have written is that you believe that your points of view or beliefs are the only ones that could possibly be true, to the point that you think any other opinion is naturally STUPID or DISHONEST. I would recommend counseling for that level of narcissism, although any good therapist will tell you that narcissists won't usually attend or benefit from counseling as much as others will.

You stated "The Bible says absolutely nothing about 'intelligent design' anywhere in the pages." That is wrong.

Genesis 1:26-27 - Then God said, "Let us make humans in our image, in our likeness. Let them rule the fish in the sea, the birds in the sky, the domestic animals all over the earth, and all the animals that crawl on the earth." So God created humans in his image. In the image of God he created them. He created them male and female.

That is creation by a designer who, although obviously not as intelligent as you, is still pretty doggone intelligent. I mean, He did create you, and all that, so I think He qualifies.

You also stated "If the bible were written inspired by God and written by men today, it would look much more sciency." Grammatically that doesn't really make sense, but I see where you're going with it. It's awfully presumptuous to claim that the Bible isn't God's inspired Word just b/c it doesn't look the way you want it to or think it would. Maybe you should take that up with Him. He might change it for you once you've riddled Him with your infallible logic. (I assume you;ll eventually notice that your logic implies that God didn't know stuff about His own creation until your beloved scientists learned about it and so now He would be able to tell us much more....)

If you insist on believing that anyone who disagrees with you is stupid or intellectually dishonest, then I don't know why you would waste your time on a forum trying to convince people who you've already said are too stupid to get it or are just lying about not getting it. Like most else I've seen from you, it just doesn't make rational sense.

quote:

Genesis 1:26-27 - Then God said, "Let us make humans in our image, in our likeness. Let them rule the fish in the sea, the birds in the sky, the domestic animals all over the earth, and all the animals that crawl on the earth." So God created humans in his image. In the image of God he created them. He created them male and female.

That is creation by a designer who, although obviously not as intelligent as you, is still pretty doggone intelligent.

OK, so what mechanism did he use to create life, Hen?

quote:

Originally posted by Billy Joe Bob Gene:
gb,

You're beyond help and reason.

Believe what you want. You're wrong, though.

Sorry, gb, you're just not honest enough to have a meaningful discussion with.

You said there are NO!!!! transitional fossils. I showed you some. You won't accept evidence.

This demonstrates a fatal prejudice on your part.

Not going to waste any more time on you.

quote:

Originally posted by Sofa King:

quote:

Genesis 1:26-27 - Then God said, "Let us make humans in our image, in our likeness. Let them rule the fish in the sea, the birds in the sky, the domestic animals all over the earth, and all the animals that crawl on the earth." So God created humans in his image. In the image of God he created them. He created them male and female.

That is creation by a designer who, although obviously not as intelligent as you, is still pretty doggone intelligent.

OK, so what mechanism did he use to create life, Hen?

Sofa, for a professed believer you sure haven't read much of the Bible. To answer your question, through His power and by His will he spoke them into existence according to His design.

Now, your turn:

Do you really believe that a fish could want really badly to walk on land, something it presumably had not even seen done before, and out of that desire this fish could think up the biology, physiology and physics necessary to design legs inside his little tiny fish brain, and then he could want it so much and wish wish wish wish wish until whattyaknow, legs started to grow? Sure enough, functional legs. Right there behind his little fishy butt.

And do you seriously believe that after creating legs all by himself, then little fishy would pop out of the water and start suffocating and wheezing b/c he couldn't breathe out of water, so little fishy stuck his tongue out and analyzed the air content to determine what organs and proteins he would need to process oxygen from the air, designed in his little fishy brain what lungs would be and how they would work, and then he thunk real real hard until POOF...functional lungs appeared inside?

And if brilliant little fishy and his brilliant little fishy brain did ALL that, then why did he give up the ability to also breathe under water? Wouldn't it increase his ability to survive natural selection, a theory he clearly must've understood in order to create new parts for himself to help him survive, to keep the ability to go back and forth between land and water? That way he could avoid land predators and water predators and give himself the greatest ability to survive his own advanced evolutionary theory of natural selection.

Just because little fishy brain thunk it up. Wish we could go back in time and get one of those little fishy brains. They were obviously far more advanced than anything we humans have today. Guess we evolved ourselves right out of the ability to evolve! Dangit!

I guess truth be told we humans have made tons of bad evolutionary choices. We gave up wings that could both soar and hover, and we gave up the ability to breathe and survive underwater. We gave up having poisonous skin, stingers and venomous bites. We gave up the ability to spin webs and swing from trees. Gave up the ability to split ourselves into multiple organisms via asexual reproduction. Dadgummit, when it comes to evolution we got our tails kicked by just about every species out there!

quote:

Originally posted by Billy Joe Bob Gene:

quote:

Originally posted by Billy Joe Bob Gene:
gb,

You're beyond help and reason.

Believe what you want. You're wrong, though.

Sorry, gb, you're just not honest enough to have a meaningful discussion with.

You said there are NO!!!! transitional fossils. I showed you some. You won't accept evidence.

This demonstrates a fatal prejudice on your part.

Not going to waste any more time on you.

gb just kicked your butt.
Billy Bob, time and time again you post links claiming they back your theory of man evolving from a fish one day and orangutan the next. You have not produced the first paper on anything that claims such evidence.

Your hand waving is not proof of anything. No one will deny proof if you produce such . I know you want to convince everyone but you just cannot do it.

Does evolution prove there is no God?

No. Many people, from evolutionary biologists to important religious figures like Pope John Paul II, contend that the time-tested theory of evolution does not refute the presence of God. They acknowledge that evolution is the description of a process that governs the development of life on Earth. Like other scientific theories, including Copernican theory, atomic theory, and the germ theory of disease, evolution deals only with objects, events, and processes in the material world. Science has nothing to say one way or the other about the existence of God or about people's spiritual beliefs.

quote:

Posted 30 August 2010 04:45 PM Hide Post

quote:
Originally posted by Sofa King:

quote:
Genesis 1:26-27 - Then God said, "Let us make humans in our image, in our likeness. Let them rule the fish in the sea, the birds in the sky, the domestic animals all over the earth, and all the animals that crawl on the earth." So God created humans in his image. In the image of God he created them. He created them male and female.

That is creation by a designer who, although obviously not as intelligent as you, is still pretty doggone intelligent.



OK, so what mechanism did he use to create life, Hen?



Sofa, for a professed believer you sure haven't read much of the Bible. To answer your question, through His power and by His will he spoke them into existence according to His design.

So, all of existence is a magic incantation.

There is, must be, a better explanation.

It used to be that when one got The King's Grief, or consumption, it was the Will of God.

Now we know better. Same with the origin of the universe.

Black holes exist throughout the universe. We can detect them. At their cores, are singularities. Our universe came from a singularity.

Could it be that black holes create alternate universes? I do not know. We've been able to examine the universe scientifically for only a few hundred years. We have questions that remain unanswered. We can be forgiven for that, these things take time to figure out.

But saying God did it answers nothing at all. It only complicates the question when one asks "Where did this complicated and powerful god come from?"

quote:

Originally posted by Sofa King:

quote:

Assumptions are made because I am religious that my arguments against evolution are from a religious base when they are not.

GB,

This is a lie. You are lying for your religion. That makes you a liar. dishonest. You are defending God by insisting on ignorance. That is NOT the way to compel others to see the light sir.

IF anyone is being dishonest and lying it is you in what you have said. Take my very first post, regarding my objections to Evolution whether under this topic or from topics of the past, EVERY CASE where I pose an argument against evolution I state it plainly that principal is the lack of incremental transitional beings/creatures/species both in the past and TODAY.

That said where in that statement is Religion injected? What about that is religious in nature or has to do with Christianity or any other theory of how we got here. My statements have always been about my objection and the reason.

It is you being disingenuous and you are small enough not to retract it or apologize for it. You should be ashamed to attempt to argue any position when you so purposely lie about things and then expect to have credibility.

Have I stated my belief in Creationism in other post .... absolutely but not in the context of my opposition to and argument against Evolution. You again are guilty of lies and falsehoods attempting to set your own agenda at another's expense.

You say I lie then cite and quote exactly where that is proven without taking my statements and post out of context. I doubt such a careless individual would ever dare apologize for their mistake so I expect none but will not be saddled with your lies about what I have said. My argument again is not religiously based for it needn't be for Evolution alone cannot stand on it's own merits for it has none and critical analysis of the evidence and material will prove it to be so.

quote:

Originally posted by Billy Joe Bob Gene:

quote:

Originally posted by Billy Joe Bob Gene:
gb,

You're beyond help and reason.

Believe what you want. You're wrong, though.

Sorry, gb, you're just not honest enough to have a meaningful discussion with.

You said there are NO!!!! transitional fossils. I showed you some. You won't accept evidence.

This demonstrates a fatal prejudice on your part.

Not going to waste any more time on you.

I think the dialog speaks or itself. You never answered question one sufficiently and cannot therefore since you, like other evolutionist attempt to, cannot suppress counter arguments or positions like they do in the educational arena then you resort to the second principal choice to defend your chosen theory and that is demean those who present arguments against it as either meaningless, idiotic, delusional, or unintelligent so as not to warrant a continued dialog from such a obviously superior intellect. Keep on with your imaginations there are others that will believe you. You feel you demonstrated transitional beings but chose creatures that were greatly separated in their development and no real ties between them. Besides where are they today? They should exist now and today as they did before as nothing changes evolution IF IT IS TRUE (which it isn't so there aren't any to point to today) which is why you struggle to pick out what may be sufficient to you but is grossly lacking in actual credibility for evidence and examples.

I don't blame you however if I had such a weak argument that I was trying to defend then I'd look for any port in the storm to retreat also. I only hope those with sincere questions about evolution as the theory of where we came from will give this conversation a critical look. It won't answer the question about how we got here but it should reveals how we didn't which is evolution

Gb,

These atheist are so confused now that biology is abandoning them they grab up the atheist hand book by dawkins where he tells them when all else fails call them names and call them liars.

They are so stupid and ignorant.

You have body slammed the fundie atheist so many times they are having second thoughts about atheism.

Billy will soon have you on ignore. He can’t take it.muhahaha

gbrk,

You've hardly shot down evolution, but for the sake of argument, let's hear your explanation for the diversity of life. Let's hear your notion of how all of life seems to indicate common ancestry. Let's hear your argument about the fossil record vs. time and the genetic indications that all of contemporary life is a matter of interrelationships and nested hierarchies.

I'm all ears.

NSNS

quote:

Originally posted by buffalo:
Does evolution prove there is no God?

No. Many people, from evolutionary biologists to important religious figures like Pope John Paul II, contend that the time-tested theory of evolution does not refute the presence of God. They acknowledge that evolution is the description of a process that governs the development of life on Earth. Like other scientific theories, including Copernican theory, atomic theory, and the germ theory of disease, evolution deals only with objects, events, and processes in the material world. Science has nothing to say one way or the other about the existence of God or about people's spiritual beliefs.

I believe that is the most coherent thing I've ever seen you write Buff. God job. No, evolution does not kill God. It simply explains His mechanism for life development. Understand evolution and you grasp a small part of His plan.

I didn't write it sofa. I just wondered what nut would jump on it. it was last on janks list of eleven.

quote:

Originally posted by buffalo:
Gb,

These atheist are so confused now that biology is abandoning them they grab up the atheist hand book by dawkins where he tells them when all else fails call them names and call them liars.

I am not an atheist. I'm simply educated in science and despise the face that fundamentalism haas enslaved the mind of people like Hen and GB and seceded in convincing them that to b
Accept evolution is to somehow deny God.

It is insanity. Pure systematic, institutionalized inanity propagated by the ignorant.

Sofa I think you are kin to Toby Dammit who bet the devil his head.

Why do you try to appear like you wanna pet a gator.

These atheist will eat your babies.

Also you insist that you are a scientist yet you want someone to except evolution of man from apes simply on your authority or the likes of bill bob. Get real . You are taking leaps of faith
.

sofa I will promise you this: if you come up with proof that man evolved from apes; myself and everyone on here will believe it. It’s that simple. Don’t worry about God versus evolution of man from apes. First prove how the first non living dna instructed the first living cell…..uhhh…no…that’s a paradox. uhhh

quote:

Originally posted by Sofa King:

quote:

Originally posted by buffalo:
Gb,

These atheist are so confused now that biology is abandoning them they grab up the atheist hand book by dawkins where he tells them when all else fails call them names and call them liars.

I am not an atheist. I'm simply educated in science and despise the face that fundamentalism haas enslaved the mind of people like Hen and GB and seceded in convincing them that to b
Accept evolution is to somehow deny God.

It is insanity. Pure systematic, institutionalized inanity propagated by the ignorant.

Sofa,

How many times does one have to say it. It is YOU that are equating my opposition to evolution with religion and fundamentalism, as you call it. I cited my opposition in non-religious terms based on just one of the problems I had with it but you keep trying to tie it to religious and my belief in God. How long will it take for you to realize that on this forum I have opposition in the theory of evolution not based in Religion but from physical observation and lack of material evidence alone. Please stop equating it to Religion as far as my opposition to evolution is concerned. I guess it could be that by tying it to religion, if you were successful in doing so, you could better exclude my argument without having to confront it head on. I don't know but for what ever reason please at least be honest about it and regardless if you ever retract it or apologize for it stop now equating my opposition with and seeking to tie it to my Christian beliefs.

quote:

Originally posted by Not Shallow Not Slim:
gbrk,

You've hardly shot down evolution, but for the sake of argument, let's hear your explanation for the diversity of life. Let's hear your notion of how all of life seems to indicate common ancestry. Let's hear your argument about the fossil record vs. time and the genetic indications that all of contemporary life is a matter of interrelationships and nested hierarchies.

I'm all ears.

NSNS

Very well worded and put and a fair question you have ask. First of all I have not tried to shoot down evolution for if someone wants to place their faith in how all life got here in that process, as wrong as I believe it to be, then so be it and I am sure they have their reasons for it. Rather than shoot down evolution I have just tried to present the reasons I find problems with evolution as being the vehicle by which all life arrived.

Now to your question. First the Background. I have stated before that I am Religious, that I consider myself Christian and as a part of that I do believe in a all powerful deity that we call God for lack of a sufficient name or description. I believe this God not to be white haired man or human or physical in any way. I further believe that apart from this physical world/universe we live in exist a Spiritual realm which is co-exist along with the physical but which cannot be measured, touched, comprehended, or understood by the limited scientific or physical world. God's realm is the Spiritual which I also believe, by faith, (as I have no proof) is far more powerful than our physical realm. I also believe the Spiritual realm will be the realm that each of us will eventually enter into upon our physical death and with our inner spirit/soul's separation from the physical body along with leaving this physical world behind.

I feel that the ONLY tangible evidence or proof of God from a physical sense comes from and in Jesus Christ who I fully believe, and I believe the Bible teaches, is and was the SON of GOD or literally God as and in Man. I believe that no human can and will ever totally comprehend what GOD is nor can understand. There are certain things that our limited minds have the ability to comprehend and understand such as the concept of eternity past or eternity future. Another area I believe that we will fail to totally comprehend is just how God created! As a Christian I also believe that modern day man, we humans, can and have only one way that we can sense and encounter God today. In Jesus day it was Jesus Christ, before Jesus it was the words of the prophets and looking forward to His coming as taught from the scriptures given them. Today we look back, in Faith, to Christ but the only encounter we will and can ever have with God is by His Holy Spirit which is the vehicle or way God chooses to convict and speak to His creation (man) today but that is yet another topic and another dialog. Regarding your question.

My personal belief is that God, who exist in the Spiritual realm brought about the Physical world and physical universe that is around us from pure thought (God Thought if you will, my own wording). That God is so magnificent and powerful that we humans could not comprehend His power or abilities. I believe that the Physical world and Universe came from this Spiritual kingdom where God resides and came into being from what will continue to be an unknown and miraculous process. It isn't something from nothing but something physical from some unknown and indescribable Spiritual existence or process. I further believe that God established living things, life, from the same miraculous power that our physical world came from and in His intelligence God enables a physical world that supports the life he creates. I also believe, and would not be shaken to find out, that we are not His only created life forms in this vast universe. I do believe that man (human) is a unique creation though apart from the other life forms that God Created (in God's Image) whereas Man has a unique intelligence and more to the point of being LIKE God Man has an INNER spirit or soul with his physical body. No other life form, on Earth (insect, mammal, bird, etc) has this significant spirit/soul living inside of their living physical, fleshly, body. This inner spirit/soul is, like the Spiritual Realm, ever bit alive and factual yet cannot be touched, measured, held, or apply to physical testing methods but exists as a creation of God. Your body was created by the union of your parents a physical fleshly creation whereas your soul/spirit is a creation of God's power alone and separate from but resident within your fleshly physical body. I believe that we (humans) can know and sense this inner life/spirit/soul exist and lives and is special and apart from the physical body. This spirit/soul is what makes humans special in God's creation as it also gives us the ability to make choices and to be above other life creation and to have free will to make determinations that none other of God's creation can do. I also believe it's far more complex and involved than what I'm able to relate right here in words but that man (being human) is a special gift from God.

It bothers me not that there are commonalities between life forms or things alive as if man was creating life he would most likely work with common elements also. Why would God not do the same being so much greater and more powerful than man. Who is to say that God didn't create many species with common traits and functions but as I said above I believe God mad man separate and special above His other life Creations. I cannot accept evolution because of several things but none of which is based upon my Christian beliefs for being a Christian and believing God IS All Powerful could just as well believe that God chose evolution as the process of creation IF I BELIEVED in evolution. I don't for it has far too many holes and simply couldn't be how we got here or how God created life.

The EXACT process by which God Created life forms, just like how life is maintained and how order is kept in this universe is known only to God and the Spiritual Realm and is a power and process which I believe that man does not have the capacity to comprehend or understand for it comes from the Spiritual Realm and science cannot measure or understand it. It is therefore like many things associated with God, and Religion, a matter of FAITH.

An analogy might be in order here. My envisioning of the Creation process, by God, may be as simple as if man could say dream about or have a mind thought about a tree and from that thought process or dream one appeared. A thought or dream isn't real as far as science can test it or prove it's existence yet you and I know it exist because we have them constantly and experience them. I cannot experience your thoughts or your dreams nor can you mine so you cannot prove I have them nor I prove you do yet I trust and have faith you do and I know I do so i know they exist.

If you are looking for an A to Z or step by step creation process description I cannot provide it nor can any other human. My belief about how life got here and how our very existence and physical world/universe got here is simply answered .... "By the Power of God". The exact process by which He used is beyond my comprehension and therefore I don't worry about it but have faith that God not only knew what he was doing but is still in control and directing it. Again regarding evolution, my belief is that evolution could not be the process by which God chose to create for evolution cannot stand on it's own merits and one of the reasons why I know that is as I have said in earlier post. If it was and could then it would be visible before us carrying on today as it is said it has for many years past. Missing links would be alive, breathing, and transitioning before us and able to be documented and measured each day by living scientist as they continued to live and evolve. As it is evolutionist are left to dig up past fossils and attempt to forcibly connect them and by conjecture say they evolved from one to the next to the next to reinforce their theory as to how everything got here from one common primary source or primordial soup yet somewhere long ago this soup just stopped the process and somehow knew we all evolved so therefore the transitions from one state to the next need not happen anymore and all we are left with is fossil remains to piece together. Again sorry but I just don't buy it.

I hope that somehow answered your question about what I personally believe. I also believe that it's important for each person to be comfortable and sure of what they believe and why they believe. It still may not be correct but at least they have a basis for their belief.

My problem with many evolutionist is that they are so dogmatic and by excluding any other possibility that they seek to control the agenda by exclusion and somehow those that disagree or have another philosophy or belief are inferior, stupid or ignorant, or somehow don't understand. Evolution therefore is the only method taught in most schools today because it's science's accepted theory of how life got here but Science also, with it's inability to accept the Spiritual realm, will never give possibility to any other method that involves Intelligent design for it cannot understand, comprehend, or define the Spiritual or anything outside of the physical realm therefore it, and it's scientist, grope to apply any demonstrable method as the answer to how we got here for many just can't seem to say "I don't understand" or "I don't really know". Hence you get a theory like evolution promulgated throughout our educational system.

quote:

Originally posted by Billy Joe Bob Gene:

quote:

Posted 30 August 2010 04:45 PM Hide Post

quote:
Originally posted by Sofa King:

quote:
Genesis 1:26-27 - Then God said, "Let us make humans in our image, in our likeness. Let them rule the fish in the sea, the birds in the sky, the domestic animals all over the earth, and all the animals that crawl on the earth." So God created humans in his image. In the image of God he created them. He created them male and female.

That is creation by a designer who, although obviously not as intelligent as you, is still pretty doggone intelligent.



OK, so what mechanism did he use to create life, Hen?



Sofa, for a professed believer you sure haven't read much of the Bible. To answer your question, through His power and by His will he spoke them into existence according to His design.

So, all of existence is a magic incantation.

There is, must be, a better explanation.

It used to be that when one got The King's Grief, or consumption, it was the Will of God.

Now we know better. Same with the origin of the universe.

Black holes exist throughout the universe. We can detect them. At their cores, are singularities. Our universe came from a singularity.

Could it be that black holes create alternate universes? I do not know. We've been able to examine the universe scientifically for only a few hundred years. We have questions that remain unanswered. We can be forgiven for that, these things take time to figure out.

But saying God did it answers nothing at all. It only complicates the question when one asks "Where did this complicated and powerful god come from?"

Hmmmm....can't help but notice that my fishy-story is being ignored...perhaps there's not an answer to give?

Billy Joe (Deep? Is that you?) - You are correct that there are questions I can't answer about where God came from. That is why faith is required to supply the evidence of things not seen. But the reality for you, and I believe you know this, is that the same questions you ask about God can be asked about your theory of evolution and Big Bang theory.

So the initial blob of super-matter that exploded, creating life where there was none, exactly where did it come from? Yep, see, questions complicate things, and no matter which theory who hold you must fill the gap with faith.

quote:

Originally posted by Henhouse Prowler:

quote:

Originally posted by Billy Joe Bob Gene:

quote:

Posted 30 August 2010 04:45 PM Hide Post

quote:
Originally posted by Sofa King:

quote:
Genesis 1:26-27 - Then God said, "Let us make humans in our image, in our likeness. Let them rule the fish in the sea, the birds in the sky, the domestic animals all over the earth, and all the animals that crawl on the earth." So God created humans in his image. In the image of God he created them. He created them male and female.

That is creation by a designer who, although obviously not as intelligent as you, is still pretty doggone intelligent.



OK, so what mechanism did he use to create life, Hen?



Sofa, for a professed believer you sure haven't read much of the Bible. To answer your question, through His power and by His will he spoke them into existence according to His design.

So, all of existence is a magic incantation.

There is, must be, a better explanation.

It used to be that when one got The King's Grief, or consumption, it was the Will of God.

Now we know better. Same with the origin of the universe.

Black holes exist throughout the universe. We can detect them. At their cores, are singularities. Our universe came from a singularity.

Could it be that black holes create alternate universes? I do not know. We've been able to examine the universe scientifically for only a few hundred years. We have questions that remain unanswered. We can be forgiven for that, these things take time to figure out.

But saying God did it answers nothing at all. It only complicates the question when one asks "Where did this complicated and powerful god come from?"

Hmmmm....can't help but notice that my fishy-story is being ignored...perhaps there's not an answer to give?

Billy Joe (Deep? Is that you?) - You are correct that there are questions I can't answer about where God came from. That is why faith is required to supply the evidence of things not seen. But the reality for you, and I believe you know this, is that the same questions you ask about God can be asked about your theory of evolution and Big Bang theory.

So the initial blob of super-matter that exploded, creating life where there was none, exactly where did it come from? Yep, see, questions complicate things, and no matter which theory who hold you must fill the gap with faith.

Not at all, HP.

Evolution is established fact based on scientific evidence. No faith is required to understand it rather fully.

The ultimate origin of the universe? I have to admit that I can't explain it. But saying God did it is worse than no explanation at all. By saying that, you've massively complicated the situation, and unnecessarily so.

And without a shred of evidence.

Faith is nothing of which to be proud when it's used to spackle the holes in human knowledge, and that's exactly what your argument is.

quote:

I cited my opposition in non-religious terms based on just one of the problems I had with it

Your non-religious term, lack of transitional forms, is patent nonsense. There is perfectly good scientific evidence for past and current transitional forms.

But you won't accept the evidence because you don't want to have to admit evolution is a fact. Who's gotten into your mind so? Why are you afraid to admit the demonstrated truth? Is God going to look kindly on your efforts to not only deny reality in his name, but to also corrupt innocent minds in his name?

The argument is over, except for certain fundy wackjobs. Evolution is a fact. Human evolution is a fact. Common ancestry between humans and the other Great Apes is a fact. Within the scientific community there is no controversy whatever about these basic conclusions of the evidence.

But your preacher knows better. gb, seriously, this is Medieval. It's time to put the toys away and behave like an intelligent adult. You and other fundy Creationists are holding back the South and I resent it.

quote:

Originally posted by Billy Joe Bob Gene:
Not at all, HP.

Evolution is established fact based on scientific evidence. No faith is required to understand it rather fully.

The ultimate origin of the universe? I have to admit that I can't explain it. But saying God did it is worse than no explanation at all. By saying that, you've massively complicated the situation, and unnecessarily so.

And without a shred of evidence.

Faith is nothing of which to be proud when it's used to spackle the holes in human knowledge, and that's exactly what your argument is.

No faith is required to believe in evolution? what about all the questions that can't be and haven't been answered by science? Like how a fish can think itself a pair of legs, or a single-cell organism can think itself some eyes? That's a lot more faith than it would require for me to believe that a higher power created the universe. And there is evidence of intelligent design all around - in fact, you are walking evidence of it.

I mean, you have to admit that evolution requires you and I to believe that these little critters were capable of doing millions of years ago what we can't do now...

To me it's ignoring obvious questions that are part of evolution and claiming it is proven fact that massively complicates things. If people who believe in the theory of evolution would simply admit that it is only a theory, then the conversation wouldn't be complicated at all.

quote:

Originally posted by Billy Joe Bob Gene:

quote:

I cited my opposition in non-religious terms based on just one of the problems I had with it

Your non-religious term, lack of transitional forms, is patent nonsense. There is perfectly good scientific evidence for past and current transitional forms.

But you won't accept the evidence because you don't want to have to admit evolution is a fact. Who's gotten into your mind so? Why are you afraid to admit the demonstrated truth? Is God going to look kindly on your efforts to not only deny reality in his name, but to also corrupt innocent minds in his name?

The argument is over, except for certain fundy wackjobs. Evolution is a fact. Human evolution is a fact. Common ancestry between humans and the other Great Apes is a fact. Within the scientific community there is no controversy whatever about these basic conclusions of the evidence.

But your preacher knows better. gb, seriously, this is Medieval. It's time to put the toys away and behave like an intelligent adult. You and other fundy Creationists are holding back the South and I resent it.

Since you and others are so certain of Evolution why don't you start by demonstrating a little of it yourself. EVOLVE into a decent civil forum member who will chose to cease degrading fellow forum members you disagree with. Rather than advancing your argument instead you resort to either demeaning others intelligence or calling them ignorant or other negative terms to try and somehow elevate yourself above them yet you only serve to show how childish you are and your own inability to reasonably debate an issue on it's merits.

We present our cases, before the other forum members, and they will make their own intelligent conclusions based upon the material presented. If you wish to base your faith in evolution as the vehicle by which all life forms got to where they are today and that everything just popped up from one primordial soup or element, by mistake, that's okay. If you wish to be content that evolution is so certain with such sparse and insufficient evidence that's your own prerogative.

To resort to name calling though or attempts to demean another forum members intelligence just because they disagree with you or present an argument that you are inadequate to refute and the greatest strength of your argument is found in attacks on another person then you demonstrate how really shallow you are.

You would have been far more succinct and appeared far more versed in evolutionary theory if you had just responded by saying ...
" duh .. is so .... is so "
and in doing so would have summed up the composite of the defense for evolutionary theory as we know it today.

You say there is perfectly good scientific evidence for past and current transitional forms yet given the vast world around us and the many species that exist your concrete scientific evidence would be less than could fill a perverbal thimble and worse is so vague that only someone looking for their last straw of hope could believe it would be sufficient to prove their case. You did provide some cited samples of fossils found in the past and attempted to tie them together with the thinnest of string and associate this as proof of evolution however nowhere did you nor is science providing CURRENT ALIVE and living specimens of species in incremental transition states. At least be honest about it. In this respect you are at least better at name calling.

quote:

Originally posted by Henhouse Prowler:
Hmmmm....can't help but notice that my fishy-story is being ignored...perhaps there's not an answer to give?

Hen, two things: The story is so ignorant that it barely deserves any comment. Sorry, but your education level in this stuff is simply too far removed from reality that it is difficult to know how to respond. Don't get me wrong, being ignorant is no sin. I am ignorant in may areas, too. I was not born with a knowledge of the mechanics of evolution. Where it becomes truly stupid is when you refuse to learn more about a subject that you are so passionate about yet defend with such complete ignorance.

I'll give you a point, though: Your story about fish "wishing" legs into existence isn't too far removed from one of the hypotheses that were popular about 100 years before Darwin wrote his work. A guy named Lamarck proposed that individual efforts during the lifetime of the organisms were the main mechanism driving species to adaptation such as fish growing legs.

He described the mechanism of inheritance pretty well. He made other great contributions and laid some of the foundational elements that Darwin built upon to discover the "real" cause of adaptation. Lamark simply had the process backwards: Instead of fish struggling to make their own adaptations from within, the machinery of adaptation came from the outside. Environmental changes. Natural selection. Random mutations over very long periods of time.

According to the laws of evolution, your little fish didn't just "decide" to grow legs one day. What actually happened was probably something along the lines of this: Environmental changes (warming, cooling, etc) caused some deep water fish to search for food closer to the shore. Some of those species of fish found less competition for food VERY close to shore in tidal pools or river banks. Completely random mutations caused some fish to grow larger tail fins. It turned out that those larger tail fins allowed the fish to anchor themselves to the river bank where they could eat the insects that reside in the world above them. So those larger tail fins were passed on from generation to generation. The larger the tail fins, the more fish survived which produced offspring with larger tail-fins and so on. After an unimaginably long time - hundreds of thousands if years, some of those fish gained the ability to "walk" from one shallow area to the next using their oversized tail fins.

Again, random mutations allowed for some fish to just barely begin gathering oxygen from the air instead of water. This was a benefit because they could stay in the air longer and eat more insects and reproduce more often. So the inevitable happened, gills eventually became internalized. Fish could hold bits of air inside their internal gills (sort of hold their breath) while they gathered food on the shore just as lungfish do today. Eventually, after millions of years, those little fish became amphibians. Again, over millions of more years. those amphibians adapted enough to be able to live full time on the land.

This process likely happened to many different species of fish all over the world resulting in various species of land dwelling animals.

Again, many dozens of hundreds of million of years later, these minuscule changes over vast periods of time resulted in the diversity of life we see today.

The story is real. It almost certainly happened much as I described. This is the real story of life on earth, Hen. Deny it at your own intellectual peril. The rest of us will continue to add to the body of knowledge. We live in a world where knowledge of this caliber is available to anyone simply for the asking. You don't have to wallow in your ignorance any more but of you choose to do so, it is your right, of course. Just don't expect me to stand idle and allow you to infect our children with your terror of science.

quote:

No faith is required to believe in evolution? what about all the questions that can't be and haven't been answered by science? Like how a fish can think itself a pair of legs,

Hen, question for you: Are you taller or shorter than your parents? Let us assume you are taller (evidence shows that average height in this country has been growing since the 1700's or so). Did you "think" your tallness into existence? No, your height is determined by both the environment (better healthcare), and sexual selection (your mate chose you because of your height or lack thereof but women generally choose taller men over short ones).

. Are you lactose intolerant? If so, you can blame your ancestors who did not evolve the ability to digest milk. Most of us of European descent have the ability to digest milk from other animals and gain nutrition from it. That trait spread through the population quite rapidly since it clearly allowed more people to survive into adulthood - or at least survive long enough to mate and have offspring that were also able to digest milk.

This single trait likely allowed our ancestors to spread into the unoccupied areas of what is now western Europe while people of Asian descent (who typically are lactose intolerant) stay pretty close to home.

These are just two traits (height and lactose tolerance) that have appeared very recently in our evolutionary history. But these are just two traits out of millions, perhaps billions. Each of these traits are "selected" based on the laws established by the theory of evolution. Now consider that there were millions upon millions of changes to our genome over many tens of hundreds of millions of years and you might grasp how these tiny changes eventually lead up to vastly different species.

quote:

EVOLVE into a decent civil forum member who will chose to cease degrading fellow forum members you disagree with.

That would be nice, Hen, but is difficult to do when so many insist we live on a flat earth, insist n teaching that to kids and insist they are right about the flat earth and my spherical theory has absolutely no evidence.

Sorry, Hen, but we can civilly disagree on democrat and republican, hot versus cold, blonde versus brunette and fat versus skinny. But when you passionately insist that the earth is flat and "flat out" refuse to look at the evidence that it is spherical, I'm sorry but you got it coming to you.

And make no mistake, the evidence for evolution is just as substantial as the evidence for a spherical earth. It just takes a little more education to understand it.

Don't like it? You got the wrong forum.

quote:

No faith is required to believe in evolution? what about all the questions that can't be and haven't been answered by science? Like how a fish can think itself a pair of legs, or a single-cell organism can think itself some eyes?

HP,

Obviously you don't understand the mechanisms of evolution. Science has the answers to your questions.

First, evolution is not directed. The fish does not get legs or lungs because it wants them, those features mutate from fins and gills. Ever heard of the walking catfish, down in Florida? It is a living transitional species that usually lives in the water, but breathes air and walks for considerable distances. The fish developed those mutations randomly, and natural selection kept them because they perpetuate the species.

Since eyes are obviously complex organs, single cell life does not have them. The evolution of the eye is very well understood. I can show you a video, if you'd like. But, simply put, the eye evolved from photosensitive cells over time. Also, species exist right now with every stage of the advanced eye's evolution on display for us to see.

HP, evolution is a fact. You will have to do a small bit of work to understand it, and you might have to work up some courage to admit it, but the truth is worth all that and more. I have no reason to lie to you about this, neither do millions of scientists who take the truth of evolution as established fact.

quote:

Originally posted by gbrk:

quote:

Originally posted by Billy Joe Bob Gene:

quote:

I cited my opposition in non-religious terms based on just one of the problems I had with it

Your non-religious term, lack of transitional forms, is patent nonsense. There is perfectly good scientific evidence for past and current transitional forms.

But you won't accept the evidence because you don't want to have to admit evolution is a fact. Who's gotten into your mind so? Why are you afraid to admit the demonstrated truth? Is God going to look kindly on your efforts to not only deny reality in his name, but to also corrupt innocent minds in his name?

The argument is over, except for certain fundy wackjobs. Evolution is a fact. Human evolution is a fact. Common ancestry between humans and the other Great Apes is a fact. Within the scientific community there is no controversy whatever about these basic conclusions of the evidence.

But your preacher knows better. gb, seriously, this is Medieval. It's time to put the toys away and behave like an intelligent adult. You and other fundy Creationists are holding back the South and I resent it.

Since you and others are so certain of Evolution why don't you start by demonstrating a little of it yourself. EVOLVE into a decent civil forum member who will chose to cease degrading fellow forum members you disagree with. Rather than advancing your argument instead you resort to either demeaning others intelligence or calling them ignorant or other negative terms to try and somehow elevate yourself above them yet you only serve to show how childish you are and your own inability to reasonably debate an issue on it's merits.

We present our cases, before the other forum members, and they will make their own intelligent conclusions based upon the material presented. If you wish to base your faith in evolution as the vehicle by which all life forms got to where they are today and that everything just popped up from one primordial soup or element, by mistake, that's okay. If you wish to be content that evolution is so certain with such sparse and insufficient evidence that's your own prerogative.

To resort to name calling though or attempts to demean another forum members intelligence just because they disagree with you or present an argument that you are inadequate to refute and the greatest strength of your argument is found in attacks on another person then you demonstrate how really shallow you are.

You would have been far more succinct and appeared far more versed in evolutionary theory if you had just responded by saying ...
" duh .. is so .... is so "
and in doing so would have summed up the composite of the defense for evolutionary theory as we know it today.

You say there is perfectly good scientific evidence for past and current transitional forms yet given the vast world around us and the many species that exist your concrete scientific evidence would be less than could fill a perverbal thimble and worse is so vague that only someone looking for their last straw of hope could believe it would be sufficient to prove their case. You did provide some cited samples of fossils found in the past and attempted to tie them together with the thinnest of string and associate this as proof of evolution however nowhere did you nor is science providing CURRENT ALIVE and living specimens of species in incremental transition states. At least be honest about it. In this respect you are at least better at name calling.

I've been chastised! Hehe.

gb, first, I'm a sweetheart. I only call fundies wackjobs because it's descriptive and accurate.

You have quite a problem with accuracy, gb. Let's see... "evolution is faith"--*BUZZER* Wrong! "Sparse and insufficient evidence"--*BUZZER* Wrong! "Perverbal [sic] thimble"ful of vague evidence?--*BUZZER* Wrong again!

See, here's my problem, gb. Either you have no flippin' idea what you're talking about, or you're lying. I'll give you the benefit of the doubt and just say you have no idea. But liars abound, such as everyone at the Discovery Institute and the Creation Museum.

Interested in a challenge? Check this out: http://www.youtube.com/user/Ar...F002CC/0/KnJX68ELbAY Watch 'em all, they get into scientific detail as they go along.

And yeah, I've exposed myself (not that way) to Kent Hovind, Ken Ham, Phillip Johnson, etc. Extensively. The more I see of them, the more laughable and despicable they become.

We're all transitional species. Humankind is much different than it was 500,000 years ago, and will be that different in another half million years, should we be so lucky as not to kill ourselves. But, for just one easy example, google the walking catfish of Florida. Imagine... a fish that is happy enough to swim underwater, but can walk and breathe on land.

I've been perfectly honest throughout this entire conversation. What I'm saying is true. And every honest, sane scientist on Earth supports me. We are discussing a scientific issue, after all.

Side note. Creationists seem to hate the person of Charles Darwin, and think that pointing out his ignorances and failings somehow discredits evolution. That is an ad hominem attack and weakens the arguments of the likes of the lunatic rramlimmn. See his thread on the issue. It's true enough Darwin knew nothing of genetics. It's a very new science, but one in which we've made fine progress. Newton knew nothing of quantum or Einsteinian physics. Does that invalidate his findings? Not at all, of course. Will we be forgiven in the future for not discovering levitrons right now? One must hope the people of the future will display more grace and understanding than Creationists do today.

Good lord billy and sofa you two think hen is a sucker for your doctored claims.

You would look a little less goofy if you would ambush him with some tact at least. Lol

Sofa your charade as a believer is bogus even to the untrained eye.

You keep messin’ us with the notion you are trained in science I’m gonna ask you a science question.