+Zach Lang Evolution REALLY does in fact exist and it has NOTHING TO FREAKING to do with atheism or Christianity or religion or God. It is freaking BIOLOGY MAN not theology.
+Steve McRae Correct. It is those who fear truth that attempt to distort science to conform with a fundamentalist religious view. Science takes no stand on the supposed existence of supernatural entities. *'It is a capital mistake to theorize before one has data. Insensibly one begins to twist facts to suit theories, instead of theories to suit facts.'* Sherlock Holmes-A Scandal in Bohemia Where is there ANY evidence to support creationism?
+Steve McRae Hey, man, please forget that stuff I was saying in regards to you a few days ago. These youtube comments can easily get blown out of proportion. You are a good man, for the reasons I said from the start. Anyway, I deleted most of the other stuff. Regardless of how evolution might work for you, I'm still a God believer. Over and out.
+Richard Hill Accepted. And you should know I literally have NO issue what so ever with the belief or concept of God. I would never try to change a persons religious beliefs. I try to change peoples understanding of proper science and logical thinking...not their ideology. (Granted sometimes they are effected by each other). I am more than happy to explain to you evolutionary concepts, explain evolutionary facts and basic biology (I'm hardly an expert in the field) or even just science stuff.....I would never try to get someone to stop believing in God as that isn't my agenda at all. Cheers.
The biggest difference is, the arc doesn't have to insult you to "appear" to be making a point. If you think it insults your intelligence, you get offended way too easily. BTW...add a baryon and a meson and the Europeans got an awesome 3way. Typical Europeans...lol
Consider that creationists teach their children a preposterous straw man version of evolutionary theory and teach them to mock it. Your first task is convincing them that evolution says something completely different from what they have been taught. The problem is dishonesty more that stupidity.
Brad Davies Hahahahaha It's hilarious!!! I'd love to know whom this idiot is, what denomination your church is and how many morons have believe him so far.
You seem quite intelligent for, sorry for the presumption, a theist. Please stretch your intelligence a little further and do a little research. Learn more about mutation. Learn more about gradual evolution. It takes many small changes in the genes to make a physical change within the body, or to enable a change in function. Do not take my word for this. I am a stupid and ill-educated man. I left school aged 15. I've worked in manual labour for 48 years. All I know I've taught myself. I probably had a major advantage over you, by not being born into a religion. Although it is traditional, in my family, and country, when filling in forms, and being asked for your religion to write down a religion. Just habit. Nothing to do with belief. It is easy to brainwash children, They learn from example. It takes a lot to break the conditioning. The main thing is you are using your intelligence. Please just use it a little more.
Every creationist argument ever made summarized in one sentence: "My misunderstanding of what evolution is conflicts with my misunderstanding of how science works."
@@spidaman0112 Cells are divided into two main classes, initially defined by whether they contain a nucleus. Prokaryotic cells (bacteria) lack a nuclear envelope, eukaryotic cells do have a nucleus in which the genetic material is separated from the cytoplasm. Prokaryotic cells are generally smaller and simpler than eukaryotic cells, in addition to the absence of a nucleus, the gnomes are less complex and they do not contain cytoplasmic organelles or exoskeleton. In spite of these differences the main basic molecular mechanisms govern the lives of both eukaryotes and eukaryotes. Present day cells evolved from a common prokaryotic ancestor long three lines of descent, giving rise to archaebacteria, eubacteria, and eukaryotes. Life emerged 3.8 million years ago, that’s 750 million years after Earth was formed. The research seems to be showing that the first life formed from complex chemistry, which had its self evolved over a long period. Much of this chemical evolution has been studied and is now quite well understood.
Why would anyone reject the theory of evolution? What better transitional forms could you ask for than _Australapethicus afarensis_ and _A. africanus_?
It's depressing that people want to believe in God with no evidence while many of the same people don't consider evolution to be true because they fail to understand the evidence.
kevin smith I'm not advocating creation but having an opinion on three parts of the body is not evidence. His proof was an educated guess that already had a bias. Anyone could come and look at the same evidence and come with a different opinion. Not only that, what about the thousands of other parts of the body that look and show a purpose.
ericjones33 *Anyone could come and look at the same evidence and come with a different opinion* Sure, but that does not make them right. Evidence is not opinions. *Not only that, what about the thousands of other parts of the body that look and show a purpose* Is it time for the same old "X look complex to me so GOD DID IT!" or the classic "Despite that we know how things evolve, let me argue for how X don't work in its current state if I remove a vital part of it" now?
ericjones33 Evidence is: a fact which appears to indicate something (your hypotheses aka evolution) as being true. and this video was LOADED with it. Beyond loaded. I'd say he makes his case very well. Watch the damn video
kevin smith There is no evidence in this video. It is mostly some guy spouting off his beliefs. The horse is an excellent example of a creature that has lost genetic functions. It has less bones, less tooth density and the jaw has become weaker. Every geneticist knows that it takes more functioning genes to produce more bones. The oldest "horse" has far more joints and bones.
Almost all of the people whom I've met who disagree with evolution do so on ideological terms. Even many who believe in evolution do not believe that humans came from apes, because it is (to them) embarrassing.
alot of people have trouble reading a musty old tome that makes ridiculous claims and then taking it on faith without ever seeing any evidence. that is what you guys are always doing with evolution. you haven't ever seen non-living matter miraculously spring to life, and you haven't ever seen living organisms mutate into a new species. in a world where either were possible, you would see both. in the real world, a century of experiments have yet to produce either in a lab.
DrHaz3 You are committing a fallacy that way to many creationists do. Abiogenesis is NOT evolution. God could have created the first life forms and then let them evolve from there. It doesn't matter to the theory of evolution as evolution only cares that life exists. So please stop trying to refute evolution by attacking abiogensis. Anyways we have seen new species being born. Creationists just dont admit it because its small changes with makes sense to evolutionists because we understand how slow evolution is.
Travis Frazier i can understand why you would want to distance yourself from such crackpot lunacy as spontaneous generation, it is not my fault you atheists pretending to have science on your side keep changing the definition and terminology every time you get debunked.
A year later...and another 500 replies to a comment I've left on some video on RUclips...and yet still not one young Earth creationist has bothered to give actual scientific evidence that supports their position. Perhaps this year will be the year one actually does...pfff...who am I kidding. Of course none of the ever will.
Thanks for that list WOW but you forgot Barbara Brennan, the NASA physicist that wrote "Hands of Light" that says we are eternal , holographic, multidimensional, electromagnetic energy and light beings This book is full of pictures of what we look like out of these electrical bodies as holograms
@Winning Grinn You are too lazy to read or to even have an opinion of your own You are the one not motivated enough making you the one too boring to read CONSTANT CREATION was proven by quantum physicists a long time ago I wonder which evolutionist has paid you to write what you write AND evolution is the only pseudo science because without quantum physics it would not exist AND quantum physics says that all of existence is constantly bursting forth as light which are those quarks that spin billions of times a second as 3 points of light forming what are called protons and neutrons These words come from the book "The Quantum World" written by the physicist Kenneth Ford Grinn that you are an eternal light being or hologram constantly being created proven by many, many physicists over the years I don't mind giving you information that you should have looked up yourself before writing, but then I expect everyone to know E=mcsquared by now
Constant creation has been proven by quantum physicists, especially Barbara Brennan, the physicist that wrote "Hands of Light" which was published in 1987 When I write on youtube sites where evolutionists write mostly, they blast me with such negative demeaning words I wonder if this is all the information they have AND of course it is Observable and testable science has had many answers for many years---with the words that defy evolutionists Why wouldn't anyone want to know that they are literally eternal energy and light right now? Because they have been so brain washed by nazis that don't understand quantum physics These nazi thinking people don't care who they hurt, so they don't look to quantum physics for answers These nazi thinkers are glad everyone believes in death because they are able to continue to take trillions of dollars from the tax payers of the world based on this belief DEATH IS A BELIEF-----A HIGHLY ERRONEOUS ONE At the quantum level subatomic particles vibrate and spin and rotate so super fast that nothing can be solid This means that what is called consciousness IS those waves that saturate everything AND it is evident that it takes consciousness to rotate those waves of energy and light into what is called solidity which ARE those quarks from the start When you so-called "die" you will see yourself out of that holographic body that you have called your own to see that you have been an electrical magnetic energy field set of vibrations the whole time We are all brilliant eternal beings of light right now Don't let anyone tell you anything different From the book "The Quantum World" written by the physicist Kenneth Ford comes these words---'magically bursting forth are quarks spinning billions of times a second as 3 points of light forming protons and neutrons which are the basis of the atom which must also have the electron which vibrates super fast as 1 point of light and of course all of this is the hydrogen atom spinning and vibrating as 7 points of light---electrical magnetic energy field vibrations is what physicists call an atom
Most Americans don't even know science basics such as the Laws of Thermodynamics either. Our science education is insufficient and under assault by religionism.
Religion is the antithesis of science and its greatest impediment. Religion is the practice of training one's mind to ignore evidence, logic and reason, while being able to believe in fairy tales based on faith alone..... and being proud of it rather than ashamed. Science encourages the expansion of one's mind. Religion does nothing of the sort. In science, one goes where the evidence leads, not to someone's preferred outcome. Science provides the only reliable way to determine what is true or not true about the universe. It has not yet answered all the questions, but is the only methodology that has the capacity to do so. Scientific facts are backed by multiple lines of evidence. Science discovers a million times more truth by questioning than all the proponents of the world's religions do by believing. One's inability to understand basic science does not mean 'God did it' Religion has its roots in the ignorance of ancient peoples and its proponents must perpetuate that ignorance for religion to survive. To accept a religion, one must subordinate their intellect to that of ancient tribalism. Religion then becomes the tribe which must be defended against all outside influence.
The creationists' caricature of the second law wouldn't even allow lifeforms to grow or reproduce. Of course creationists never bother to learn enough about biology or thermodynamics to understand that.
I know enough to know that scientists say the first law of thermodynamics says matter and energy can never be created or destroyed and yet the same scientists says the big bang was nothing exploding into everything. You can't have it both ways.
Evolution isn't science in the strict sense as it is neither observable nor testable. Observable and testable science has no answers to the hard questions that defy evolution. Here are a few questions for evolutionists. 1. How did life originate? As Richard Dawkins said, no one has a clue. But life is necessary for evolution. 2. How did the Dna code originate? Dna contains a massive amount of coded, precisely ordered, information. Proteins are made of up of precisely ordered left handed amino acids. 3. How could mutations, random copying errors, create the huge volumes of new information needed for upward evolution? 4. How can random selection, taught as evolution, explain the diversity of life? 5. Living things look like they were designed,. so why do evolutionists know that they weren't designed? 6. Where are the countless millions of missing transitional fossils? If Darwinism predicts gradual change from one type of animal to another there should be a continual parade of slowly changed fossils. 7. If evolution means gradual change over time how come we have so many "living fossils". We observe many animals today that are unchanged from supposed 150 million year old fossils. 8. If the unprovable theory of evolution is so important that our kids must be taught it, where are these scientific breakthroughs? 9. Why is evolution, not a science but a belief system, taught in science classes? 10. Why are these problems with evolution theory not taught to our university students? Why don't our students get the whole story, for and against, evolution? Why is pertinent information withheld?
Number Six Evolution is nothing more than a dumb theory based on faith. It's never been observed other than at the micro level and really has nothing to do with science either.
BigKWS "Evolution is nothing more than a dumb theory based on faith" --- Let's see. You and a bunch of religious fundamentalist, non-scientists take that position and virtually all of the earth's career scientists disagree. Give me a few years to decide which group is more credible.
I'd be careful using words like "true" in a science claim. "Fact" is more accurate, and much less vulnerable to being twisted by those who are ignorant about evolution.
Truth as used by theists is in a bionic brain mentally its either absolute or not............very bad to hold a position of absolute truth claims because you have to back engineer and shoehorn what evidence fits you claim and ignore the rest.......on the other hand truth as a result of the scientific method is provisional to the evidence the supports it......that is the only objective path to reality
The sad thing is the people are ignorant because its ok in schools to teach the "theory of evolution" but not the "theory of Christianity". And if you've ever been in a school classroom they only teach evolution and don't even mention the counter arguments.
Isaac Wolvie QUOTE: 'its ok in schools to teach the "theory of evolution" but not the "theory of Christianity". " That's what churches are for, to teach religious doctrine. Schools are reserved for science.
So glad that I've taught my daughter so well. She is seven and understands the basics of evolution AND we live in the deep south. She will grow up smarter than most of her peers. There's lots of people in the south that believe in spirits, ghosts, gods, demons, devils, etc. It's an insane place to live.
"She will grow up smarter than most of her peers." I live in Oklahoma. You are correct, the U.S. South is an insane place to live. Thanks to you, your seven year old probably knows more about biology than do many of the parents of her peers. I wish I'd had your foresight when my children were your daughter's age!
I'm a religious person...i think, I was born in a strict Christian family who believes God is the creator of all. When I was 7 i never wanted to go to church, for some reason I would say it made me uncomfortable but they still forced me to go, I would get dragged out of my bed and forced out the door. As I got older I stopped going to crunch all together because I started to believe "why do I have to go to a place to worship with other people I don't know, When I can just do that at home by myself" church for some odd reason has always made me feel weird. when it's usually suppose to do the opposite, I felt like something was up or something wasn't right. But As I'm getting older I realize I am still confused it's like I'm in a grey area right now between faith and realism logic and evolution. listening to this video makes sense to me. I'm starting to stray from the ways my parents taught me and I'm relying more on logic, because everything makes much more sense that way. I always felt something odd with my religion since I was 7 or younger but I ignored it because it was simply "the right thing to do". I'm tired of living in ignorance and not being aware, I don't want to live a lie...
Yes, and at least 100 top scientists as well.You know all of those things you learned in grade school? Fakes, and lies. miller's experiment used the wrong gas mixture, and with the right mixture, you get embalming fluid Darwin's tree of Life was supposed to be something that was supposed to be gradual, but it seems that most of the birds, mammals, reptiles and birds all seemed to spring to life too quickly for that tree as most came to life at the Cambrian period. Haeckel's embryos were not drawn lifelike. They started out, and ended up looking different. Only during a short time in the middle do they look similar, which is different to what is stated. Then, we have the fossils. Well, most of those fossils are "made" by people in china, who are paid well for these finds.Then there is java Man. Everyone thinks that an entire person was found whereas what was found was only a skullcap, a femur, and 3 teeth. Can you show me anything that completely proves that evolution is actually a fact?
What lie did I say?? Miller's experiment? The experiment did create Amino acids According to most scientists, even evolutionists admit that the chemicals that Miller used to depict the atmosphere, however was not right. had they used the correct chemical makeup, the result would be embalming fluid, not amino acids
fredandpj So what you are saying is that fossils are fake? You're point is seriously flawed, even if they make fake bones they are modeled after a species that did exist lol. Evolution is clearly fact i cant wait for the brainwashed religion freaks to die off. Religious people take all of there facts from a book that was written thousands of years ago as proof god exists. Then they try to disprove science with a fucking book? It's 2014 were not in the 1800's. Atheism is on the rise because the more people that are educated about SCIENCE the more that wisely choose to be atheist. Here is the timeline of evolution NOTE-you say that birds mammals and reptiles came to life to quickly just look at the time line. 100 million between reptiles and mammals and 50 million between mammals and birds in case you didn't know that's a SHIT LOAD OF TIME. In its 4.6 billion years circling the sun, the Earth has harbored an increasing diversity of life forms: for the last 3.6 billion years, simple cells (prokaryotes); for the last 3.4 billion years, cyanobacteria performing photosynthesis; for the last 2 billion years, complex cells (eukaryotes); for the last 1 billion years, multicellular life; for the last 600 million years, simple animals; for the last 550 million years, bilaterians, animals with a front and a back; for the last 500 million years, fish and proto-amphibians; for the last 475 million years, land plants; for the last 400 million years, insects and seeds; for the last 360 million years, amphibians; for the last 300 million years, reptiles; for the last 200 million years, mammals; for the last 150 million years, birds; for the last 130 million years, flowers; for the last 60 million years, the primates, for the last 20 million years, the family Hominidae (great apes); for the last 2.5 million years, the genus Homo (human predecessors); for the last 200,000 years, anatomically modern humans. Periodic extinctions have temporarily reduced diversity, eliminating: 2.4 billion years ago, many obligate anaerobes, in the oxygen catastrophe; 252 million years ago, the trilobites, in the Permian-Triassic extinction event; 66 million years ago, the pterosaurs and nonavian dinosaurs, in the Cretaceous-Paleogene extinction event.
james bond "Could it be Satan?" The Church Lady would think so! :P Anti evolutionist never even bother to look at the overwhelming evidence and yet they for some strange reason continually try to refute evolutionary facts. It's really quite an interesting psychological phenomenon.
BigKWS So you want to see a family change to another family? Does that even remotely make sense to you in context of how evolution is a branching process?
Mice and rats are RELATED. That genera branch into MULTIPLE species isn't crazy, its proved beyond all doubt and the BACKBONE of the science of Biology. Owls and ostriches are RELATED, by blood. Squirrels are related to mice. You are the imbecile. All of science proves you to be WRONG.
***** It is fact. The idea that the random interaction of atoms and molecules lead to what we call life over billions of years is - even if you deny known facts that support evolution - less crazy than everything being designed and placed on earth 6000 years ago... out of nothing. You are a prepubescent servile pleb.
Martin Koch Intelligence is not your forte granted but quit shouting about that fact, trust me everyone gets the point! You are very ignorant on what Creationism teaches - go read up on it then come back. Also it helps little when you have never read all of The Bible even once, never mind studied the original languages - akin to watching the first 20 mins of 'Gone With The Wind' then writing a detailed indepth review of it.
Wayne Huninghake " If you are unable to provide observable scientific evidence of "life from non-life" you have proven to yourself that evolution is a man made fairy tale ... Doesn't get any easier than that ." Um, no. Evolution starts and ends with life. Your thinking of Abiogenesis,Panspermia, or Genesis. What your proposing is like using Hindu texts to disprove Christianity.
Wayne Huninghake said, *_"provide observable scientific evidence of "life from non-life"_* Sure Wayne, here... en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miller%E2%80%93Urey_experiment Now, you provide O.S.E that the Christian God is real.
USERNAMEfieldempty sorry, but the miller experiment is not evidence for evolution. it's obvious you don't even know what it is. But at least now you have refuted and debunked evolution yourself because you are unable to provide any observable scientific evidence of "life from non-life" so you are without excuse Romans 1:20 The Resurrection is an Irrefutable fact. Each person should never forget that the empty tomb has proved beyond reasonable doubt that Christ rose from the dead after suffering and dying for his or her personal sins and for the sins of all the world. His resurrection in turn proves that He is the God of all creation, for only God can conquer death. The Resurrection proves that all His promises and all His warnings are true and will be totally fulfilled when He comes again. Therefore, one great promise is especially fitting in conclusion. "That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus |that is, openly acknowledge Jesus as your Lord|, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead |that is, that He died for all your sins and completely satisfied the terrible debt you incurred before God and thereby demonstrated the sin-debt to be completely settled by His glorious victory over death|, thou shalt be saved |that is, saved from your deserved destiny in hell and given everlasting life with Him in the new earth|" (Romans 10:9). "Blessed are all they that put their trust in him" (Psalm 2:12). My friend, if you started today as unsaved and you leave here unsaved, I am the worst enemy that you have ever had, because you have been provided the gospel and you can never go into the presence of God and tell Him that you know nothing about the gospel. You have been provided the gospel, and it will be worse for you when God pronounces judgment than for any heathen in the darkest part of the earth today.
Wayne Huninghake said, _"the miller experiment is not evidence for evolution. it's obvious you don't even know what it is. But at least now you have refuted and debunked evolution yourself because you are unable to provide any observable scientific evidence of "life from non-life" so you are without excuse."_ You know what, Wayne? I consider your reply to be seriously downright fucking rude. Really. Just totally plain ignorant, disrespectful and rude. You asked for some evidence for _life from non-life_ (which isn't evolution) I gave you some and you just slapped it away as not "proof of evolution" _(??? you specified life from non-life)_ You didn't explain why it wasn't good enough and then *_you_* mocked *_me_* for my supposed ignorance. Who the fuck do you think you are, you drooling fat dotard? First you spit in my face, _(because _*_you_*_ are confused about the most basic definitions)_, then you try and stand over me like some doom-laden 21st century Moses, wailing about the fate you have prepared for me? Legs apart like some avenging angel calling down judgement on the wicked???? WTF? You pompous little tit! Are you drunk or something? Avenging angels don't have pizza-stains on their XXXL T-shirts. They don't have a tragic lack of self-awareness either. Your religion certainly hasn't made you a better person, but it's definitely made you a ruder, more arrogant one. So go fuck yourself, you clownish bumbling hayseed. Learn some fucking manners if you want people to respect your religion. Because right now, you are a brilliant ambassador for the coarse stupidity of fundamentalists. Congratulations.
USERNAMEfieldempty Firstly, First, resorting to offensive language generally occurs when someone has no substance to an argument. Your foolish emotional comments do not change the facts. In no way have I been rude, but you are now without excuse. Romans 1:20 , Hebrews 4:12 Your foolish emotional comments don't change the fact that you have refuted and debunked evolution due to the lack of observable scientific evidence of "life from non-life" ... The Miller-Urey research argues against abiogenesis and although widely heralded by the popular press for decades as ‘proof’ that life originated on the early earth entirely by natural conditions, the Miller-Urey experiments has actually provided compelling evidence for exactly the opposite conclusion. This set of experiments-more than almost any other carried out by modern science-has done much more to show that abiogenesis is not possible on Earth than to indicate how it could be possible. My friend, if you leave here unsaved, I am the worst enemy that you have ever had, because you have been provided the gospel and you can never go into the presence of God and tell Him that you know nothing about the gospel. You have been provided the gospel, and it will be worse for you when God pronounces judgment than for any heathen in the darkest part of the earth today. ================================= The Gospel According To The Author =================================
Geology shows that fossils are of different ages. Paleontology shows a fossil sequence, the list of species represented changes through time. Taxonomy shows biological relationships among species. Evolution is the explanation that threads it all together. Creationism is the practice of squeezing one's eyes shut and wailing "Does not!"
That was a wonderful presentation. I used to be a religious creationist and i wish i could revert my thinking back ans truely watch the presentation as my former self to see how uncomfortable it made me. Fossils of premodern mad used to make me cringe and I would pretty much just say no and then stop thinking about it. Thank god I don't believe in god anymore so i can take in info objectively and not have to be upset when something contradicts what i think i know.
+Heywood Yabloome Just jumping in here. I wouldn't call it brain desease, just rigorous brain training, literally hardwiring sensory input, It physically develops the brain. Practicing religion happens in the temporal lobes, where emotions reside. When someone prays, it lights up like a Christmas tree on scans. The more practice the stronger it gets, sometimes even resulting in cases of epilepsy (those shuddering folk lying on the floor supposedly having revelations). All the time it gets harder to reprogram. Apart from the fact that they don't want to, they are physically hampered. High temporal lobe activity slows or can even completely block frontal lobe activity (logic, reason). The brain simply rejects things too alien without structural reprogramming or some kind of mental shock. When you consider that, installing the Islamic rule that Muslims must pray six times a day, was a brilliant move.
Heywood Yabloome No I am not a scientist. I did have education in psychology/ criminology and effects of drugs when I did police sciences (BSc) for a few years, but this I got from just reading a lot of stuff and watching videos. And I am a track coach that puts heavy emphasis on brain training. In justice, accountability and responsibility are big things. Intentional, unintentional, premeditated. Forced, tricked or provoked, heat of the moment, emergency, mental instability. Accountability is very case specific, but not responsibility since the offense / crime _was_ committed by said person. If a religious zealot harms an unbeliever I would say perhaps a small measure of accountability and shared responsibility befalls the teacher(s). But if he was actually taught to harm unbelievers, he is just a pawn. Then full accountability and shared responsibility lies with the teacher and the zealot will probably be acquitted... though he will be forced to get psychiatric help, if he isn't already shocked enough to desire it. Consider if free will is mere illusion. There are those that argue the universe is pure causality, deterministic. Even if not 100% true, that may still be the case for us. If so, then there is no free will. We just react to sensory input. Current input gets cross-referenced with older input, giving the illusion of consideration. But the path was set. If one knows a person well, one can predict his/her (re)actions. So, if you were to know both circumstances and person perfectly, can you then perfectly predict them? I am on the fence. At the _very least_ it is a matter of probability. Let's say a kid may steal a pack of gum while the shop is temporarily unattended: e.g. 95% no, 5% yes.
Heywood Yabloome Well, essentially religious rules laws are also human :-) Most of them are common sense and secular in essense. Some of them just tend to be (seriously) outdated. It isn't so much that the Jesus figure is immoral, though some of his actions and words are quite questionable, it's the way he is (ab)used as you describe. And then well... it's up to you to imagine your "I'm sorry" was good enough. Or you've been 'saved' already and then there are no restraints. Jesus didn't change things much though, forgiveness was first asked directly from Yhwh. I've noticed that here, it's the 'saved ones' that can be most annoying. So self-rightious, talking down from their imaginary moral high horses. Some of them are extreme religious bigots. Anyway... artificial intelligence. I expect it will only get more and more sophisticated as better computers are built that can process more data, and while they learn. Just look at robots learning to balance themselves. Coordination is also a form of intelligence. Emotions are probably by far the trickiest to mimic. Remember that the more lifeforms evolved intelligence, the more emotions and character they show. So basically it comes last. Mankind is the smartest, but (consequently) also the most irrational. We have all these conflicts in interests and emotions, also within ourselves, because we can process and evaluate so much more data. And we think ourselves so rational, but deep down we are still ruled by basic instincts, of which fear / insecurity is arguably the strongest one (apart from the desire to live of course).
I agree. So does the Bible. According to the Bible God also hates religion and people who say they're not religious but, "spiritual". He refers to them as "mentally ill". I call them ''crazy as bat shit". According to the Christian's story, Jesus also hated religion. He cursed religious leaders many times over. Even beat up some of them for turning a church into a den of liars and thieves. So I guess you might have a lot of Christians agreeing with you. That's almost a 1st....lol
@@JamesRichardWiley What would you think if someone was "room temperature" for over an hour, with no signs of life whatsoever including no heartbeat, no breathing, no brain waves, then that person was somehow revived and that person had no brain damage or lasting effects, and that person was able to tell you everything that happened while he was dead with total accuracy including conversation and medical procedures he couldn't possibly know about because he was a farmer not a doctor? And...he also clearly recalled a bald spot on "top" of one of the doctor's heads. One more thing; that person had no opportunity to collude with anyone on any details because no one had left the room since that person woke up. What would you think if the story was verified by world renown neurosurgeons who had nothing to gain and everything to lose by being part of a false story? What would you think? BTW...this is an IQ test as well as a test to see if you are really a researcher or just a big mouth. And I noticed that you list some of the most notorious cults on your channel including the Catholic "religion". You may have been raised Catholic, in which case, with them being the ultimate child abusers, I will make adjustments for your answer.
@BillPrestin Esquire question for you Mr. Pretentious asshole: Where did you see me promoting Jesus or any other religious figure? You're a self assuming moron and BTW....I'd love to see you try to prove that....rof.
@@JamesRichardWiley I'm gonna go ahead and assume that none of that would bother you and you can make that call without the slightest bit of research....That's kinda why people don't commit crimes because they have Fear of disconnection from family and friends. Fear of death Fear of being wrong. Does that make them stupid? I get the idea that you're one of these people who is just smart enough to remember what you're told and just dumb enough not to challenge it or complain. Your mother must be proud.
The REAL Genesis: IN THE BEGINNING, a bunch of bored goat herders were sitting around wondering why they didn't know shit and decided to start making up shit so they could tell others about it, and become experts on the shit they made up. Others liked the idea of making up shit, so that they too could become experts on their own shit. Their ideas caught on and people have been doing it ever since.
I don't normally listen to lectures by evolutionists, or read Dawkins' evolution books, because evolution is MIDDLE SCHOOL science! The fact that strenuous efforts have to be made to educate American adults in the 21st century on a subject that most of the rest of the developed and developing world is just basic science is just baffling to me.
Kevin I'm not sure why you brought up 9/11, and I don't know enough about it to debate you on that. Our government is corrupt, yes. But can you send me a link to some info on these civilizations you're speaking of? Also, I'm not sure what you mean by "Evolution is materialism in disguise." Look, I'm open to hearing your argument, however, from what I have seen at the moment, evolution is the most probable theory. I think that if enough evidence is given, then the theory of evolution should be rewritten/discarded, just as Dalton's theories on the atom are no longer valid, and we now accept plate tectonics. That's what science is all about. As we gather more information, what is accepted changes.
EVOLUTION is a non existence. Because TIME is a non existence. Evolution cannot exist as it relies EXCLUSIVELY on acceptance that there is such a thing as the existence of Time. LIFE IS SIMPLY CYCLES OF REPETITION WITH ONE GOAL: CONTINUE.
You really should some really cool new discoveries keep coming up. Don't need them to prove evolution, although they all support it, but science is cool
The amazing part of this is at an hour in. Income inequality correlates with religious belief. How the ruling class laughs at you; but you'll get yours in the next life, right?
Evolution is true, but it only explains gradual changes, but it doesn't explain major changes, like Cambrian explosion, when many species appeared very suddenly. It does NOT explain origin of life at all. Darwin had admitted it himself. The real issue is: people politicize science, anything different from mainstream position should be dismissed. You shouldn't talk about it. That's not science.
@@seanleith5312 you realize that Darwin died in 1882, right? While he's the father of the Theory of Evolution, the field didn't stagnate with his death. Evolutionary biology has progressed way beyond *just* what Darwin stated. So when anyone says something along the lines of "Even Darwin said....", it's just laughable! Next, the Theory of Evolution doesn't speak to the origin of life. It only speaks to allele changes over time. There are hypotheses that attempt to answer the origin of life, such as abiogenesis, which has great potential for becoming a theory.
@@seanleith5312 What you call "very suddenly" is actually 20 million years... Your mind simply does not realise how different the time scale is when it comes to life on earth, cosmos and the universe
@@seanleith5312 When we say the cambrian explosion (lasted at least 20 million years) happened suddenly, we mean by that: compared to the life of earth (4 billion years)
I feel like this is only an issue in America. I live in Finland where the assumption is that you don't believe in God unless stated otherwise, and creationists are openly ridiculed. Even my RE teacher (who happens to be religious) said that creationism has given Christianity a bad name, the entire idea is completely ludicrous and he can imagine Jesus face palming in heavens when he sees creationists.
*WHAT THE BIBLE TELLS US - About Morality* Please note the biblical passages that promote morality. Quiz at the end. 1. You can own slaves. You can buy and sell slaves. You can even sell your own daughter (Exodus 21:7-10). If she fails to please her master, you must refund him the purchase price. WHAT THE BIBLE TELLS US - About Morality Please note the biblical passages that promote morality. Quiz at the end. 2. You can beat the living shit out of your slaves without being punished, as long as they do not die within two days (Exodus 20:20-21). Under what standards of morality is it ever okay to beat another human being like that and not suffer any consequences? It is reassuring the bible endorses property rights, but a source of morality it is not. 3. The bible not only condones slavery but sets prices for them (Leviticus 27:3-7). The bible obviously was concerned about human traffickers getting a fair price for their goods. 4. Surely Jesus had compassion towards slaves. He tells slaves to be obedient and subservient. That is why slave owners in the Americas pushed Christianity onto their slaves and punished those caught practicing their ancient religions.. Very reassuring. It was okay to beat slaves, those who unwittingly made mistakes were to be given few lashes, those who knowingly violated rules were to be given many lashes. 5. Thou shalt not kill. Now THERE is a good one. However, it seems there are exceptions: No sooner had Moses returned from his first trip up the mountains to find a party to which he had not been invited, in a fit of rage he orders his Levite goon squad to kill "every man his brother, and every man his friend and every man his neighbor." Exodus 32:28 "The Levites did as Moses commanded and that day about 3000 of the people died." 'Tough Love' maybe? 6. But there are others. The bible requires the faithful to put to death by stoning; Adulterers (Deuteronomy 22:23-24, Leviticus 20:10); Homosexuals (Leviticus 20:13), Non virgins (Deuteronomy 22:20-21), any of your neighbors foolish enough to mow their lawn on the Sabbath (Exodus 31:12-15,Exodus 35:1-3,Numbers 15:32-36). 7. Oh, and speaking of rape, surely that ranks high on the ‘Thou shalt nots’ of the ten commandments. *NO???* It is not even mentioned??? An oversight perhaps? But then it was so important to forbid mixing fabrics or cooking a kid in its mother's milk (so important that it needed to be repeated three times) and such. Take a look at these REALLY important commandments (there are different versions within the bible). Thou shalt not: Worship other gods Work on the Sabbath (death penalty crime) Take the name of the lord in vain (OMG, ANOTHER capital crime) Make graven images Covet thy neighbor’s wife or house or ass And, oh yes, ‘thou shalt not kill’ and ‘thou shalt not steal’ are in there somewhere near the bottom. *But rape? Not one word!!!* How about elsewhere in the bible? Surely somewhere the bible must condemn rape, no? Oh, yes, here; Deuteronomy 22:28-29 28 "If a man happens to meet a virgin who is not pledged to be married and rapes her *and they are discovered,* 29 he shall pay her father fifty shekels of silver. He must marry the young woman, for he has violated her. He can never divorce her as long as he lives" *YESSS! There it is. Rape is a PROPERTY crime*. The rapist has damaged the father’s PROPERTY and it is he that must be compensated. What justice for the victim of the rape? She has to marry her rapist. Surely she lived happily ever after, no? And what if they were not discovered and the girl kept quiet out of fear? The bible is quite clear about the fate of girls who are not virgins on their wedding day. Here, as elsewhere in the bible, women are chattel and have no say in their future. It is interesting to note that, while the bible mandates death by stoning for adulterers and non virgin brides, raping an unbethrothed virgin incurred only a monetary penalty. This is biblical justice? 8. The bible endorses mass murder and sex slavery. Numbers 31:14-18 "14 Moses was angry with the officers of the army-the commanders of thousands and commanders of hundreds-who returned from the battle. 15 “Have you allowed all the women to live?” he asked them. 16 “They were the ones who followed Balaam’s advice and enticed the Israelites to be unfaithful to the Lord in the Peor incident, so that a plague struck the Lord’s people. *17 Now kill all the boys. And kill every woman who has slept with a man, 18 but save for yourselves every girl who has never slept with a man."* Numbers 31:35 - "And thirty and two thousand persons in all, of women that had not known man by lying with him." *THIRTY TWO THOUSAND VIRGINS* being divided up to be used by “god’s chosen people” at the same time their mothers and brothers by the tens of thousands were being slaughtered like animals. Many of those women would have been pregnant, their unborn fetus dying inside them. And what would have been the crime of young boys of whatever age? 2? 4? 10? There was no distinction about age. This is GENOCIDE, condemned by civilized nations of the world. If you fail to feel a deep sense of moral outrage at this, how do you condemn ISIS for doing far less? Genocide in whatever form is an ugly stain on humanity. To claim it to be a moral act is the ultimate evil. Why then, should you regard the bible as a moral guide? Is ISIS any less evil? So what response do we hear from zealots? Shock? Horror? No! Their predicable response is indifference and a callous “They had it coming to them.” We have heard those words echoed by unrepentant Nazis and the barbaric ISIS. And how does that equate to morality? Are not empathy and compassion the cornerstones of morality? Where then is there any morality here? Perhaps it was just an oversight that the bible nowhere condemns slavery, or rape or molesting children, but yet it was so important to forbid mixing fabrics or cooking a kid in its mother's milk (so important that it needed to be repeated three times). What does that say about biblical priorities? If the bible is the source of your 'morality', call a mental health hotline, NOW.. God sends Abraham to murder his own son, clearly an immoral act. Abraham is perfectly willing to do so. And for this, the bible praises Abraham. To a rational person, morality is doing what's right, no matter what one is told. Biblical morality is doing what you are told no matter what. Although an angel was sent to 'stay Abraham's hand', no such courtesy was given Jephthah's daughter made into a burnt offering to the lord (Judges 11:29-40). That should be enough to turn anyone's stomach. And what of Jephthah? Was this murderer of an innocent child punished in any way? *Was he condemned? NO. He is PRAISED. THE BIBLE APPROVES OF HUMAN SACRIFICE.* To suggest that morality stems from religion is not only wrong, it is frightening. You don't need religion to have morals. If you can't determine right from wrong, you lack empathy, not religion. And the bible has a special message for women: "STFU". We see at every turn they are denied the rights afforded to men; they were regarded as property, either of their father or their husband. It can be a source of pride for women that apparently not a single one of them participated in the writing of the bible.The rights that women have today were not granted them by the bible, they had to fight for them. The bible endorses misogyny. Atheists are far more moral than those who espouse religion. They are moral because it is the intelligent way to behave towards our fellow man, not out of expectation of reward or fear of punishment. If you are "moral" because of those constraints, you are a very dangerous person. Slavery still exists, but it has been made illegal in virtually every part of the world, NOT because of guidance from the bible, but because it was the right thing to do. Morality stems from empathy and concern for our fellow man. Good people will do good things, bad people will do bad things; but for good people to do bad things, that takes religion. Dictators take control of a populace by instilling fear of punishment, how is religion any different than that? Mark Twain once said "It ain't the parts of the bible I don't understand that bother me, it's the parts I DO understand. Now the question: Do YOU understand why the bible is said to be the source of morality? Because I sure don't.?
The question regarding which should be taught in public school Evolution or creation is misleading. I would say both should be taught in public school but within the proper context, i.e. Evolution in science class and creation in classes on religion. It's always been astounding to me that creationists bellow about teaching the controversy (creation in science class) but they seem to fail to realize that many schools have classes on religion and even teach bible stories in literature class. There aren't any scientists I'm aware of that are hollering to have evolution taught in classes on religion.
No. Religious accounts are of a private matter and has no place in schools. Or else, what religion's creation story would be thought? The Hindu creation? The Islamic version? The Jewish account? Scientology maybe? There are so many religions and beliefs that we cannot possibly take only one into account and discriminate all the others. At least, it cannot be imposed during the academic progress. Childrens are the most malleable people intellectually and we should not be asking them to chose between facts and myths. They cannot possibly understand and make informed choices at this age. Especially when their parents tell them every nights how "Jesus" loves them and how they should have "faith" in these things, how confusing for the children that learns the very mechanisms of the world in biology at the same time. That's why churches have always and will always try to take them young, at school. So no. Religions has NO place at all in schools, it's a matter of personal beliefs and should remain at a family range, not public school teachings.
We already have classes in public schools that teach students about various world religions which include introducing them to what members of those religions believe. We also have courses on ancient Mythology that teach students about what the ancient Greeks, Romans, Mayans, Aztecs, Egyptians, etc. believed. Are classes in ancient beliefs to be abolished as well? Shouldn't students be taught about historical and current cultures and societies?
***** No! Of course not. Along with ancient cultures and mythologies, the religious account should be taught as a "what people believed in" framework. Not a "here is how it works" stuff. Understand the difference? I think we may have misunderstood each other. Like you, I'm 100% for the well-oriented education on history and that is why one religion should not be thought as a veridic account of the history. Because you know, in every scriptures of every religions, there are teachings that makes claims about the world (how it was constructed, why, what we should do about it...) but that is only a matter of belief that has nothing to do with what is confirmed with science and history. Are we clear on that? I don't want you to think that I said we should not inform children about history or the religious beliefs all over the world. I just don't want childrens to be though the entire account of how the world was magically created by a specific religious view. It is irrelevant and confusing for them. If they are interested and wanna know more about a religion, they will find other times outside school to read about it. In schools, there should be only teachings of well studied and confirmed facts about the world.
***** As a child I was exposed to numerous religions ranging from Christianity to Wicca to Buddhism. I found classes in religion and mythology to some of my favourite subjects, oddly enough without them having a profound impact on my personal beliefs. I would never propose or support the teaching of one specific religious institution as unquestionably true over any other but I do think it's important to teach children about religions in an academic setting. Expose them to a variety of religions while applying critical thinking skills and perhaps they'll be less susceptible to the effects of religious brain washing, e.g. the Branch Davidians and Heaven's Gate.
***** Agreed. Have you had philosophy class? I've has both philosophy class and Ethics and cultures class and I would say it informed me a lot about religions. I made my position much more clear when I learnt about all the other beliefs (from stupid to very dangerous) that people hold during history. It's mind boggling that people still believe in gods in 2013, after all we learned about the world.
@@ozowen5961 It is very correct. With you would be a theory of Evolution you can't reproduce any step of this evolution you claim to be able to explain, nor can you predict any future development of actual species. But you're proud to repeat such a nonsense like the Whales developing from land mammals. Not realizing how retarded this story is.
@@O-Kyklop What do you mean by "reproduced"? Experiments on organelles in cells have shown the ID claims of Irreducible Complexity to be nonsense because they can indeed be reduced down by removing genes and still have functioning organelles. DNA experiments of many sorts of this nature are being done all the time taking the genome as a time capsule. Predicting the future of a species is not possible because no one can tell what the genomic mutations will be that Natural Selection will respond to the changing environment with. However, pathways of change are being seen all the time. Since whales are closely related genetically to other land animals, and their fossil evolution is well noted, your claims that this is somehow bogus are just you scoffing at the science because, well, you are a bit of a mental midget.
@@ozowen5961 Mate. If you don't know what it means to "reproduce" an evolutive process to develop new species from existing ones, then forget it. Try playing chess. But I try to stand on the shoulders of giants, like you. I just wonder, where did the whale consulate his mutation from legs to flippers. On land or in Water. Because either way that animal would have been extinct in one or two generations. But you're the brain here.
The reason people do not like evolutionism is its connection to atheism, eugenics and massmurder racial cleansing. All of which are valid objections against political application.
Bullshit. The only people who see that in a scientific theory are religious fundamentalists. The very people most likely to partake in gendercide and racial cleansing.
“People cited violation of the First Amendment when a New Jersey schoolteacher asserted that evolution and the Big Bang are not scientific and that Noah's ark carried dinosaurs. This case is not about the need to separate church and state; it's about the need to separate ignorant, scientifically illiterate people from the ranks of teachers.” ― Neil deGrasse Tyson
The Neil deGrasse Tyson who claims that Information has MASS? Ok. Guess on which side will he stay when the separation takes place. As for Evolutions theory and BigBang not being scientific theories, well, it is true (let aside the dinos now). The theory of Evolution is not even a Theory and the BB is a transcription of the Book Genesis of the Bible, just written in scientific nomenclature. It has been even written by a jesuit priest. Don'r even need to go around looking for evidence. the priest IS the evidence.
@@O-Kyklop Your ignorance and gullibility have no limits. Creatard dipshits do not get to dietermine what is or is not a scientific theory. Go back to your pedophile priest, crawl back under your rock.
@@O-Kyklop I imagine Sunday school history: how the people came to be? Magic. When was the flood? Who the fuk knows, somewhat (insert number) years ago. How did it happen? Magic. How the earth was repopulated? Well that's a tricky question. When brothers and sisters love each other very much.. How did jesus do miracles? Magic. How everything was created? Should guess by now - MAGIC.
@@smashexentertainment676 Well. How they tell you the BB came about is magic too, if you look a bit closer. And, the BB being magic, all further explanations about the way Universe works are based on magic too.
chris prevatt The Scientific Case Against Evolution by Henry M. Morris, Ph.D. Belief in evolution is a remarkable phenomenon. It is a belief passionately defended by the scientific establishment, despite the lack of any observable scientific evidence for macroevolution (that is, evolution from one distinct kind of organism into another). This odd situation is briefly documented here by citing recent statements from leading evolutionists admitting their lack of proof. These statements inadvertently show that evolution on any significant scale does not occur at present, and never happened in the past, and could never happen at all. Evolution Is Not Happening Now First of all, the lack of a case for evolution is clear from the fact that no one has ever seen it happen. If it were a real process, evolution should still be occurring, and there should be many "transitional" forms that we could observe. What we see instead, of course, is an array of distinct "kinds" of plants and animals with many varieties within each kind, but with very clear and -- apparently -- unbridgeable gaps between the kinds. That is, for example, there are many varieties of dogs and many varieties of cats, but no "dats" or "cogs." Such variation is often called microevolution, and these minor horizontal (or downward) changes occur fairly often, but such changes are not true "vertical" evolution. Evolutionary geneticists have often experimented on fruit flies and other rapidly reproducing species to induce mutational changes hoping they would lead to new and better species, but these have all failed to accomplish their goal. No truly new species has ever been produced, let alone a new "basic kind." A current leading evolutionist, Jeffrey Schwartz, professor of anthropology at the University of Pittsburgh, has recently acknowledged that: . . . it was and still is the case that, with the exception of Dobzhansky's claim about a new species of fruit fly, the formation of a new species, by any mechanism, has never been observed.1 The scientific method traditionally has required experimental observation and replication. The fact that macroevolution (as distinct from microevolution) has never been observed would seem to exclude it from the domain of true science. Even Ernst Mayr, the dean of living evolutionists, longtime professor of biology at Harvard, who has alleged that evolution is a "simple fact," nevertheless agrees that it is an "historical science" for which "laws and experiments are inappropriate techniques"2 by which to explain it. One can never actually see evolution in action. Evolution Never Happened in the Past Evolutionists commonly answer the above criticism by claiming that evolution goes too slowly for us to see it happening today. They used to claim that the real evidence for evolution was in the fossil record of the past, but the fact is that the billions of known fossils do not include a single unequivocal transitional form with transitional structures in the process of evolving. Given that evolution, according to Darwin, was in a continual state of motion . . . it followed logically that the fossil record should be rife with examples of transitional forms leading from the less to the more evolved.3 Even those who believe in rapid evolution recognize that a considerable number of generations would be required for one distinct "kind" to evolve into another more complex kind. There ought, therefore, to be a considerable number of true transitional structures preserved in the fossils -- after all, there are billions of non-transitional structures there! But (with the exception of a few very doubtful creatures such as the controversial feathered dinosaurs and the alleged walking whales), they are not there. Instead of filling in the gaps in the fossil record with so-called missing links, most paleontologists found themselves facing a situation in which there were only gaps in the fossil record, with no evidence of transformational intermediates between documented fossil species.4 The entire history of evolution from the evolution of life from non-life to the evolution of vertebrates from invertebrates to the evolution of man from the ape is strikingly devoid of intermediates: the links are all missing in the fossil record, just as they are in the present world. With respect to the origin of life, a leading researcher in this field, Leslie Orgel, after noting that neither proteins nor nucleic acids could have arisen without the other, concludes: And so, at first glance, one might have to conclude that life could never, in fact, have originated by chemical means.5 Being committed to total evolution as he is, Dr. Orgel cannot accept any such conclusion as that. Therefore, he speculates that RNA may have come first, but then he still has to admit that: The precise events giving rise to the RNA world remain unclear. . . . investigators have proposed many hypotheses, but evidence in favor of each of them is fragmentary at best.6 Translation: "There is no known way by which life could have arisen naturalistically." Unfortunately, two generations of students have been taught that Stanley Miller's famous experiment on a gaseous mixture, practically proved the naturalistic origin of life. But not so! Miller put the whole thing in a ball, gave it an electric charge, and waited. He found that amino acids and other fundamental complex molecules were accumulating at the bottom of the apparatus. His discovery gave a huge boost to the scientific investigation of the origin of life. Indeed, for some time it seemed like creation of life in a test tube was within reach of experimental science. Unfortunately, such experiments have not progressed much further than the original prototype, leaving us with a sour aftertaste from the primordial soup.7 Neither is there any clue as to how the one-celled organisms of the primordial world could have evolved into the vast array of complex multi-celled invertebrates of the Cambrian period. Even dogmatic evolutionist Gould admits that: The Cambrian explosion was the most remarkable and puzzling event in the history of life.8 Equally puzzling, however, is how some invertebrate creature in the ancient ocean, with all its "hard parts" on the outside, managed to evolve into the first vertebrate -- that is, the first fish-- with its hard parts all on the inside. Yet the transition from spineless invertebrates to the first backboned fishes is still shrouded in mystery, and many theories abound.9 Other gaps are abundant, with no real transitional series anywhere. A very bitter opponent of creation science, paleontologist, Niles Eldredge, has acknowledged that there is little, if any, evidence of evolutionary transitions in the fossil record. Instead, things remain the same! It is a simple ineluctable truth that virtually all members of a biota remain basically stable, with minor fluctuations, throughout their durations. . . .10 So how do evolutionists arrive at their evolutionary trees from fossils of oganisms which didn't change during their durations? Fossil discoveries can muddle over attempts to construct simple evolutionary trees -- fossils from key periods are often not intermediates, but rather hodge podges of defining features of many different groups. . . . Generally, it seems that major groups are not assembled in a simple linear or progressive manner -- new features are often "cut and pasted" on different groups at different times.11 As far as ape/human intermediates are concerned, the same is true, although anthropologists have been eagerly searching for them for many years. Many have been proposed, but each has been rejected in turn. All that paleoanthropologists have to show for more than 100 years of digging are remains from fewer than 2000 of our ancestors. They have used this assortment of jawbones, teeth and fossilized scraps, together with molecular evidence from living species, to piece together a line of human descent going back 5 to 8 million years to the time when humans and chimpanzees diverged from a common ancestor.12 Anthropologists supplemented their extremely fragmentary fossil evidence with DNA and other types of molecular genetic evidence from living animals to try to work out an evolutionary scenario that will fit. But this genetic evidence really doesn't help much either, for it contradicts fossil evidence. Lewin notes that: The overall effect is that molecular phylogenetics is by no means as straightforward as its pioneers believed. . . . The Byzantine dynamics of genome change has many other consequences for molecular phylogenetics, including the fact that different genes tell different stories.13 Summarizing the genetic data from humans, another author concludes, rather pessimistically: Even with DNA sequence data, we have no direct access to the processes of evolution, so objective reconstruction of the vanished past can be achieved only by creative imagination.14 Since there is no real scientific evidence that evolution is occurring at present or ever occurred in the past, it is reasonable to conclude that evolution is not a fact of science, as many claim. In fact, it is not even science at all, but an arbitrary system built upon faith in universal naturalism. Actually, these negative evidences against evolution are, at the same time, strong positive evidences for special creation. They are, in fact, specific predictions based on the creation model of origins. Creationists would obviously predict ubiquitous gaps between created kinds, though with many varieties capable of arising within each kind, in order to enable each basic kind to cope with changing environments without becoming extinct. Creationists also would anticipate that any "vertical changes" in organized complexity would be downward, since the Creator (by definition) would create things correctly to begin with. Thus, arguments and evidences against evolution are, at the same time, positive evidences for creation. The Equivocal Evidence from Genetics Nevertheless, because of the lack of any direct evidence for evolution, evolutionists are increasingly turning to dubious circumstantial evidences, such as similarities in DNA or other biochemical components of organisms as their "proof" that evolution is a scientific fact. A number of evolutionists have even argued that DNA itself is evidence for evolution since it is common to all organisms. More often is the argument used that similar DNA structures in two different organisms proves common evolutionary ancestry. Neither argument is valid. There is no reason whatever why the Creator could not or would not use the same type of genetic code based on DNA for all His created life forms. This is evidence for intelligent design and creation, not evolution. The most frequently cited example of DNA commonality is the human/chimpanzee "similarity," noting that chimpanzees have more than 90% of their DNA the same as humans. This is hardly surprising, however, considering the many physiological resemblances between people and chimpanzees. Why shouldn't they have similar DNA structures in comparison, say, to the DNA differences between men and spiders? Similarities -- whether of DNA, anatomy, embryonic development, or anything else -- are better explained in terms of creation by a common Designer than by evolutionary relationship. The great differences between organisms are of greater significance than the similarities, and evolutionism has no explanation for these if they all are assumed to have had the same ancestor. How could these great gaps between kinds ever arise at all, by any natural process? The apparently small differences between human and chimpanzee DNA obviously produce very great differences in their respective anatomies, intelligence, etc. The superficial similarities between all apes and human beings are nothing compared to the differences in any practical or observable sense. Nevertheless, evolutionists, having largely become disenchanted with the fossil record as a witness for evolution because of the ubiquitous gaps where there should be transitions, recently have been promoting DNA and other genetic evidence as proof of evolution. However, as noted above by Roger Lewin, this is often inconsistent with, not only the fossil record, but also with the comparative morphology of the creatures. Lewin also mentions just a few typical contradictions yielded by this type of evidence in relation to more traditional Darwinian "proofs." The elephant shrew, consigned by traditional analysis to the order insectivores . . . is in fact more closely related to . . . the true elephant. Cows are more closely related to dolphins than they are to horses. The duckbilled platypus . . . is on equal evolutionary footing with . . . kangaroos and koalas.15 There are many even more bizarre comparisons yielded by this approach. The abundance of so-called "junk DNA" in the genetic code also has been offered as a special type of evidence for evolution, especially those genes which they think have experienced mutations, sometimes called "pseudogenes."16 However, evidence is accumulating rapidly today that these supposedly useless genes do actually perform useful functions. Enough genes have already been uncovered in the genetic midden to show that what was once thought to be waste is definitely being transmitted into scientific code.17 It is thus wrong to decide that junk DNA, even the socalled "pseudogenes," have no function. That is merely an admission of ignorance and an object for fruitful research. Like the socalled "vestigial organs" in man, once considered as evidence of evolution but now all known to have specific uses, so the junk DNA and pseudogenes most probably are specifically useful to the organism, whether or not those uses have yet been discovered by scientists. At the very best this type of evidence is strictly circumstantial and can be explained just as well in terms of primeval creation supplemented in some cases by later deterioration, just as expected in the creation model. The real issue is, as noted before, whether there is any observable evidence that evolution is occurring now or has ever occurred in the past. As we have seen, even evolutionists have to acknowledge that this type of real scientific evidence for evolution does not exist. A good question to ask is: Why are all observable evolutionary changes either horizontal and trivial (so-called microevolution) or downward toward deterioration and extinction? The answer seems to be found in the universally applicable laws of the science of thermodynamics. Evolution Could Never Happen at All The main scientific reason why there is no evidence for evolution in either the present or the past (except in the creative imagination of evolutionary scientists) is because one of the most fundamental laws of nature precludes it. The law of increasing entropy -- also known as the second law of thermodynamics -- stipulates that all systems in the real world tend to go "downhill," as it were, toward disorganization and decreased complexity. This law of entropy is, by any measure, one of the most universal, bestproved laws of nature. It applies not only in physical and chemical systems, but also in biological and geological systems -- in fact, in all systems, without exception. No exception to the second law of thermodynamics has ever been found -- not even a tiny one. Like conservation of energy (the "first law"), the existence of a law so precise and so independent of details of models must have a logical foundation that is independent of the fact that matter is composed of interacting particles.18 The author of this quote is referring primarily to physics, but he does point out that the second law is "independent of details of models." Besides, practically all evolutionary biologists are reductionists -- that is, they insist that there are no "vitalist" forces in living systems, and that all biological processes are explicable in terms of physics and chemistry. That being the case, biological processes also must operate in accordance with the laws of thermodynamics, and practically all biologists acknowledge this. Evolutionists commonly insist, however, that evolution is a fact anyhow, and that the conflict is resolved by noting that the earth is an "open system," with the incoming energy from the sun able to sustain evolution throughout the geological ages in spite of the natural tendency of all systems to deteriorate toward disorganization. That is how an evolutionary entomologist has dismissed W. A. Dembski's impressive recent book, Intelligent Design. This scientist defends what he thinks is "natural processes' ability to increase complexity" by noting what he calls a "flaw" in "the arguments against evolution based on the second law of thermodynamics." And what is this flaw? Although the overall amount of disorder in a closed system cannot decrease, local order within a larger system can increase even without the actions of an intelligent agent.19 This naive response to the entropy law is typical of evolutionary dissimulation. While it is true that local order can increase in an open system if certain conditions are met, the fact is that evolution does not meet those conditions. Simply saying that the earth is open to the energy from the sun says nothing about how that raw solar heat is converted into increased complexity in any system, open or closed. The fact is that the best known and most fundamental equation of thermodynamics says that the influx of heat into an open system will increase the entropy of that system, not decrease it. All known cases of decreased entropy (or increased organization) in open systems involve a guiding program of some sort and one or more energy conversion mechanisms. Evolution has neither of these. Mutations are not "organizing" mechanisms, but disorganizing (in accord with the second law). They are commonly harmful, sometimes neutral, but never beneficial (at least as far as observed mutations are concerned). Natural selection cannot generate order, but can only "sieve out" the disorganizing mutations presented to it, thereby conserving the existing order, but never generating new order. In principle, it may be barely conceivable that evolution could occur in open systems, in spite of the tendency of all systems to disintegrate sooner or later. But no one yet has been able to show that it actually has the ability to overcome this universal tendency, and that is the basic reason why there is still no bona fide proof of evolution, past or present. From the statements of evolutionists themselves, therefore, we have learned that there is no real scientific evidence for real evolution. The only observable evidence is that of very limited horizontal (or downward) changes within strict limits. Evolution is Religion -- Not Science In no way does the idea of particles-to-people evolution meet the long-accepted criteria of a scientific theory. There are no such evolutionary transitions that have ever been observed in the fossil record of the past; and the universal law of entropy seems to make it impossible on any significant scale. Evolutionists claim that evolution is a scientific fact, but they almost always lose scientific debates with creationist scientists. Accordingly, most evolutionists now decline opportunities for scientific debates, preferring instead to make unilateral attacks on creationists. Scientists should refuse formal debates because they do more harm than good, but scientists still need to counter the creationist message.20 The question is, just why do they need to counter the creationist message? Why are they so adamantly committed to anti-creationism? The fact is that evolutionists believe in evolution because they want to. It is their desire at all costs to explain the origin of everything without a Creator. Evolutionism is thus intrinsically an atheistic religion. Some may prefer to call it humanism, and "new age" evolutionists place it in the context of some form of pantheism, but they all amount to the same thing. Whether atheism or humanism (or even pantheism), the purpose is to eliminate a personal God from any active role in the origin of the universe and all its components, including man. The core of the humanistic philosophy is naturalism -- the proposition that the natural world proceeds according to its own internal dynamics, without divine or supernatural control or guidance, and that we human beings are creations of that process. It is instructive to recall that the philosophers of the early humanistic movement debated as to which term more adequately described their position: humanism or naturalism. The two concepts are complementary and inseparable.21 Since both naturalism and humanism exclude God from science or any other active function in the creation or maintenance of life and the universe in general, it is very obvious that their position is nothing but atheism. And atheism, no less than theism, is a religion! Even doctrinaire-atheistic evolutionist Richard Dawkins admits that atheism cannot be proved to be true. Of course we can't prove that there isn't a God.22 Therefore, they must believe it, and that makes it a religion. The atheistic nature of evolution is not only admitted, but insisted upon by most of the leaders of evolutionary thought. Ernst Mayr, for example, says that: Darwinism rejects all supernatural phenomena and causations.23 A professor in the Department of Biology at Kansas State University says: Even if all the data point to an intelligent designer, such a hypothesis is excluded from science because it is not naturalistic.24 It is well known by almost everyone in the scientific world today that such influential evolutionists as Stephen Jay Gould and Edward Wilson of Harvard, Richard Dawkins of England, William Provine of Cornell, and numerous other evolutionary spokesmen are dogmatic atheists. Eminent scientific philosopher and ardent Darwinian atheist Michael Ruse has even acknowledged that evolution is their religion! Evolution is promoted by its practitioners as more than mere science. Evolution is promulgated as an ideology, a secular religion -- a full-fledged alternative to Christianity, with meaning and morality . . . . Evolution is a religion. This was true of evolution in the beginning, and it is true of evolution still today.25 Another way of saying "religion" is "worldview," the whole of reality. The evolutionary worldview applies not only to the evolution of life, but even to that of the entire universe. In the realm of cosmic evolution, our naturalistic scientists depart even further from experimental science than life scientists do, manufacturing a variety of evolutionary cosmologies from esoteric mathematics and metaphysical speculation. Socialist Jeremy Rifkin has commented on this remarkable game. Cosmologies are made up of small snippets of physical reality that have been remodeled by society into vast cosmic deceptions.26 They must believe in evolution, therefore, in spite of all the evidence, not because of it. And speaking of deceptions, note the following remarkable statement. We take the side of science in spite of the patent absurdity of some of its constructs, . . . in spite of the tolerance of the scientific community for unsubstantiated commitment to materialism. . . . we are forced by our a priori adherence to material causes to create an apparatus of investigation and set of concepts that produce material explanations, no matter how counterintuitive, no matter how mystifying to the uninitiated. Moreover, that materialism is absolute, for we cannot allow a Divine Foot in the door.27 The author of this frank statement is Richard Lewontin of Harvard. Since evolution is not a laboratory science, there is no way to test its validity, so all sorts of justso stories are contrived to adorn the textbooks. But that doesn't make them true! An evolutionist reviewing a recent book by another (but more critical) evolutionist, says: We cannot identify ancestors or "missing links," and we cannot devise testable theories to explain how particular episodes of evolution came about. Gee is adamant that all the popular stories about how the first amphibians conquered the dry land, how the birds developed wings and feathers for flying, how the dinosaurs went extinct, and how humans evolved from apes are just products of our imagination, driven by prejudices and preconceptions.28 A fascinatingly honest admission by a physicist indicates the passionate commitment of establishment scientists to naturalism. Speaking of the trust students naturally place in their highly educated college professors, he says: And I use that trust to effectively brainwash them. . . . our teaching methods are primarily those of propaganda. We appeal -- without demonstration -- to evidence that supports our position. We only introduce arguments and evidence that supports the currently accepted theories and omit or gloss over any evidence to the contrary.29 Creationist students in scientific courses taught by evolutionist professors can testify to the frustrating reality of that statement. Evolution is, indeed, the pseudoscientific basis of religious atheism, as Ruse pointed out. Will Provine at Cornell University is another scientist who frankly acknowledges this. As the creationists claim, belief in modern evolution makes atheists of people. One can have a religious view that is compatible with evolution only if the religious view is indistinguishable from atheism.30 Once again, we emphasize that evolution is not science, evolutionists' tirades notwithstanding. It is a philosophical worldview, nothing more. (Evolution) must, they feel, explain everything. . . . A theory that explains everything might just as well be discarded since it has no real explanatory value. Of course, the other thing about evolution is that anything can be said because very little can be disproved. Experimental evidence is minimal.31 Even that statement is too generous. Actual experimental evidence demonstrating true evolution (that is, macroevolution) is not "minimal." It is nonexistent! The concept of evolution as a form of religion is not new. In my book, The Long War Against God,32 I documented the fact that some form of evolution has been the pseudo-rationale behind every anti-creationist religion since the very beginning of history. This includes all the ancient ethnic religions, as well as such modern world religions as Buddhism, Hinduism, and others, as well as the "liberal" movements in even the creationist religions (Christianity, Judaism, Islam). As far as the twentieth century is concerned, the leading evolutionist is generally considered to be Sir Julian Huxley, primary architect of modern neo-Darwinism. Huxley called evolution a "religion without revelation" and wrote a book with that title (2nd edition, 1957). In a later book, he said: Evolution . . . is the most powerful and the most comprehensive idea that has ever arisen on earth.33 Later in the book he argued passionately that we must change "our pattern of religious thought from a God-centered to an evolution-centered pattern."34 Then he went on to say that: "The God hypothesis . . . is becoming an intellectual and moral burden on our thought." Therefore, he concluded that "we must construct something to take its place."35 That something, of course, is the religion of evolutionary humanism, and that is what the leaders of evolutionary humanism are trying to do today. In closing this survey of the scientific case against evolution (and, therefore, for creation), the reader is reminded again that all quotations in the article are from doctrinaire evolutionists. No Bible references are included, and no statements by creationists. The evolutionists themselves, to all intents and purposes, have shown that evolutionism is not science, but religious faith in atheism.
Dagan Poe Well, he is wrong about "dats and cogs" The hyena resembles a dog in appearance and behavior, but it is genetically more closely related to cats.
Evolution will never become a fact. Because evolution is based on facts. The theory of evolution is the best explanation for the facts observed. Theories never become laws either. So saying I don't believe in the theory of evolution because it is not a fact, is scientific illiteracy. Gravity is both a law and a theory. The fact observed is that things fall. The law is that things fall at 9.81 meters per second squared. The theory tries to explain why things fall.
Semantics. You're playing games with various definitions of the words theory and law. Layman's definitions vs scientific definitions. Plus your understanding of gravity is superficial.
dothedeed Laurent Jade clearly used the word 'theory' in exactly *one* sense: the scientific one. If using language accurately _is_ a game, then you finished a poor second (out of two!)
Isaac Wolvie And creationism is not brainwash? How come creationists have the highest church-attendance among Christians? "Evolutionists" don't go to no Creation Museum to sit in front of a charlatan spewing pseudo-scientific bullshit as truth. But they give you hope, they enforce your faith, and that makes you feel good. You creationists blindly trust all the lies your mega-church, multi-millionnaire preachers vomit. I'll trust the scientists....
*EVIDENCE FOR EVOLUTION - Our Common Ancestry* with chimps is based on more than physical or genetic similarity. although those are pieces of evidence. Just as you have in your genome a defective gene you inherited from your parents who inherited it from their ancestors.That gene, named GULO, is what allows most other animals to produce vitamin C which is essential for good health. That gene has a specific mutation which prevents it from completing the final stage of vitamin C production and it is now a pseudo gene. Humans who do not get vitamin C in their diet (from fresh fruits and vegetables) get Scurvy, a disease that decimated the crews of sailing ships. It turns out that chimps have that same defective gene, disabled by exactly the same mutation. That fact does not bother chimpanzees in the least, because their diet of mostly leaves and fruit provide all the vitamin C they need. Living chimps today of course got that defective gene from their parents who got it from their ancestors who happen to be our ancestors as well. Not only does every ape have that same pseudo gene with the same disabling mutation so in fact does every other primate in the sub order Haplorhini. That is Old World monkeys, New World monkeys, even Tarsiers, which are close to basal primates but not ancestral to the Strepsirrhini sub order (Lemurs, Lorises et al). That places the origin of that mutation to be about 63 million years ago and underscores their common ancestry. And that is just one of the many pseudo genes passed from generation to generation from ancestors to present day organisms that are evidence for common ancestry. But those are just part of the problem for creationists and "intelligent design" advocates. Evolution explains pseudo genes very well. Explaining why some "creative entity" would leave such things "on the cutting room floor" is quite another matter. And as if that were not enough, there is the matter of Endogenous Retroviruses (ERV's), the genetic 'fossils' of ancient retroviral infections. The thing about retroviruses is that when they enter a host organism's cell, they always insert DNA copies of their RNA into a random location of that host's genome. When that cell divides and replicates, the viral DNA will be replicated at that same location. If that cell is a germ cell, that DNA sequence will be replicated and passed through millions of generations and found in present day species. Again, that is also evidence of common ancestry. As always, the creationist/'intelligent design' people have no good explanation for them. Those ERV's make up 8% of the human genome which is an awful lot of DNA compared to just 2% that code for proteins. That expanse of DNA may be something of a 'Scrap Pile' of disabled viruses, but that doesn't mean that certain useful snippets can't be found and put to use. They certainly have. One such snippet is a segment of Human Endogenous Retrovirus W (HERV-W), named Synctin 1 which in humans aids the formation of the placenta. See: "Syncytin is a captive retroviral envelope protein involved in human placental morphogenesis" www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10693809 Now, other placental mammals use other versions of synctins for placental development, but they are derived from different ERV's. The one utilized by the human genome is the same one used by the other apes and Old World monkeys, but not New World monkeys, which places common ancestry of those species (Catarrhini) more than 25 million years ago. academy.resonance.is/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/endogenous-retroviruses.jpg slideplayer.com/slide/5684143/18/images/63/endogenous+retroviruses.jpg
*EVIDENCE FOR EVOLUTION - The Predictive Ability of the Theory - Part II* The defining characteristic of all scientific knowledge, including theories, is the ability to make falsifiable or testable predictions. The best test of any scientific theory is its usefulness as a predictive tool. In that respect, the Theory of Evolution performs admirably. The Theory of Evolution would predict that, IF birds evolved from dinosaurs, there should be a progression of derived traits in dinosaurs leading up to the origin of birds and that is exactly what we see. Perhaps the most complete transitional sequence in the fossil record is that from dinosaurs to birds. Birds didn’t just evolve from dinosaurs overnight, but the features of birds evolved one by one; first light bones and bipedal locomotion, then feathers, then a wishbone, then more complex feathers that look like quill-pen feathers, then wings. Yes, wings evolved before flight. Just as there are birds today such as ostriches, emus, rheas, etc. that no longer fly, yet still use their wings for other purposes, there were winged theropod dinosaurs that may have used them to shelter young, for mating displays, or intimidating a predator or rival just as do birds of today. Long before wings, the forelimbs of theropods evolved to allow them to reach forward to grasp prey with their claws. Those are the Maniraptors. That movement is exactly the same as that required for flapping wings. Archaeopteryx still had those grasping claws as did other early birds. The young chicks of the Hoatzin still retain them. Claws are also evident on many bird species; Emus, Cassowarys and Kiwis still have them on vestigial wings. Feathers and scales are formed from the same material, keratin. Birds retain scales on their legs; the japanese Silkie chicken has been bred for fully feathered legs, indicating that only slight genetic modification is necessary. Take a look at an Emu; its legs are exactly what would be expected on a dinosaur. It too, has a useless nub of a wing with an equally useless claw. Vestigial remnants are always confusing to creationists There is a succession of feathered dinosaur fossils with increasingly bird like characteristics i.e. Xiaotingia, Sinosauropteryx prima, Caudipteryx, Sinovenator and others. Any of these fossils showing such a mix of traits can be considered transitional. The whole lineage of feathered dinosaurs could be considered transitional. The fossil record even shows the stages of feather evolution from simple spikes to down to contour feathers and ultimately to quilled flight feathers. Today we have lots of feathered dinosaur fossils; so many feathered theropod fossils in fact, that most paleontologists now think ALL theropods were probably feathered. There were dinosaurs with wings that couldn't possibly fly, like 5 foot 40 pound Zhenyuanlong suni. There were a great many almost-birds and not-quite-birds, until about 150 million years ago, birds ultimately took flight. Birds or almost birds like Auronis, Archaeopteryx, Shenzhouraptor, Rahonavis, Yandangornis Jixiangornis, Sapeornis, Omnivoropteryx, Confuciusornis and Changchengornis retain some dinosaur-like features such as teeth and long bony tails. Evolution is NOT a linear process. Many of these species lived at the same time, displaying a matrix of characteristics. Evolution is a natural experiment. Some things work and get perpetuated, others may enjoy brief success before extinction. Any organism that can exploit a new environment or food source has an evolutionary advantage.When birds took to the air it vastly expanded their ability to move through and into new environments and rapid diversification followed. With so many transitional fossils displaying both bird-like and dinosaur-like features, there is an almost seamless transition from dinosaur to bird (as well as a great number of dead end evolutionary experiments) and it is often difficult to separate the two. Doing so requires statistical analysis of nearly 1000 inherited and derived characteristics. Lest you think of evolution as being a linear process, feathered non-avian dinosaurs continued to pursue differing evolutionary paths. About 25 million years after the origin of birds saw new evolutionary experiments in Microraptors, four winged dromeosaurs with pinnaceous flight feathers on both arms and legs that were capable of gliding and possibly powered flight as well. Their fossils indicate that for a while at least, they were quite successful. There are some 300 of these fossil 'experiments' in museum collections around the world. Coinciding with the demise of the dinosaurs, a great many lineages of birds (excuse me, Avian Dinosaurs) and mammals also perished. However, so many environmental niches were opened to mammals and birds that, again, rapid diversification followed in both groups. The Theory of Evolution predicted that, IF birds evolved from dinosaurs, there should be a progression of derived traits in dinosaurs leading up to the origin of birds and that is exactly what we see. It is not just that birds descended from theropod dinosaurs, they ARE theropod dinosaurs,... AND Amniotes AND Sarcopterygians AND Vertebrates AND Animals AND Eucaryotes, because ones ancestry is never lost.
Scientific belief and Religious belief are two entirely separate things. The scientific use of theory and the common vernacular of theory also mean two entirely separate things. Too many people, however, assume that belief trumps fact or truth, when in reality, fact and truth do not require belief to exist. Too many people are willing to dismiss fact and truth as 'That is your belief' when they disagree. Then they will exaggerate to back up their statement. As a result, it brings me to my singular point: If you have to fight so hard to reinforce your beliefs to the point that you will ignore all evidence that contradicts your beliefs, perhaps you need to reexamine your philosophical existence in order to achieve a solution that works for everyone and not just yourself.
There is a difference between not understanding the evolution and denying it. Evolution is supported by evidences, although in some cases those evidences are not available for all animals, but they proof it for sure.
Most scientifically literate creation scientists accept the fact of micro-evolution but deny macro-evolution. I'm reminded of the joke Would you sleep with me for a $100. "No!!" Would you sleep with me for 1billion dollars dollars? "Uhh, maybe" OK we've established what you are, now we're just arguing price
Randall Wilks Hey Randall. Actually I must respectfully disagree. Dr. Michael Behe is a real scientist and admits "Evolution works". Creation scientists have also reputed the Moondust theory and Pulaxy Man. Even a stopped clock is right twice a day ;) You are essentially right though.
I don't get the whole micro vs macro evolution debate is small change can happen over a small amount of time then large change can happen over a large amount of time. That is just pure logical sense.
Evolution makes sense and explains many problems with how we got here and the diversity of life on Earth. In fact makes way more sense then the nonsense creationism is explaining.
+Omar Abuaita Evolution explains death, diversity and deformity. Religion explains those as the wages of sin (inherited from one's parents of course), makes zero predictions from that stance other than the ones they choose to make up (none of which are verifiable at all), and usually prefers to to fabricate such answers to recruit more followers.
+sarud durdstrom WTF!!!!!! Were you home schooled or just naturally stupid? Whoever told you that was evolution was dumber than a box of rocks. Get an education, it beats the hell out of ignorance.
Fossilization is an extremely rare process. We are lucky to even have the fossils we have. And in the absence of DNA in fossils (we call the ones that contain DNA "subfossils"), we can never _know_ whether a fossilized organism is the ancestor of another, or they are just distant cousins. Note: even if we didn't have any fossils at all, Genetics alone (the distribution of ERVs) provides conclusive evidence for past evolution hands down. And any observed instance of a speciation event (there are more than 30 so far, both in lab, and in Nature) shows that evolution happens continuously.
Describe these speciation events if you don't mind or tell me were I can go to study them. And how in the world does "the distribution of ERVs" point toward evolution when cats can only produce cats, dogs can only produce dogs, pigs can only produce pigs, and so on. See, animals can only produce toward its own "kind' and can never produce something in the slightest of differences. Sure you can have mutated animals, but name one instance where mutation was beneficial, and mutation still only produces out of it's own "kind."
Silas Cole I gave you the site where you can learn more, but seems like you have to be spoonfed: Two scientific studies describing speciation events (of the many): [Weinberg, J. R., V. R. Starczak and P. Jora. 1992. Evidence for rapid speciation following a founder event in the laboratory. Evolution. 46:1214-1220.] [Schluter, D. and L. M. Nagel. 1995. Parallel speciation by natural selection. American Naturalist. 146:292-301.] A prediction of the ToE is that we can find identical Endogenous retroviral gene insertions in the exact same spot of different species which we suspect to be of common ancestry (e.g. humans and other apes). Genetic studies in the 90s already found such ERV gene insertions, providing conclusive evidence for the claim that humans and all other apes share common ancestors. See: [Welkin E. Johnson and John M. Coffin. 1999. "Constructing primate phylogenies from ancient retrovirus sequences" Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 1999 August 31; 96(18): 10254-10260.] "point toward evolution when cats can only produce cats, dogs can only produce dogs, pigs can only produce pigs, and so on. " You know, "cat" is a big category; a taxonomic family (Felidae), "pig" is a genus (Sus), and "dog" is a subspecies of wolves (Canis lupus familiaris). And we know well that dogs were bred from ancient wolves (wolves producing dogs). "See, animals can only produce toward its own "kind' and can never produce something in the slightest of differences. " Define "kind". Be specific. I won't accept examples, only a clear, single-sentence definition. "Sure you can have mutated animals, but name one instance where mutation was beneficial," White skin was originally a mutation, and it is pretty beneficial in cloudy, foggy areas because it is better at producing vitamin D. Another example is the appearance of the Nylonase enzyme (you probably heard about this one) See: [Ohno S (April 1984). "Birth of a unique enzyme from an alternative reading frame of the preexisted, internally repetitious coding sequence"] "and mutation still only produces out of it's own "kind."" We will get back to this after you will be able to define "kind", but let it be suffice now that different mutations can accumulate over generations, and after 10, 1000, or even 100.000 generations, the accumulated mutations can result in pretty radical changes (See genetic drift).
internetsurfer777 whatever advise you give, make it short. so arguing with an age old greek sayings which are true the majority of times and therefor trying to adjust them and make them more complex, isn't always a good thing ;)
Trying to explain the integrity of the scientific method to someone who believes dinosaurs and people coexisted is like trying to explain vector calculus to someone who just learned to count to ten.
Although someone who learned how count count to ten have an edge to learn vector calculus, an hardcore creationists will have barely a chance to understand that the little world he's been indoctrinated to believe in all his life is in fact not real.
This debate is really getting mind numbing with science experts pseudo experts, believers, theologians, and charlatans talking over and past one another. Whether the science is flawed or not, it is science, and its study belongs in public schools. Whether there is a god or not, it is a belief, and belongs in church and sunday school. As long as neither venue teaches the controversy, there is no harm and no foul, and the kids can figure it out for themselves. I did.
Macro evolution brought about by unguided natural selection cannot be proven scientifically, yet it is still accepted as "science" by godless scientists. If the evidence leads to an intelligent cause as the best explanation, it cannot ever be accepted as real "science" because it is a threat to the New Atheist religion and its "spaghetti monster" god.
that is a completely cogent and sensible argument. I ought to be public policy ... but school boards are loaded with Fundamentalist Christians who forget that they are NOT teaching in a religious school.
HarleyDrummer1 The Scientific Case Against Evolution by Henry M. Morris, Ph.D. Belief in evolution is a remarkable phenomenon. It is a belief passionately defended by the scientific establishment, despite the lack of any observable scientific evidence for macroevolution (that is, evolution from one distinct kind of organism into another). This odd situation is briefly documented here by citing recent statements from leading evolutionists admitting their lack of proof. These statements inadvertently show that evolution on any significant scale does not occur at present, and never happened in the past, and could never happen at all. Evolution Is Not Happening Now First of all, the lack of a case for evolution is clear from the fact that no one has ever seen it happen. If it were a real process, evolution should still be occurring, and there should be many "transitional" forms that we could observe. What we see instead, of course, is an array of distinct "kinds" of plants and animals with many varieties within each kind, but with very clear and -- apparently -- unbridgeable gaps between the kinds. That is, for example, there are many varieties of dogs and many varieties of cats, but no "dats" or "cogs." Such variation is often called microevolution, and these minor horizontal (or downward) changes occur fairly often, but such changes are not true "vertical" evolution. Evolutionary geneticists have often experimented on fruit flies and other rapidly reproducing species to induce mutational changes hoping they would lead to new and better species, but these have all failed to accomplish their goal. No truly new species has ever been produced, let alone a new "basic kind." A current leading evolutionist, Jeffrey Schwartz, professor of anthropology at the University of Pittsburgh, has recently acknowledged that: . . . it was and still is the case that, with the exception of Dobzhansky's claim about a new species of fruit fly, the formation of a new species, by any mechanism, has never been observed.1 The scientific method traditionally has required experimental observation and replication. The fact that macroevolution (as distinct from microevolution) has never been observed would seem to exclude it from the domain of true science. Even Ernst Mayr, the dean of living evolutionists, longtime professor of biology at Harvard, who has alleged that evolution is a "simple fact," nevertheless agrees that it is an "historical science" for which "laws and experiments are inappropriate techniques"2 by which to explain it. One can never actually see evolution in action. Evolution Never Happened in the Past Evolutionists commonly answer the above criticism by claiming that evolution goes too slowly for us to see it happening today. They used to claim that the real evidence for evolution was in the fossil record of the past, but the fact is that the billions of known fossils do not include a single unequivocal transitional form with transitional structures in the process of evolving. Given that evolution, according to Darwin, was in a continual state of motion . . . it followed logically that the fossil record should be rife with examples of transitional forms leading from the less to the more evolved.3 Even those who believe in rapid evolution recognize that a considerable number of generations would be required for one distinct "kind" to evolve into another more complex kind. There ought, therefore, to be a considerable number of true transitional structures preserved in the fossils -- after all, there are billions of non-transitional structures there! But (with the exception of a few very doubtful creatures such as the controversial feathered dinosaurs and the alleged walking whales), they are not there. Instead of filling in the gaps in the fossil record with so-called missing links, most paleontologists found themselves facing a situation in which there were only gaps in the fossil record, with no evidence of transformational intermediates between documented fossil species.4 The entire history of evolution from the evolution of life from non-life to the evolution of vertebrates from invertebrates to the evolution of man from the ape is strikingly devoid of intermediates: the links are all missing in the fossil record, just as they are in the present world. With respect to the origin of life, a leading researcher in this field, Leslie Orgel, after noting that neither proteins nor nucleic acids could have arisen without the other, concludes: And so, at first glance, one might have to conclude that life could never, in fact, have originated by chemical means.5 Being committed to total evolution as he is, Dr. Orgel cannot accept any such conclusion as that. Therefore, he speculates that RNA may have come first, but then he still has to admit that: The precise events giving rise to the RNA world remain unclear. . . . investigators have proposed many hypotheses, but evidence in favor of each of them is fragmentary at best.6 Translation: "There is no known way by which life could have arisen naturalistically." Unfortunately, two generations of students have been taught that Stanley Miller's famous experiment on a gaseous mixture, practically proved the naturalistic origin of life. But not so! Miller put the whole thing in a ball, gave it an electric charge, and waited. He found that amino acids and other fundamental complex molecules were accumulating at the bottom of the apparatus. His discovery gave a huge boost to the scientific investigation of the origin of life. Indeed, for some time it seemed like creation of life in a test tube was within reach of experimental science. Unfortunately, such experiments have not progressed much further than the original prototype, leaving us with a sour aftertaste from the primordial soup.7 Neither is there any clue as to how the one-celled organisms of the primordial world could have evolved into the vast array of complex multi-celled invertebrates of the Cambrian period. Even dogmatic evolutionist Gould admits that: The Cambrian explosion was the most remarkable and puzzling event in the history of life.8 Equally puzzling, however, is how some invertebrate creature in the ancient ocean, with all its "hard parts" on the outside, managed to evolve into the first vertebrate -- that is, the first fish-- with its hard parts all on the inside. Yet the transition from spineless invertebrates to the first backboned fishes is still shrouded in mystery, and many theories abound.9 Other gaps are abundant, with no real transitional series anywhere. A very bitter opponent of creation science, paleontologist, Niles Eldredge, has acknowledged that there is little, if any, evidence of evolutionary transitions in the fossil record. Instead, things remain the same! It is a simple ineluctable truth that virtually all members of a biota remain basically stable, with minor fluctuations, throughout their durations. . . .10 So how do evolutionists arrive at their evolutionary trees from fossils of oganisms which didn't change during their durations? Fossil discoveries can muddle over attempts to construct simple evolutionary trees -- fossils from key periods are often not intermediates, but rather hodge podges of defining features of many different groups. . . . Generally, it seems that major groups are not assembled in a simple linear or progressive manner -- new features are often "cut and pasted" on different groups at different times.11 As far as ape/human intermediates are concerned, the same is true, although anthropologists have been eagerly searching for them for many years. Many have been proposed, but each has been rejected in turn. All that paleoanthropologists have to show for more than 100 years of digging are remains from fewer than 2000 of our ancestors. They have used this assortment of jawbones, teeth and fossilized scraps, together with molecular evidence from living species, to piece together a line of human descent going back 5 to 8 million years to the time when humans and chimpanzees diverged from a common ancestor.12 Anthropologists supplemented their extremely fragmentary fossil evidence with DNA and other types of molecular genetic evidence from living animals to try to work out an evolutionary scenario that will fit. But this genetic evidence really doesn't help much either, for it contradicts fossil evidence. Lewin notes that: The overall effect is that molecular phylogenetics is by no means as straightforward as its pioneers believed. . . . The Byzantine dynamics of genome change has many other consequences for molecular phylogenetics, including the fact that different genes tell different stories.13 Summarizing the genetic data from humans, another author concludes, rather pessimistically: Even with DNA sequence data, we have no direct access to the processes of evolution, so objective reconstruction of the vanished past can be achieved only by creative imagination.14 Since there is no real scientific evidence that evolution is occurring at present or ever occurred in the past, it is reasonable to conclude that evolution is not a fact of science, as many claim. In fact, it is not even science at all, but an arbitrary system built upon faith in universal naturalism. Actually, these negative evidences against evolution are, at the same time, strong positive evidences for special creation. They are, in fact, specific predictions based on the creation model of origins. Creationists would obviously predict ubiquitous gaps between created kinds, though with many varieties capable of arising within each kind, in order to enable each basic kind to cope with changing environments without becoming extinct. Creationists also would anticipate that any "vertical changes" in organized complexity would be downward, since the Creator (by definition) would create things correctly to begin with. Thus, arguments and evidences against evolution are, at the same time, positive evidences for creation. The Equivocal Evidence from Genetics Nevertheless, because of the lack of any direct evidence for evolution, evolutionists are increasingly turning to dubious circumstantial evidences, such as similarities in DNA or other biochemical components of organisms as their "proof" that evolution is a scientific fact. A number of evolutionists have even argued that DNA itself is evidence for evolution since it is common to all organisms. More often is the argument used that similar DNA structures in two different organisms proves common evolutionary ancestry. Neither argument is valid. There is no reason whatever why the Creator could not or would not use the same type of genetic code based on DNA for all His created life forms. This is evidence for intelligent design and creation, not evolution. The most frequently cited example of DNA commonality is the human/chimpanzee "similarity," noting that chimpanzees have more than 90% of their DNA the same as humans. This is hardly surprising, however, considering the many physiological resemblances between people and chimpanzees. Why shouldn't they have similar DNA structures in comparison, say, to the DNA differences between men and spiders? Similarities -- whether of DNA, anatomy, embryonic development, or anything else -- are better explained in terms of creation by a common Designer than by evolutionary relationship. The great differences between organisms are of greater significance than the similarities, and evolutionism has no explanation for these if they all are assumed to have had the same ancestor. How could these great gaps between kinds ever arise at all, by any natural process? The apparently small differences between human and chimpanzee DNA obviously produce very great differences in their respective anatomies, intelligence, etc. The superficial similarities between all apes and human beings are nothing compared to the differences in any practical or observable sense. Nevertheless, evolutionists, having largely become disenchanted with the fossil record as a witness for evolution because of the ubiquitous gaps where there should be transitions, recently have been promoting DNA and other genetic evidence as proof of evolution. However, as noted above by Roger Lewin, this is often inconsistent with, not only the fossil record, but also with the comparative morphology of the creatures. Lewin also mentions just a few typical contradictions yielded by this type of evidence in relation to more traditional Darwinian "proofs." The elephant shrew, consigned by traditional analysis to the order insectivores . . . is in fact more closely related to . . . the true elephant. Cows are more closely related to dolphins than they are to horses. The duckbilled platypus . . . is on equal evolutionary footing with . . . kangaroos and koalas.15 There are many even more bizarre comparisons yielded by this approach. The abundance of so-called "junk DNA" in the genetic code also has been offered as a special type of evidence for evolution, especially those genes which they think have experienced mutations, sometimes called "pseudogenes."16 However, evidence is accumulating rapidly today that these supposedly useless genes do actually perform useful functions. Enough genes have already been uncovered in the genetic midden to show that what was once thought to be waste is definitely being transmitted into scientific code.17 It is thus wrong to decide that junk DNA, even the socalled "pseudogenes," have no function. That is merely an admission of ignorance and an object for fruitful research. Like the socalled "vestigial organs" in man, once considered as evidence of evolution but now all known to have specific uses, so the junk DNA and pseudogenes most probably are specifically useful to the organism, whether or not those uses have yet been discovered by scientists. At the very best this type of evidence is strictly circumstantial and can be explained just as well in terms of primeval creation supplemented in some cases by later deterioration, just as expected in the creation model. The real issue is, as noted before, whether there is any observable evidence that evolution is occurring now or has ever occurred in the past. As we have seen, even evolutionists have to acknowledge that this type of real scientific evidence for evolution does not exist. A good question to ask is: Why are all observable evolutionary changes either horizontal and trivial (so-called microevolution) or downward toward deterioration and extinction? The answer seems to be found in the universally applicable laws of the science of thermodynamics. Evolution Could Never Happen at All The main scientific reason why there is no evidence for evolution in either the present or the past (except in the creative imagination of evolutionary scientists) is because one of the most fundamental laws of nature precludes it. The law of increasing entropy -- also known as the second law of thermodynamics -- stipulates that all systems in the real world tend to go "downhill," as it were, toward disorganization and decreased complexity. This law of entropy is, by any measure, one of the most universal, bestproved laws of nature. It applies not only in physical and chemical systems, but also in biological and geological systems -- in fact, in all systems, without exception. No exception to the second law of thermodynamics has ever been found -- not even a tiny one. Like conservation of energy (the "first law"), the existence of a law so precise and so independent of details of models must have a logical foundation that is independent of the fact that matter is composed of interacting particles.18 The author of this quote is referring primarily to physics, but he does point out that the second law is "independent of details of models." Besides, practically all evolutionary biologists are reductionists -- that is, they insist that there are no "vitalist" forces in living systems, and that all biological processes are explicable in terms of physics and chemistry. That being the case, biological processes also must operate in accordance with the laws of thermodynamics, and practically all biologists acknowledge this. Evolutionists commonly insist, however, that evolution is a fact anyhow, and that the conflict is resolved by noting that the earth is an "open system," with the incoming energy from the sun able to sustain evolution throughout the geological ages in spite of the natural tendency of all systems to deteriorate toward disorganization. That is how an evolutionary entomologist has dismissed W. A. Dembski's impressive recent book, Intelligent Design. This scientist defends what he thinks is "natural processes' ability to increase complexity" by noting what he calls a "flaw" in "the arguments against evolution based on the second law of thermodynamics." And what is this flaw? Although the overall amount of disorder in a closed system cannot decrease, local order within a larger system can increase even without the actions of an intelligent agent.19 This naive response to the entropy law is typical of evolutionary dissimulation. While it is true that local order can increase in an open system if certain conditions are met, the fact is that evolution does not meet those conditions. Simply saying that the earth is open to the energy from the sun says nothing about how that raw solar heat is converted into increased complexity in any system, open or closed. The fact is that the best known and most fundamental equation of thermodynamics says that the influx of heat into an open system will increase the entropy of that system, not decrease it. All known cases of decreased entropy (or increased organization) in open systems involve a guiding program of some sort and one or more energy conversion mechanisms. Evolution has neither of these. Mutations are not "organizing" mechanisms, but disorganizing (in accord with the second law). They are commonly harmful, sometimes neutral, but never beneficial (at least as far as observed mutations are concerned). Natural selection cannot generate order, but can only "sieve out" the disorganizing mutations presented to it, thereby conserving the existing order, but never generating new order. In principle, it may be barely conceivable that evolution could occur in open systems, in spite of the tendency of all systems to disintegrate sooner or later. But no one yet has been able to show that it actually has the ability to overcome this universal tendency, and that is the basic reason why there is still no bona fide proof of evolution, past or present. From the statements of evolutionists themselves, therefore, we have learned that there is no real scientific evidence for real evolution. The only observable evidence is that of very limited horizontal (or downward) changes within strict limits. Evolution is Religion -- Not Science In no way does the idea of particles-to-people evolution meet the long-accepted criteria of a scientific theory. There are no such evolutionary transitions that have ever been observed in the fossil record of the past; and the universal law of entropy seems to make it impossible on any significant scale. Evolutionists claim that evolution is a scientific fact, but they almost always lose scientific debates with creationist scientists. Accordingly, most evolutionists now decline opportunities for scientific debates, preferring instead to make unilateral attacks on creationists. Scientists should refuse formal debates because they do more harm than good, but scientists still need to counter the creationist message.20 The question is, just why do they need to counter the creationist message? Why are they so adamantly committed to anti-creationism? The fact is that evolutionists believe in evolution because they want to. It is their desire at all costs to explain the origin of everything without a Creator. Evolutionism is thus intrinsically an atheistic religion. Some may prefer to call it humanism, and "new age" evolutionists place it in the context of some form of pantheism, but they all amount to the same thing. Whether atheism or humanism (or even pantheism), the purpose is to eliminate a personal God from any active role in the origin of the universe and all its components, including man. The core of the humanistic philosophy is naturalism -- the proposition that the natural world proceeds according to its own internal dynamics, without divine or supernatural control or guidance, and that we human beings are creations of that process. It is instructive to recall that the philosophers of the early humanistic movement debated as to which term more adequately described their position: humanism or naturalism. The two concepts are complementary and inseparable.21 Since both naturalism and humanism exclude God from science or any other active function in the creation or maintenance of life and the universe in general, it is very obvious that their position is nothing but atheism. And atheism, no less than theism, is a religion! Even doctrinaire-atheistic evolutionist Richard Dawkins admits that atheism cannot be proved to be true. Of course we can't prove that there isn't a God.22 Therefore, they must believe it, and that makes it a religion. The atheistic nature of evolution is not only admitted, but insisted upon by most of the leaders of evolutionary thought. Ernst Mayr, for example, says that: Darwinism rejects all supernatural phenomena and causations.23 A professor in the Department of Biology at Kansas State University says: Even if all the data point to an intelligent designer, such a hypothesis is excluded from science because it is not naturalistic.24 It is well known by almost everyone in the scientific world today that such influential evolutionists as Stephen Jay Gould and Edward Wilson of Harvard, Richard Dawkins of England, William Provine of Cornell, and numerous other evolutionary spokesmen are dogmatic atheists. Eminent scientific philosopher and ardent Darwinian atheist Michael Ruse has even acknowledged that evolution is their religion! Evolution is promoted by its practitioners as more than mere science. Evolution is promulgated as an ideology, a secular religion -- a full-fledged alternative to Christianity, with meaning and morality . . . . Evolution is a religion. This was true of evolution in the beginning, and it is true of evolution still today.25 Another way of saying "religion" is "worldview," the whole of reality. The evolutionary worldview applies not only to the evolution of life, but even to that of the entire universe. In the realm of cosmic evolution, our naturalistic scientists depart even further from experimental science than life scientists do, manufacturing a variety of evolutionary cosmologies from esoteric mathematics and metaphysical speculation. Socialist Jeremy Rifkin has commented on this remarkable game. Cosmologies are made up of small snippets of physical reality that have been remodeled by society into vast cosmic deceptions.26 They must believe in evolution, therefore, in spite of all the evidence, not because of it. And speaking of deceptions, note the following remarkable statement. We take the side of science in spite of the patent absurdity of some of its constructs, . . . in spite of the tolerance of the scientific community for unsubstantiated commitment to materialism. . . . we are forced by our a priori adherence to material causes to create an apparatus of investigation and set of concepts that produce material explanations, no matter how counterintuitive, no matter how mystifying to the uninitiated. Moreover, that materialism is absolute, for we cannot allow a Divine Foot in the door.27 The author of this frank statement is Richard Lewontin of Harvard. Since evolution is not a laboratory science, there is no way to test its validity, so all sorts of justso stories are contrived to adorn the textbooks. But that doesn't make them true! An evolutionist reviewing a recent book by another (but more critical) evolutionist, says: We cannot identify ancestors or "missing links," and we cannot devise testable theories to explain how particular episodes of evolution came about. Gee is adamant that all the popular stories about how the first amphibians conquered the dry land, how the birds developed wings and feathers for flying, how the dinosaurs went extinct, and how humans evolved from apes are just products of our imagination, driven by prejudices and preconceptions.28 A fascinatingly honest admission by a physicist indicates the passionate commitment of establishment scientists to naturalism. Speaking of the trust students naturally place in their highly educated college professors, he says: And I use that trust to effectively brainwash them. . . . our teaching methods are primarily those of propaganda. We appeal -- without demonstration -- to evidence that supports our position. We only introduce arguments and evidence that supports the currently accepted theories and omit or gloss over any evidence to the contrary.29 Creationist students in scientific courses taught by evolutionist professors can testify to the frustrating reality of that statement. Evolution is, indeed, the pseudoscientific basis of religious atheism, as Ruse pointed out. Will Provine at Cornell University is another scientist who frankly acknowledges this. As the creationists claim, belief in modern evolution makes atheists of people. One can have a religious view that is compatible with evolution only if the religious view is indistinguishable from atheism.30 Once again, we emphasize that evolution is not science, evolutionists' tirades notwithstanding. It is a philosophical worldview, nothing more. (Evolution) must, they feel, explain everything. . . . A theory that explains everything might just as well be discarded since it has no real explanatory value. Of course, the other thing about evolution is that anything can be said because very little can be disproved. Experimental evidence is minimal.31 Even that statement is too generous. Actual experimental evidence demonstrating true evolution (that is, macroevolution) is not "minimal." It is nonexistent! The concept of evolution as a form of religion is not new. In my book, The Long War Against God,32 I documented the fact that some form of evolution has been the pseudo-rationale behind every anti-creationist religion since the very beginning of history. This includes all the ancient ethnic religions, as well as such modern world religions as Buddhism, Hinduism, and others, as well as the "liberal" movements in even the creationist religions (Christianity, Judaism, Islam). As far as the twentieth century is concerned, the leading evolutionist is generally considered to be Sir Julian Huxley, primary architect of modern neo-Darwinism. Huxley called evolution a "religion without revelation" and wrote a book with that title (2nd edition, 1957). In a later book, he said: Evolution . . . is the most powerful and the most comprehensive idea that has ever arisen on earth.33 Later in the book he argued passionately that we must change "our pattern of religious thought from a God-centered to an evolution-centered pattern."34 Then he went on to say that: "The God hypothesis . . . is becoming an intellectual and moral burden on our thought." Therefore, he concluded that "we must construct something to take its place."35 That something, of course, is the religion of evolutionary humanism, and that is what the leaders of evolutionary humanism are trying to do today. In closing this survey of the scientific case against evolution (and, therefore, for creation), the reader is reminded again that all quotations in the article are from doctrinaire evolutionists. No Bible references are included, and no statements by creationists. The evolutionists themselves, to all intents and purposes, have shown that evolutionism is not science, but religious faith in atheism.
I do hope those more intuitive people observed what Mr Coyne was concluding. His presuppositions were based on the folliwing: 1. vivid imagination 2. unprovable assumptions 3. biased interpretations 4. outlandish speculation and all wrapped up in 5. CONJECTURE These are what the Theory hides behind and labels it as science, that's not science that's anti-science.
It´s so miserable . Every site you come to about evolution or just common sense you have these ju-ju people going on about some ridiculous religious fable.
KbcBerlin It is extremely difficult for anyone to overcome childhood conditioning. That is why it is necessary for religious adherents to indoctrinate children before they have the ability to think for themselves. If a child can be made to feel guilty for doubting, he is not likely to ask many questions. When a child is surrounded by authority figures; parents, aunts, uncles, church members, and/or clergy, the message of what to believe is pounded home. Enforcement does not require physical threat or even a verbal rebuke, to an impressionable child a scowl speaks volumes. All that carries over into adulthood so that when evidence is presented that conflicts with belief, gut wrenching cognitive dissonance results. Reason would dictate that perhaps the belief is wrong, but fear of a thought crime circumvents that avenue and the only remaining option is to attack and deny the evidence. Evolution deniers expend a great deal of time and energy doing just that and have been doing so for 150 years without having any discernible effect. There is no free will in religion. Free will does not serve the interests of religion and it is to be discouraged. With very few exceptions, children grow up in the religion of their parents. That is not free will, that is following the path of least resistance. That is the path that sheep take.
Randall Wilks In many psychology tests it is clear those who like to think for themselves is a small minority. Authority worshippers will go to great lengths to defend, and appease authority .In this world to be, and do as you are told has great advantages. You will go the furthest for your abilities. Starting in school and continuing through career. It is such a successful tactic I sometimes wonder if that is the social evolutionary destination of mankind. Ants or bees. Nothing wrong with ants or bees, but with our individual mental capacity it seems a waste. I believe groups of human well educated enough can also live harmoniously while thinking independently. . For anarchy to work you need very well educated people, and no, or very few psychopaths.
***** What an ignorant dishonest thing to write. "so many people who just believe what they are told about evolution" because a vast body of scientific evidence supports it. So many people who just believe what they are told about religion, and that is the end of evidence. I was told therefore I believe it.Is all religion is. "I want to believe it because my group believe it. I want to believe it because I can cope with life and death more easily. Still not evidence of truth.
***** 1. Science does not yet have the answer to how life started and neither do you. Unlike religion, science will not pretend to know the answer to something when there is insufficient evidence to form a conclusion. 2. No rational person ever claimed one animal turned into another. That is a creationist straw man. 3. Science makes no claims as to the existence or non-existence of any god, gods or any supernatural entity or event. Since you claim the existence of such, the onus is on you to provide supporting evidence. You DO have real empirical evidence, do you not?
Adult cancer is up well over 60 times the incidents or 6000% since 1900. Cancer now kills 1 in 3 ages 15 to 64. The statistics on childhood cancer rising is beyond numbers because it did not exist in the 1800's to do a chart on it in percentage. but it is well over 30,000% rise from obscure to common now. There were no child hospitals needed because there were no pandemic childhood genetic diseases. Childhood cancer is now the number one disease cause of death of children ages 1 to 15. Cancer is now proven beyond all doubts to be genetic in over 700,000 medical studies. Mutations destroying our children. Second is genetic deformity. The body parts are messed up from mutations. Mutations destroying our children. Third is genetic, congenital heart disease. That is up by 200% in the last 34 years. Mutations destroying our children. Is that evolution?
Hey fucktard cancer existed in all life millions of years before the 1800's. Cancer isn't even in the top 10 of childhood disease. Suicide, homicide and accidental death account for over 85 percent.(In the US) Where the fuck do you get your facts? Cancer is in fact a genetic disorder what else would it be? The problem here is you don't know what cancer is. You think cancer is inherited. Without inheritance there is no evolution. To answer your question No. Cancer is not evolution.
Tyrannosaur Rex My data comes from credited sources. Where do you get you data? Out of your ass? Cancer is the NUMBER ONE DISEASE killer of children. Number two is genetic deformity. Number 3 is congenital heart disease.
Oh man, not you again. When will it finally get it into that religiously armour plated skull of yours that the increase of cancer is due to a LACK OF selective pressure? This while evolution heavily relies on the PRESENCE of selective pressure? Your data isn't incorrect, but your conclusions are downright idiotic.
I'd love to have some scientific paperwork indicating that STD's are the primary cause of genetic deterioration, oh Holey Prophet of Swift Extinction. Either that, or the admission that you are full of shit.
*EVOLUTION OF THE HUMAN BRAIN* - While the human brain is the largest in relation to body size of any animal, it came about in response to a series of environmental pressures. When we look at endocasts of early mammal skulls, we see rapid brain expansion, particularly in the area of the Olfactory Lobe. A highly developed sense of smell was obviously a tremendous survival advantage to early mammals as it enabled the avoidance of predatory dinosaurs as well as finding food and mates. When we look at modern mammalian genomes, we find a large number of different odor receptor genes, (as many as 1,000) approximately 3% of the total number of genes in the genome. Each olfactory gene codes for a protein that is sensitive to a specific range of chemical signatures (odorants). Each olfactory receptor (OR) triggers a nerve response sending a message to the brain. As olfactory receptors proliferated, a larger brain was required to process them. When ancestral primates took to the trees, hand-eye coordination became of paramount importance, again necessitating a larger brain to process that information. Any individual deficient in that area, or lacking depth perception stood a greater likelihood of falling to its death, thus eliminating its genes from the gene pool. Monkeys had larger cranial capacity than prosimians, and apes larger still. It has long been known that human brains go through a rapid expansion in connectivity during childhood. What was not known was whether humans were unique in that respect, or if it was also found in other apes. In Japan, researchers did MRI brain scans of three baby chimps over their first 6 years. That data was compared with previously existing brain scans for six macaque monkeys and 28 Japanese children. They found that brain development in early life for both chimpanzees and humans greatly exceeded that of macaques. "The increase in total cerebral volume during early infancy and the juvenile stage in chimpanzees and humans was approximately three times greater than that in macaques," the researchers wrote in the Proceedings of the Royal Society B article. It showed however that, during early childhood, human brain expansion was twice that of Chimpanzees, due to rapid growth of connections between brain cells (white matter). In terms of calorie consumption the brain is a very expensive organ. The adult human brain weighs about 3 pounds and constitutes about 2% of average human body mass, yet it uses 20% of total caloric intake. In human infants undergoing rapid brain expansion the figure is even more dramatic; 60% of caloric intake go to neural development. For most animals, life is a daily struggle to secure sufficient calories for survival. Having to nourish a larger brain would not enhance their survival. Humans, with hands capable of manipulating objects, and perhaps a more cooperative nature, could have put extra brain power to use and improve the odds of survival, IF they were able to provide the necessary calories. The diet of today's chimpanzees is largely leaves, which their forest environment supplies in great quantity, supplemented by fruit in season and the meat of small animals when the opportunity presented itself. Leaves are low in nutrient value and chimps must consume them in large quantities. It has been observed that chimps spend about a third of their waking hours just chewing. Ape physiology is well adapted to that diet; large teeth, powerful jaw muscles that wrap around the skull and a long gut to enable maximum nutrient extraction from a nutrient poor diet. The ape rib cage flares outward to accommodate the large gut, unlike the tucked-in rib cage of modern humans. Since the discovery of the fossil hominid "Lucy" (Austalopithecus afarensis) in 1974, there have been many other discoveries of both her species Australopithecus afarensis and perhaps a dozen other species of australopithecenes, including several with rather complete skeletons. From them, it has been determined that they were fully bipedal, but retained rather long arms for climbing. The skull was ape-like in that it projected forward (prognathic) and cranial capacity was like that of chimps. One major difference was that the teeth were much smaller and the huge fighting canines found on chimpanzees were much reduced in size. That suggests that Australopithecus had adopted a more cooperative life style. While much of the sub cranial skeleton was more human-like than ape-like, the rib cage flared outward, indicating they had much the same low quality diet as did chimps. Analysis of phytoliths and isotopes extracted from tartar on fossil teeth indicates they too had a plant based diet, but the chemical signatures were those of grasses and sedges, perhaps roots and bulbs. Savanna baboons subsist on such a diet today. Those savanna dwelling hominids were surrounded by high quality protein in the huge herds of ungulates; unfortunately they had not the means to harvest it. At some point, however, they must have found a way. We know they began to use flake tools, the primitive Oldowan technology, to cut meat from bone. It is unlikely they had become killers at that point, but they could have become adept at scavenging lion kills. Lions will make a kill, gorging themselves on the flesh, then find a shady area to sleep it off during the heat of the day. Cagey hominids could have exploited that opportunity to make off with some leftovers. Lions don't have the same bone crushing capability as hyenas so, even if they had pretty much stripped the carcass, leg bones rich in marrow and the brains inside skulls would have been a calorie and protein bonanza for intrepid, cooperative hominids. That scenario is speculative, but we do know they were using flake tools to butcher meat and whatever mutations favored larger brains would have been useless without the calories to fuel it. Homo erectus had a skeleton with all the hallmarks of a diet that provided that fuel. Double the cranial capacity of his predecessors, lean, tall, long legged and capable of running. It is speculative to suggest they engaged in persistence hunting, but it is used by Kalahari Bushmen even today. We know that H. erectus used fire, and eventually learned how to make it. Cooking food would have made it easier to chew and digest allowing greater extraction of nutrients. Physical evidence for early man's use of fire is patchy and there is no doubt they witnessed lightning strike fires and learned how to retrieve glowing coals from them and nurture a more or less continuous flame. There was a movie made on this theme; “Quest for Fire”; perhaps 45 years ago, but should be available from multiple sources; perhaps even RUclips as copyright has expired. What that movie illustrates is that early man's use of fire depended on maintaining glowing coals over long periods of time and that was very tenuous. The ability to make fire occurred much later.
A larger brain is need for swinging through trees, I GIVE YOU THE LEMUR THAT PUTS YOUR FUCKING CLIAM WHERE IT BELONGS IN THE CREATIONIST CAMP WITH ALL THE OTHER SOON TO BE EXTINCT MORONS.
*Some people who post to this forum have no idea what the word THEORY means*. *"A scientific theory is a well-substantiated explanation of some aspect of the natural world that is acquired through the scientific method* and repeatedly tested and confirmed through observation and experimentation. As with most (if not all) forms of scientific knowledge, *scientific theories are inductive in nature and aim for predictive power and explanatory capability*. The strength of a scientific theory is related to the diversity of phenomena it can explain, and to its elegance and simplicity (Occam's razor). As additional scientific evidence is gathered, a scientific theory may be rejected or modified if it does not fit the new empirical findings- in such circumstances, a more accurate theory is then desired and free of confirmation bias. In certain cases, the less-accurate unmodified scientific theory can still be treated as a theory if it is useful (due to its sheer simplicity) as an approximation under specific conditions (e.g. Newton's laws of motion as an approximation to special relativity at velocities which are small relative to the speed of light). *Scientific theories are testable and make falsifiable predictions*. They describe the causal elements responsible for a particular natural phenomenon, and are used to explain and predict aspects of the physical universe or specific areas of inquiry (e.g. electricity, chemistry, astronomy). Scientists use theories as a foundation to gain further scientific knowledge, as well as to accomplish goals such as inventing technology or curing disease. *Scientific theories are the most reliable, rigorous, and comprehensive form of scientific knowledge*. This is significantly different from the common usage of the word "theory", which implies that something is a conjecture, hypothesis, or guess (i.e., unsubstantiated and speculative)." en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_theory
The following quotes come from eminent scientists and eminent evolutionists themselves: 1) Charles Darwin: “Long before the reader has arrived at this part of my work, a crowd of difficulties will have occurred to him. Some of them are so serious that to this day I can hardly reflect on them without being in some degree staggered; but, to the best of my judgment, the greater number are only apparent, and those that are real are not, I think fatal to the theory.” Toward the end of his life, Darwin openly admitted: “Not one change of species into another is on record…. We cannot prove that a single species has changed into another.” Darwin, Charles, My life and Letters, Vol. 1. Page 2 10. 2) Thomas Huxley said that “evolution was not an established theory but a tentative hypothesis, an extremely valuable and even probable hypothesis, but a hypothesis none the less.” Himmelfarb, Gertrude, Darwin and the Darwinian Revolution, Doubleday and Co., New York, 1859, page 366. 3) Dr. Austin H. Clark, noted biologist of the Smithsonian Institute, stated: “There is no evidence which would show man developing step by step from lower forms of life. There is nothing to show that man was in any way connected with monkeys…. He appeared SUDDENLY and in substantially the same form as he is today…. There are no such things as missing links.” He also said, “So far as concerns the major groups of animals, the creationists appear to have the best of the argument. There is NOT THE SLIGHTEST EVIDENCE THAT ANY ONE OF THE MAJOR GROUPS AROSE FROM ANY OTHER. Each is a special animal complex, related more or less closely to all the rest, and appearing therefore as a species and distinct creation.” Meldau, Fred John, Witness Against Evolution, Christian Victory Publishing Co., Denver, Colo., 1953, page 39, 40, 73. 4) Professor Albert Fleischman, professor of Comparative Anatomy at Erlangen University, said, “The theory of evolution suffers from grave defects, which are becoming more and more apparent as time advances. It can no longer square with practical scientific knowledge, nor does it suffice for our theoretical grasp of the facts. The Darwinian theory of descent has not a single fact to confirm it in the realm of nature. It is not the result of scientific research, but purely the product of imagination.” Fleishman, Albert, Victoria Institute, Vol. 65, pages 194, 195. 5) Sir William Dawson, Canada’s great geologist, said of evolution: “It is one of the strangest phenomena of humanity; it is utterly destitute of proof.” Dawson, Sir William, Story of Earth and Man, page 317. 6) Dr. Robert A. Millikan, famous physicist and Nobel prize winner, said, “Everyone who reflects believes in God.” Millikan, Robert A., The Commentator, June 1937. In an address to the American Chemical Society, he said: “The pathetic thing about it is that many scientists are trying to prove the doctrine of evolution, which no scientists can do.” 7) Dr. George Wald, a Nobel prize winner, chooses to believe in evolution even though he said he regards it as a scientific impossibility. He says, “The only alternative to a spontaneous generation is a belief in supernatural creation….” Wald, George, “Innovation and Biology,” Scientific American, Vol. 199, Sept. 1958, page 100. 8) Dr. Wernher Von Braun, who masterminded the V-2 rocket of Germany in World War II and the space program of the United States for two decades, said in a speech at Taylor University: “The idea of an orderly universe is inconceivable without God - the grandeur of the cosmos confirms the certainty of creation. One can’t be exposed to the law and order of the universe without becoming aware of a divine intent.” Keith, Bill, Scopes II the Great Debate, Huntington House, 1985, page 55. 9) Richard Goldschmidt, Ph.D., professor of zoology, University of California, said, “Geographic variation as a model of species formation will not stand under thorough scientific investigation. Darwin’s theory of natural selection has never had any proof .. yet it has been universally accepted. There may be wide diversification within the species … but the gap (between species) cannot be bridged …. Sub-species do not merge into the species either actually or ideally.” Keith, Bill, Scopes II the Great Debate, Huntington House, 1985, pages 55-56. 10) Dr. Warren Weaver, formerly chairman of the board of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, said, “Every new discovery of science is a further ‘revelation’ of the order which God has built into His universe.” Weaver, Warren, Look Magazine, April 5, 1955, page 30. 11) Antonio Lazcano, professor, National Autonomous University of Mexico and president of the International Society for the Study of the Origins of Life, “The Never-Ending Story,” American Scientist vol. 91, no. 5, 2003, “…those trying to discover the origins of life and study the earliest stages of biological evolution have an uphill quest: Over and over it happens that a theory or explanation believed to be well established has to be abandoned or rethought in the light of new findings.” 12) Evolutionist Richard Lewontin, “The New York Review,” January, 1997, p. 31 Evolutionary Pride: “We take the side of science in spite of the patent absurdity of some of its constructs, in spite of the failure to fulfill many of its extravagant promises of health and life, in spite of the tolerance of the scientific community for unsubstantiated just-so-stories, because we have a prior commitment, a commitment to materialism. It is not that the methods and institutions of science somehow compel us to accept a material explanation of the phenomenal world, but, on the contrary, that we are forced by our a priori adherence to material causes to create an apparatus of investigation and a set of concepts that produce material explanations, no matter how mystifying to the uninitiated. Moreover, that materialism is an absolute, for we cannot allow a Divine Foot in the door.” The fool says in his heart, “"There is no God".” (Psalm 14:1)
It seems apparent that rather than having read any of the material from which you quote, you merely copy from creationist sources. “Long before the reader has arrived at this part of my work, a crowd of difficulties will have occurred to him. Some of them are so serious that to this day I can hardly reflect on them without being in some degree staggered; but, to the best of my judgment, the greater number are only apparent, and those that are real are not, I think fatal to the theory.” Is correctly quoted but loses context in isolation. Anyone familiar with Darwin's teaching methods will tell you that it was his habit to first propose possible objections to his theory, then answer them. Your quotation is at least more honest than that of many creationists who omit the last part. As for the second supposed quotation, Darwin never wrote a book titled "My life and Letters", proof of your creationist source. Were you to fact check the other supposed quotations, you would find similar distortions. You cannot lie and say "prove it's not true"
Randall Wilks Genesis 1: The History of Creation 1 In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. 2 The earth was without form, and void; and darkness was[a] on the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters. 3 Then God said, “Let there be light”; and there was light. 4 And God saw the light, that it was good; and God divided the light from the darkness. 5 God called the light Day, and the darkness He called Night. So the evening and the morning were the first day. 6 Then God said, “Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters.” 7 Thus God made the firmament, and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament; and it was so. 8 And God called the firmament Heaven. So the evening and the morning were the second day. 9 Then God said, “Let the waters under the heavens be gathered together into one place, and let the dry land appear”; and it was so. 10 And God called the dry land Earth, and the gathering together of the waters He called Seas. And God saw that it was good. 11 Then God said, “Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb that yields seed, and the fruit tree that yields fruit according to its kind, whose seed is in itself, on the earth”; and it was so. 12 And the earth brought forth grass, the herb that yields seed according to its kind, and the tree that yields fruit, whose seed is in itself according to its kind. And God saw that it was good. 13 So the evening and the morning were the third day. 14 Then God said, “Let there be lights in the firmament of the heavens to divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs and seasons, and for days and years; 15 and let them be for lights in the firmament of the heavens to give light on the earth”; and it was so. 16 Then God made two great lights: the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night. He made the stars also. 17 God set them in the firmament of the heavens to give light on the earth, 18 and to rule over the day and over the night, and to divide the light from the darkness. And God saw that it was good. 19 So the evening and the morning were the fourth day. 20 Then God said, “Let the waters abound with an abundance of living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth across the face of the firmament of the heavens.” 21 So God created great sea creatures and every living thing that moves, with which the waters abounded, according to their kind, and every winged bird according to its kind. And God saw that it was good. 22 And God blessed them, saying, “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the waters in the seas, and let birds multiply on the earth.” 23 So the evening and the morning were the fifth day. 24 Then God said, “Let the earth bring forth the living creature according to its kind: cattle and creeping thing and beast of the earth, each according to its kind”; and it was so. 25 And God made the beast of the earth according to its kind, cattle according to its kind, and everything that creeps on the earth according to its kind. And God saw that it was good. 26 Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, over all[b] the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” 27 So God created man in His own image; in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them. 28 Then God blessed them, and God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply; fill the earth and subdue it; have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over every living thing that moves on the earth.” 29 And God said, “See, I have given you every herb that yields seed which is on the face of all the earth, and every tree whose fruit yields seed; to you it shall be for food. 30 Also, to every beast of the earth, to every bird of the air, and to everything that creeps on the earth, in which there is life, I have given every green herb for food”; and it was so. 31 Then God saw everything that He had made, and indeed it was very good. So the evening and the morning were the sixth day.
Not quite. IN THE BEGINNING, a bunch of bored goat herders were sitting around wondering why they didn't know shit and decided to start making up shit so they could tell others about it, and become experts on the shit they made up. Others liked the idea of making up shit, so that they too could become experts on their own shit. Their ideas caught on and people have been doing it ever since.
Randall Wilks You won't be calling God "shit" when you stand before Him at the Great White Throne Judgment after you croak. Your "evolution" theory is shit that came out of Darwin's rear orifice.
wtom04 +Randall Wilks You won't be calling God "shit" when you stand before Him at the Great White Throne Judgment after you croak. --- Good point! A god that is willing to torture Randall for eternity is certainly the kind of god who would make a quarter of a billion men color blind. Thank you for not dodging my question.
***** --- The creationists seem to be avoiding your question like the plague. That astonishes me. They're normally so vocal about their science and their evidence.
Number Six Oh don't be astonished, I'm even lucky this thread hasn't been flooded already by right wing conservative christians trying to spit out what they learned at Sunday school.
God created Adam and Eve and they were married and it is a picture of Jesus the bridegroom and the church the bride by blood covenant.You cannot deny this evidence because marriage between a virgin man and woman is sealed in blood when they twain become one flesh. This is true no matter the race,culture,etc marriage between a man and a woman is a picture of Jesus and the church by blood covenant.Every Christian knows we were saved by the blood of Jesus and this proves that our God is the true God.
*Here is how creationist logic fails:* Let’s assume that you, with no prior knowledge of amphibians, were to discover a pool of water with a large number of tadpoles. You take them home and place them in an aquarium. Upon examination you determine that they have no limbs but do have a tail that is used for propulsion and gills for extracting oxygen from the water. You might then reasonably assume that either they were fish or something akin to fish. Lets further assume that for whatever reason, your attention was diverted for a couple of weeks. Upon again seeing the aquarium, you are surprised to find not tadpoles, but frogs. This would no doubt come as a great surprise. Since the aquarium was covered, there was no way the tadpoles could have escaped, nor any way the frogs could have entered. Two possibilities exist; either the tadpoles had somehow transitioned into frogs, or that some form of magic had occurred. Now, someone might argue that since intervening stages were not observed, no transition is possible. The conclusion for such people would be that it must have been magic. The incredulity of such people would be understandable. The change in morphology was HUGE; lungs developed, gills shrank, limbs developed and the tail absorbed. To the uninitiated, tadpoles and frogs would appear to be different KINDS of animals, yet they are products of the same genome. The tadpoles and the frogs had identical genes, but different genes were expressed (activated) at different times and durations. Now, this is metamorphosis, not evolution, but it does demonstrate that genes, under epigenetic control can dramatically effect different morphology and organ function. That is something creationists claim is impossible.
I feel sorry for creationists.... we get one life and unfortunately they waste theirs. Parents who force creationism on children should be punished. Hell, I had Christian parents and not once did they ever try to teach me genesis as fact, or that evolution was a lie. Religion is its own problem, but creationists REALLY need to GROW UP and embrace REALITY.
'We all bound to die'- this is reality. atheist or not. The BOOK of Ecc.9;5,6 mentioned this. At death we are back to non-existent. No hellfire, no immortal soul, no life after death in hell, purgatory or in heaven, no rapture, no reincarnation. Even we enjoy or not enjoy our life today, we all bound to die, no difference, for that reason. What though makes difference, if the True God of the Bible will intervene in human affairs? There is resurrection for our dead love ones-bringing them back to life by God, not Jesus as per say. And for us who were living . Millions "will not taste death", they will NOT DIE- see John 5:28,29; 11:26.This is the Good NEWS of the COMING KINGDOM OF GOD to replace the kingdom of imperfect human. see Daniel 2:44. Questions? Inbox me please.
rankjoo. NO, not me, but God, the BIBLE IS A MESSAGE FROM God, that many profess religious leaders, even involving themselves for a worldprayer that looks like a rally or protest, just KEEP IGNORING. IM just sharing to you. God does not listen to a protest like prayer, says Jesus Christ.
+ rankjoo History and Chronology of religions does help and how the Bible explained the main reason why human had different languages. Before Qur'an, Greek Scriptures already in writing. and even Qur'an acknowledges the Torah and the Injil as original. But not all Muslim reading their books, juts like some profess CHRISTIAN does, that's why, they were being mislead and also mislead people.
+Priesthoodagitator So Earth is stationary and yet every other one of the billions of planets happens to be orbiting a star and rotating. Pretty amazing our planet is the only one not following the laws of physics.
@Dark Room Staring, Undoubtably the same principles applied. Religious beliefs are contingent upon a feeling of uniqueness. The Earth was considered the center of the universe and discovering we aren't as special as previously supposed causes extreme cognitive dissonance.
Did God create evolution to make a better product, or did evolution create God in the minds of men so they could cope with awe? Perhaps humanity will evolve beyond superstition one day.
So much non-critical thinking. You make an unwarranted assumption that God and superstition are part of the same. There are superstitions concerning God or gods, granted. To answer your first question, "no" and "no." If you're humble and hungry enough you might actually think of the right question, eventually...
+RU Kiddingme -Neither nor. God created DNA with coded and stored genetic information invented and designed by him. People with atheistic naturalistic mind shutters of materialism interpret that as 'evolution' and believe Life pulled itself into being on its own bootstraps.
@@miguelfalcao --- Miguel, the Nobel Prize in the paper you cited said the prize was awarded "for mechanistic studies of DNA repair." That's a falsification of the theory of evolution in the same way that Einstein receiving a Nobel Prize was a falsification of gravity theory! --- SORRY!
@@numbersix9477 For mechanistic studies of DNA repair on random mutations, which is the very core of the neo-Darwinian theory or Modern Synthesis. How could that holy entity Natural Selection allow a toolbox inside the cell that would prevent the very process of evolution? Weird, isn´t? The tail wagging the dog wagging the tail wagging the dog, in an infinite regression. And by the way, Einstein never received any Nobel prize for gravity theory, but the Nobel Prize in Physics 1921 was awarded to Albert Einstein "for his services to Theoretical Physics, and especially for his discovery of the law of the photoelectric effect." Maybe you are confusing him with Isaac Newton, but he didn´t have Nobel Prize on his days. www.nobelprize.org/prizes/physics/1921/summary/
@@miguelfalcao In 2015, according to your argument, Tomas Lindahl, Paul Modrich and Aziz Sancar were awarded the Nobel Prize for work that effectively falsified the theory of evolution. The responses of the scientific community, the news media and the theistic community were SO MUTED than no one even noticed. Universities teach evolution just as they did before, newspapers published no front page articles about the death of evolution and the theistic community still uses arguments about junkyards, tornadoes and perfect eyes. I've no more time to waste discussing your silly hypothesis. B' bye.
My two concepts: 1.Evolution seems to give an explanation that suits this chaotic world we live in(so I can accept it). 2. The creation model depicts a world to be very simplistic(too simplistic, to be honest), but the magician God makes it too unbelievable. What to accept then? A world based on chaos and random changes which are rarely benefical(or else utterly demaging) or a world which is ruled by a God of order, but that God seems to hide from us without one single scientific proof to be ever found up to now?
To me, evolution is the most beautiful and poetic true story about nature and planet Earth. Who needs the bible with all the fake characters murdering each other over power and moral dogmas, when you have this precious tale of adaptation and how life makes its way through obstacles and changes.
*"Human Beings Did Not Just Appear At The Top Of The Evolutionary Ladder To Reap The Benefits Of Those Millions Of Years Of Evolution Without Having To Live Through It. In Other Words You Were Those Other Animals. Someone Had To Be Them." ~ From Page 1 Of "The Present" At TruthContest♥Com*
A wonderfully articulate presentation of a little over an hour to answer two questions that can be satisfied by one line: "It is, but people are stupid".
My understanding of science is it should not be about believing but observable facts .
5 лет назад+3
In the American vernacular, "theory" often means "imperfect fact"--part of a hierarchy of confidence running downhill from fact to theory to hypothesis to guess. Thus the power of the creationist argument: evolution is "only" a theory and intense debate now rages about many aspects of the theory. If evolution is worse than a fact, and scientists can't even make up their minds about the theory, then what confidence can we have in it? Indeed, President Reagan echoed this argument before an evangelical group in Dallas when he said (in what I devoutly hope was campaign rhetoric): "Well, it is a theory. It is a scientific theory only, and it has in recent years been challenged in the world of science--that is, not believed in the scientific community to be as infallible as it once was." Well evolution is a theory. It is also a fact. And facts and theories are different things, not rungs in a hierarchy of increasing certainty. Facts are the world's data. Theories are structures of ideas that explain and interpret facts. Facts don't go away when scientists debate rival theories to explain them. Einstein's theory of gravitation replaced Newton's in this century, but apples didn't suspend themselves in midair, pending the outcome. And humans evolved from ape-like ancestors whether they did so by Darwin's proposed mechanism or by some other yet to be discovered. Moreover, "fact" doesn't mean "absolute certainty"; there ain't no such animal in an exciting and complex world. The final proofs of logic and mathematics flow deductively from stated premises and achieve certainty only because they are not about the empirical world. Evolutionists make no claim for perpetual truth, though creationists often do (and then attack us falsely for a style of argument that they themselves favor). In science "fact" can only mean "confirmed to such a degree that it would be perverse to withhold provisional consent." I suppose that apples might start to rise tomorrow, but the possibility does not merit equal time in physics classrooms. Evolutionists have been very clear about this distinction of fact and theory from the very beginning, if only because we have always acknowledged how far we are from completely understanding the mechanisms (theory) by which evolution (fact) occurred. Darwin continually emphasized the difference between his two great and separate accomplishments: establishing the fact of evolution, and proposing a theory--natural selection--to explain the mechanism of evolution. - Stephen J. Gould, " Evolution as Fact and Theory"; Discover, May 1981
these comments are demoralizing. jerry coyne may be too complicated for some of you - if you don't understand, maybe try something remedial and work your way up to this.
*EVIDENCE FOR EVOLUTION - Geographic Distribution of Species* As one travels from one isolated landmass, to another, one sees patterns that fit with evolutionary theory. The mammals populating the Australasian landmass (including New Guinea) prior to man's arrival were virtually all Marsupials; kangaroos, wombats, koalas, quolls, thylacenes, et al; found nowhere else in the world, and egg laying Monotremes (Platypus and Echidnas) also found nowhere else in the world. Indeed, prior to the coming of man who brought the dingo, the only placental mammals were those that could swim there (seal) and those that could fly there (bats). It is very obvious that mammalian evolution took a quite different turn in that isolated landmass. New Zealand as well tells of a different evolutionary history. With no native mammals, except again for those able to fly (bats) or swim (seals) there, birds assumed the ecological roles filled by mammals elsewhere. In the absence of ground dwelling predators, many birds abandoned energy consuming flight, the Kakapo, Kiwi and Moa among them. The wing of the kiwi is a mere vestige, no bigger than your little finger, with an equally useless claw at its end. Other isolated islands, Mauritania and Madagascar, also had their own unique flora and fauna, as did geologically recent islands such as the Hawaiian Archipelago. There, the science of comparative genomics shows that another species of finch underwent adaptive radiation into the at one time 55 species of Honey creepers of which only 18 survive. The same is true of many plants whose ancestral seeds found their way to these islands. The many species of the beautiful Hawaiian Silver Sword and their relatives, collectively known as the Hawaiian Silver Sword Alliance, are an example of adaptive radiation in plants over millions of years from an ancestral pacific coast tarweed. Charles Darwin made remarkable observations 150 years ago and since then biologists, geneticists, geologists, biochemists and other related fields have continued to do so and in every case further evidence is accumulated in support of what is now called the Modern Synthesis of Evolution.?
In evolution, the terms micro and macro are merely quantitative. There is no mechanism that would halt evolution at any arbitrary point because evolution is ongoing and continuous for all living species. Evolution is molecular in that the random errors that occur during cell division and replication (observed) are the raw material for the genetic variation we see in any population of organisms. If this were not so there would be no value in DNA tests. Each organism varies slightly genetically from its parent. In any population, those offspring who survive long enough to reproduce add their genetic variation to the population gene pool. Those survivors are the ones whose genes best suit them for their current environment. Environmental change will put any population under stress. If there is sufficient genetic variation within the gene pool, successive generations may be able to adapt to new conditions. When a segment (or segments) of a population become genetically isolated from the parent population a new gene pool is thus formed, no longer sharing with the parent gene pool. Random mutations continue as before, but will henceforth be unique to each population, and subject to perhaps different environmental pressures. Over generations, differing mutations continue to accumulate in such populations, reducing the chances of future interbreeding attempts being successful. Speciation thus occurs over a continuum not at some particular point on it. Loss of body hair could be considered 'micro' evolution, as could the development of sweat glands that enabled that loss. Like wise, each of the adaptations to bipedalism; length of muscles, shapes of the femur and other bones enabled further changes to the point where the cumulative effect is 'macro' evolution. Furred animals have to deal with excess body heat, larger animals even more so, which is why elephants, rhinos and other big animals are largely hairless. Most furred animals must dispose of excess heat by panting, which is not that efficient for cooling as compared to sweating. A sweating savanna hominid could move around during the day would have an advantage over animals that needed to seek shade.
Jerry Coyne doesn't even understand what religion is, yet here he is preaching about his own religious beliefs on evolution. The video shows an Indian Mongoose and a Cane Toad, but no signs of any transitions in either creature...Jerry seems to me that he's just another one of those guys that like to hear themselves talk...
Gary E=mcsquared. Energy is the same as mass. Exactly. Energy is always moving, spinning, rotating, oscillating, resonating and bursting forth. Energy must always be created for it to move. Or else how are quarks bursting forth spinning billions of times a second as 3 points of light, forming what are called protons and neutrons? I found these words in the book "The Quantum World" written by the physicist Kenneth Ford.
*"Dawn of Humanity"* the outstanding NOVA presentation that debuted September 16 on PBS, is now streaming at www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/evolution/dawn-of-humanity.html There will be discussion of fossil hominids, including the recent discoveries of Australopithecus sediba and Homo dinaledi. Creationists are not only welcome, they are encouraged to do so.
Adam and Eve (Genesis) = fairy tale Hansel and Gretel = fairy tale Talking Snakes (Genesis) = fairy tale Talking rabbit (Alice in Wonderland) = fairy tale Talking Donkey (Genesis) = fairy tale Talking wolf (Little Red Riding Hood) = fairy tale Whale swallowing Jonah (Genesis) = fairy tale Noah and the Ark (Genesis) = fairy tale Jack and the Beanstalk = fairy tale Talking Cat (Puss in Boots) = fairy tale The Emperor's New Clothes (Hans Christian Andersen) = fairy tale There is not a single piece of evidence for any of them, but credulous people will swallow such stories hook line and sinker because they have been conditioned to believe them since their earliest childhood. Rational people will have no part of it.
I listened to most of Coyne's lecture. 1. It's a cheap insult to characterize people who don't believe what he believes as "perverse" or "dumb". That's just a childish name-calling tactic. 2. Coyne neglected to mention that he gets paid to promote evolution and if he challenged evolution he would be fired and ridiculed. 3. Coyne neglected to mention a key element of contemporary evolutionism - that DNA mutations are alleged to cause functional genetic code which is expressed into traits, which if function are then subjected to selective pressure. Selection cannot create a genetic code, selection only operates on the resulting trait and only if the resulting trait is functional. This is a key omission on Coyne's part because nobody has observed a mutation creating a new functional code. And without that observation - the key evolutionist mechanism relies on speculation and imagination. 4. There are many problems with Coyne's "horse evolution". Coyne neglected to mention that creationist sites claim that modern horses are found in layers below ancient horses, that hyracotherium was not a horse, that south american fossils indicate a progression from 3 toes to 1, that nobody has actually observed the evolved horses in that order, and that 3 toed and 1 toed horses were found together. Why does Coyne omit contrary evidence raised by the creationists? 5. Coyne neglects to mention several bird evolution issues. For example, the "Chinese" fossils that Coyne referred to were later found to have been manufactured for sale by a fraud factory. Plus, feathered dinosaurs appear in the fossil record after the first so-called "bird" archeopterix. As for Coyne's claim about the "probability" of evolution - without any mathematical calculation his claim is speculation. Coyne also misrepresents the most powerful anti-evolution arguments (presumably to promote his own belief). The fact is that Coyne neglects the impossibility of random genetic mutations and the impossibility of highly complex biochemical systems. Instead, he's focused on old bones which can be interpreted to suit his belief. 6. Coyne mentioned "Whale evolution" but neglected to mention that whale fossil exhibits were created in fraud and publicized. The "blow hole" that Coyne mentioned was found to have been artificially located by the fossil re-construction expert in order to support the theory - but not as a result of actual evidence of the true location. The pakicetus "blow hole" was later found to have been completely wrong and the creature was given a "nose" and determined to be a land creature. Why did Coyne neglect to mention this? 7. Coyne mentioned Tictaalik. He neglected to mention the controversy - that the creature was hailed as predictive proof for evolution, only to be dethroned when earlier terapods were discovered. 8. Coyne mentioned australopithecus. He neglects to mention the controversy that australopithecus was merely a monkey that went extinct and did not evolve into anything. 9. Coyne mentions embryology. But Coyne neglects to mention that evolutionism was spawned by many decades of fraudulent embryology due to Haeckel whose fraudulent drawings are still published for the school kids today. In response to Coyne's claims on this lecture, I visited a creationist site which indicates that the "yolk sac" is now known to have many important functions. And the mere fact that Coyne cannot fathom an explanation other than evolution to fit his observations does not mean that he is right. It may be, that Coyne has been brain-washed into the false belief that evolution is the only answer. Solomon Asch showed that people will conform to the beliefs of their peer-group. 10. Coyne mentions that Darwin "deduced" facts. NO. Darwin used "imaginary illustrations" and speculation. Darwin repeatedly referred to "probability" but never once actually calculated the probability of his claims. 11. Coynes claim that vestiges result from genetic mutation is not supported by fact. It's entirely possible that the structures are not vestigial - but are functional. It may be that the structures were designed on purpose and that Coyne cannot understand it because he believes only in evolution. Coyne's claim that genetic mutation caused repression is speculation to support his belief - it's not science. Similarly so-called "junk DNA" was debunked. 12. Coyne mentions falsification of the theory of evolution. But Coyne neglected to mention 2 of the most powerful falsifications, possibly because of his prejudice against the opposing view. First, it is mathematically impossible for genetic mutations to occur in the DNA molecule in a way that creates new functional code. Secondly, nobody has observed a genetic mutation creating a new functional genetic code. Third, there is no evolutionist explanation for the observation of highly complex biochemical systems which do not function in the absence of any missing part, which means they could not evolve. These arguments falsify evolution and are ignored by Coyne. I was disappointed by Coynes lecture.
So Joe is "disappointed" with Jerry Coyne's lecture? What a surprise. Coyne is a Professor of Biology. It is his job to explain biology of which evolution is an integral part and for which there is abundant evidence. Joe seems to think he should espouse creationism which is a religious view, an opinion, for which there is no evidence whatsoever. That's what Joe "thinks"
So Joe is "disappointed" with Jerry Coyne's lecture? What a surprise. Coyne is a Professor of Biology. It is his job to explain biology of which evolution is an integral part and for which there is abundant evidence. Joe seems to think he should espouse creationism which is a religious view, an opinion, for which there is no evidence whatsoever. That's what Joe "thinks"
Joe is a proud graduate of the Humpty Dumpty School of Language and Logic; "When I use a word," Humpty Dumpty said, in rather a scornful tone, "it means just what I choose it to mean-neither more nor less."
***** "no one has any evidence for evolution." Definition: *Evolution is the change in the inherited characteristics of biological populations over successive generations* (It is a fact that this happens) The theory of evolution is not about _whether_ evolution happens, but about _how_ it happens.
*EVIDENCE FOR EVOLUTION - The Predictive Ability of the Theory - Part II* The best test of any scientific theory is its usefulness as a predictive tool. In that respect, the Theory of Evolution performs admirably. The Theory of Evolution would predict that, IF birds evolved from dinosaurs, there should be a progression of derived traits in dinosaurs leading up to the origin of birds and that is exactly what we see. Perhaps the most complete transitional sequence in the fossil record is that from dinosaurs to birds. Birds didn’t just evolve from dinosaurs overnight, but the features of birds evolved one by one; first light bones and bipedal locomotion, then feathers, then a wishbone, then more complex feathers that look like quill-pen feathers, then wings. Yes, wings evolved before flight. Just as there are birds today such as ostriches, emus, rheas, etc. that no longer fly, yet still use their wings for other purposes, there were winged theropod dinosaurs that may have used them to shelter young, for mating displays, or intimidating a predator or rival just as do birds of today. Long before wings, the forelimbs of theropods evolved to allow them to reach forward to grasp prey with their claws. Those are the Maniraptors. That movement is exactly the same as that required for flapping wings. Archaeopteryx still had those grasping claws as did other early birds. The young chicks of the Hoatzin still retain them. Claws are also evident on many bird species; Emus, Cassowarys and Kiwis still have them on vestigial wings. Feathers and scales are formed from the same material, keratin. Birds retain scales on their legs; the japanese Silkie chicken has been bred for fully feathered legs, indicating that only slight genetic modification is necessary. Take a look at an Emu; its legs are exactly what would be expected on a dinosaur. It too, has a useless nub of a wing with an equally useless claw. Vestigial remnants are always confusing to creationists There is a succession of feathered dinosaur fossils with increasingly bird like characteristics i.e. Xiaotingia, Sinosauropteryx prima, Caudipteryx, Sinovenator and others. Any of these fossils showing such a mix of traits can be considered transitional. The whole lineage of feathered dinosaurs could be considered transitional. The fossil record even shows the stages of feather evolution from simple spikes to down to contour feathers and ultimately to quilled flight feathers. Today we have lots of feathered dinosaur fossils; so many feathered theropod fossils in fact, that most paleontologists now think ALL theropods were probably feathered. There were dinosaurs with wings that couldn't possibly fly, like 5 foot 40 pound Zhenyuanlong suni and little ones like Microraptor that could fly. There were a great many almost-birds and not-quite-birds. And birds like Auronis, Archaeopteryx, Shenzhouraptor, Rahonavis, Yandangornis Jixiangornis, Sapeornis, Omnivoropteryx, Confuciusornis and Changchengornis that retain some dinosaur-like features such as teeth and long bony tails. Evolution is NOT a linear process. Many of these species lived at the same time, displaying a matrix of characteristics. Evolution is a natural experiment. Some things work and get perpetuated, others may enjoy brief success before extinction. With so many transitional fossils displaying both bird-like and dinosaur-like features, there is an almost seamless transition from dinosaur to bird (as well as a great number of dead end evolutionary experiments) and it is often difficult to separate the two. Doing so requires statistical analysis of nearly 1000 inherited and derived characteristics.
*The fossil record is not a video or even a photo album.* When an organism dies there is only a minuscule chance of any trace of it being preserved. Fossilization is dependent on the geological forces of erosion and deposition which are ongoing and have occurred in varying amounts throughout earth's history. Soils are eroded by wind or water and deposited elsewhere. There is no chance of fossils forming if they are not covered and protected by deposition soon after death, otherwise scavengers, rodents, fungi and UV light work to break down the remains to the point where nothing is left to preserve. Teeth are the hardest part of a vertebrate skeleton, and it is no coincidence that teeth are the most numerous fossils. Any fossils that do form can be lost by subsequent erosion. Even if a fossil survives millions of years in a stratigraphic layer, it will not be available for study unless it is discovered at just the right time by a sharp eyed paleontologist or other knowledgeable person as erosion briefly exposes them. There are nowhere near enough such people to be on hand as this happens, and any fossils thus exposed soon turn to dust from UV exposure and other weather elements. Exposed fossils are often the consistency of chalk and must be coated with hardening chemicals before extraction. For fossilization to take place entails a great deal of luck, and still more luck for some knowledgeable person to be at the right place and time when the forces of nature reveal it. We are indeed fortunate to have those we do have, and although more fossils are continuously being discovered, there will always be gaps in the fossil record. The correct environment, sediment type, climate, and luck needed for fossil preservation is often hard to come by in just the right combination. Today, through over a century of study of both the Earth’s surface and the the fossil record that does exist, paleontologists have been able to determine that while the record will never be complete and always has preservation biases, we often have more than enough evidence to draw strong evolutionary conclusions about the history of many groups, both living and extinct. "Only a small portion of the world has been geologically explored. Only organic beings of certain classes can be preserved in a fossil condition, at least in any great number. Many species when once formed never undergo any further change, but become extinct without leaving modified descendants; and the periods, during which species have undergone modification, though long as measured by years, have probably been. short in comparison with the periods during which they have retained the same form. It is the dominant and. widely ranging species which vary most frequently and vary most, and varieties are often at first local-both causes rendering the discovery of intermediate links in any one formation less likely. Local varieties will not spread into other and distant regions until they are consider-ably modified and improved ; and when they do spread, if discovered in a geological formation, they will appear as if suddenly created there, and will be simply classed as new species. Most formations have been intermittent in their accumulation; and their duration has probably been shorter than the average duration of specific forms.." (Charles Darwin - Origin of Species first edition 1859) In Darwin's time, and for long afterwards, fossils were discovered largely by accident, incidental to other human activities such as mining, road and rail construction, et al. Since then, as improved knowledge of where fossils are likely to be discovered, the fossil record has expanded exponentially. Paleontology no longer relies on accidental discoveries, since the geologic maps produced by mineral and oil exploration have made the identification of potential fossil sites much easier. Fossil explorations using that information are planned well in advance of undertaking them.
You can basically match up a US map that teaches creationism to lowest test grades and get a complete match...the reason this is not a bigger deal is because the states that teach creationism don't know what statistics even means...
+Patrick Kilduff I saw a t-shirt that had an outline of the continental United States. In the north-east and south-west (California) it had "United States of America". All the rest (north west to south east) had "Dumbfuckistan". I had to LOL.
“Questioning Darwin,” a documentary on HBO, presets a novel approach to a subject that many consider at odds with their religious views."The film, by Antony Thomas, traces Charles Darwin’s personal evolution as he slowly formed his theory of evolution, fleshing out the portrait with excerpts from his writings (read by the actor Sam West). These biographical segments are juxtaposed with comments from creationist Christians, presented non-judgmentally. Mr. Thomas for the most part lets these opposing worldviews speak for themselves." - NEIL GENZLINGER, New York Times
The Watchmaker While walking through the park, I found a watch. Watches (in my experience) do not simply spring into existence alongside the path. Someone of fairly high intelligence must have made the watch, then left it there. Wondering why someone might do such a thing, I decided to find the Watchmaker. Luck was with me. On the way home I saw an advertisement for similar watches available free (with the purchase of a meal) at a popular fast-food chain. I went to the nearest franchise and asked to see the Watchmaker. The counter-person was not helpful. "Dude, there's no Watchmaker here, we just pull 'em out of a box." I expressed my conviction that the watch could not simply happen. There must be a Watchmaker. The manager (who took an interest when I began to raise my voice) was able to shed some light on the matter. "Sir, we receive these watches from corporate headquarters in Vermont. If you want to find the Watchmaker, you will have to contact them." A very nice person at corporate headquarters was able to refer me to her contact at an import company, who referred me to his contact at a Far-Eastern manufacturing firm. Once I convinced him that I was not investigating his company's employment practices, he was kind enough to provide me with a description of their manufacturing process. The watches were assembled by unskilled workers paid the equivalent of about two dollars a day. (For some reason my contact thought it was important to point out that this is nearly one-and-a-half times the local minimum wage.) The watch band, case, and face were injection molded in an automated process. The electronic portion of the watch was purchased in bulk from another company. Contacting that company, I found that the electronic portions were produced on an assembly-line using a combination of industrial robots and semi-skilled labor. The microchips were cut from blanks grown from vats of molten silicon and traces of other elements. The machinery that did this is impressive, but it did not build the blanks so much as control the environment so that the silicon could assemble itself. The control circuitry is photo etched on to the silicon chips. The photo etchers are fairly complex, as machines go, but hardly intelligent. The operators of these machines are better trained than the laborers who assemble the finished product. However, their knowledge is limited to running the machines. They had nothing to do with the design of the watch. The doohickey that counts off the seconds is a small bit of quartz. Quartz is a naturally occurring crystal that vibrates at a constant rate when an electric current passes through it. I'm sure all the folks involved in the manufacture of the watch were quite competent. Many of the folks I talked to seemed quite intelligent; but none of the people directly involved in the watch's manufacture would have been able to make a watch themselves from scratch. No one I had talked to so far was truly the Watchmaker. The engineer who actually produced the design was knowledgeable and helpful. Unfortunately, his enthusiastic description of the process of circuit design was largely beyond me. I was able to glean two important facts: First, he used a computer aided design system. Second, his design was an enhancement of a previous design by another engineer, who based her design on an even earlier design, and so on; back through several decades. The engineer was also able to provide me with a very interesting pamphlet entitled A brief history of time-keeping. This pamphlet traced the development of quartz clocks and watches back to a team of designers in the sixties. It went on to trace time-pieces in general back to the water-clocks of the ancient Greeks. It even contained a little speculation about the prehistoric people who built Stonehenge. The watch was the product of intelligent design and construction, but there was no single Watchmaker. The watch embodies the combined intelligence of countless entities over the course of millennia, from the geniuses who invented the semi-conductor, to the minuscule "intellect" of the silicon and quartz crystals, back to the Babylonian scribe who invented astronomy, and even the purely mechanical motions of the heavenly bodies that inspired him. Seeking respite from thoughts of watches and Watchmakers, I returned to the park. As I walked along, I found a flower. Flowers (in my experience) do simply spring into existence. The flower grew from a seed, which grew on a flower, which grew from a seed, and so on. The flower is its own manufacturer. This makes the initial design of the flower all the more impressive. Before researching the Watchmaker, I might have supposed the flower had a single, super-human designer. With the Watchmakers firmly in mind, I contacted the nursery that produced the flower. A staff member described the process. The flowers indeed grew from seeds. When I asked about the design of the flower, I was surprised to hear that they were a patented variety developed by a midwestern firm specializing in such things. A botanist developed this variety from existing varieties by selective breeding. The botanist knew what he wanted, but had no way of making the design changes directly. There was also no way to communicate his desires directly to the plant. For that matter, there was no way for the plant to make the changes had there been a method of communication. There were small changes in each generation of plant, but these mutations were random. Together the botanist and the plants were able to make deliberate, intelligent changes through a process similar to a game of twenty questions. The variations in each new generation were the previous generation's way of asking "How should I change?" The botanist supplied the answer by growing the next generation using seeds from the plants representing the closest guess. In times past, gardeners made it a practice to save seeds from the best flowers to use in planting next year's garden. In hindsight, I saw that this was a kind of selective breeding. Again the development was a cooperative effort between humans, and the existing varieties of flower. The gardeners had only a general idea of what they wanted, namely better flowers. The variety still asked the question "How should I change?" Humans still supplied the answer by growing the next generation using seeds from the plants representing the best guess. There was a blight at the turn of the century that nearly caused this species of flower to become extinct in North America. For several years the American population of this flower declined, then it leveled out, then it started a slow climb. Eventually the flower returned to its previous numbers. Seeds imported from Europe continued to do poorly against the blight. Americans had to rely on their new, blight-resistant varieties. There was no intelligent botanist or gardener, but the development of blight resistance was, in a sense, still an intelligent design choice. The variety still asked the question "How should I change?" The blight supplied the answer by destroying a greater proportion of the plants representing the wrong answer, leaving a greater proportion of plants representing the correct answer to provide the seeds that would grow into the next generation. Blight was not the only non-human quiz master. Insects, other plants, higher animals, cooperative microbes, and many, many others all contributed their limited intelligence to the plants' design. Even the Sun, rain, and soil (literally dirt-dumb) made a contribution. Even discounting the human intellect of the botanists and gardeners, the flower is the product of intelligent design and construction of a sort. There was no single Designer. The flower embodies the combined intelligence of countless entities, over the course of billions of years; from the tiny intelligence of the bee, to the minuscule "intellect" of various microbes; and even the nearly mechanical actions of wind and rain. Returning to the park I contemplated this process of evolution. I marveled at the diversity and complexity of the life it creates. I considered the process of evolution itself. I meditated on its elegant simplicity, and sublime design. Old habits die hard. Soon I found myself wondering if there wasn't some subtle intelligence behind the design of evolution. Suspecting the answer almost at once, I was able to complete my research quickly. Sexual reproduction, one of the key elements in the whole process, was itself a mechanism that evolved from a simpler process of asexual reproduction. If the process of evolution itself can evolve, it requires no great leap of imagination to trace the process back through the ages to processes so basic that they are none other than the laws of physics. The process goes the other way, too. The learning ability of higher animals is essentially an improved form of evolution; able to make improvements in less than a single generation. Our own natural intellects are yet a further enhancement. Beyond even that, we develop better ways of learning, and of sharing our knowledge, nearly every day. I am able to make it back to the park before nightfall. I watch the Sun set, then I watch the stars come out. I am a direct descendant of the laws of physics, the product of intelligent design and construction, but with no single Creator. I embody the combined intelligence of countless entities since the beginning of time, from the first primates who used stone tools, back to the first creatures to experiment with sex, forward to my college instructors, and back again to the laws of physics themselves. The stars are out in all their glory. As I stargaze, I think how lucky I am that the universe is a place where the laws of physics allow life and intelligence to evolve. I wonder, for just a moment, if those laws just happened, or if they were the product of intelligent design. I laugh, and go back to stargazing. I do catch-on eventually; given enough time
An overwhelming majority of the scientific community accepts evolution as the dominant scientific theory of biological diversity.[1][2] Nearly every scientific society, representing hundreds of thousands of scientists, has issued statements rejecting intelligent design[2] and a petition supporting the teaching of evolutionary biology was endorsed by 72 US Nobel Prize winners.[3] en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Level_of_support_for_evolution
+The Froggy Vines if you are defending the Christian position - then don't sink to their level with cursing - that's the way rabid saliva dripping atheists communicate.
+whiteliketar Hi. What's your best evidence for the existence of the God of the Bible? Thanks. 'rabid saliva dripping atheists' Ironically hateful choice of words.
Down Spacey+ What are u talking about not enuf evidence for evolution there Loads of of it, very compelling evidence, u Really mean there's NO evidence for any 'god'.
Judging by some replies below, some people absolutely refused to actually watch this video! :D LOL Brilliant! even though I knew much, I learnt a lot of details, it all came together, thank you for sharing!
I taught science in rural Missouri for 25 years- students stated I was the first and only to teach evolution. Schools here are sports facilities that teach on the side. The teaching is third rate in most cases.
Hey, followers of Christ: Why don't you refute Jerry Coynes assertions made in this video instead of calling me names? Eh? Or has Jesus changed his stance on slander.
You guys are unbelievable...the question was posed where are the signs for evolution right now, and I offered 3 examples, previously I offered multiple species and genus of human evolution over the past 6-7 mya and if you want more "macro" look into the Devonian tetrapod, which I mentioned earlier. Also, where does this distinction between micro and macro come from? Who even mentions it except bible literalists and creationists that probably don't even know wtf they are talking about.
creationists want evidence when they have no evidence themselves. creationists criticize evolution because "unscientific" when their hypothesis isn't it too.
Luca I see proof as the constant creation of energy. Energy is always bursting forth as quarks which spin billions of times a second as 3 points of light, forming what are called protons and neutrons. I read these words in the book "The Quantum World" by the physicist Kenneth Ford.
The Department of Geosciences at conservative Baptist Baylor University has issued this statement: *"The fossil record clearly indicates a progression in complexity of organisms from very simple fossil forms in the oldest rocks (>3.5 billion years old) to a broad spectrum from simple to complex forms in younger rocks, that some organisms that were once common are now extinct, and that the living organisms inhabiting our world today are similar (but generally not the same) as organisms represented as fossils in young sedimentary deposits, which in turn have evolutionary ancestors represented as fossils in yet older rocks.* *Mammals, for example, are prevalent today and can be traced back in the fossil record for approximately 200 million years, but are not present as mammals in the fossil record before that; however, fossil forms that have reasonably been interpreted to be associated with the evolutionary precursors to mammals are found in older rocks. Whether biological evolution occurs has not been a matter of scientific debate for more than a century. It is considered a proven fact. The specific mechanisms of biological change over time continue to be a topic of active research, and include mechanisms proposed by Charles Darwin as well as more recently developed ideas based on our growing knowledge of genetics and molecular biology. Using the methods of modern science, our knowledge of the fundamental mechanisms of life has grown enormously since the initial characterization of the role of DNA in reproduction, inheritance and evolution in the mid-1950s.* *The American Geological Institute and The Paleontological Society, partnering with the most respected geoscience societies in America including the Geological Society of America, the American Geophysical Union, and the American Association of Petroleum Geologists (among others), have produced a booklet on evolution and the fossil record that can be downloaded as a PDF file. This booklet was written for the general public by people who have worked with the fossil record throughout their careers, and was thoroughly reviewed by other professional geologists and paleontologists."* www.baylor.edu/geology/index.php?id=62340 That site also has a link to download above referenced "Evolution and the Fossil Record" by Pojeta and Springer. (1 MB PDF file). It also provides links to the position statements from other scientific organizations.
*Genetic Differences Between Humans and Apes* While geneticists are still working to resolve the genetic differences between humans and apes, certain genes stand out as being particularly important in human evolution. Included among them are those involved in the development of language (FOXP2), changes in the musculature of the jaw (MYH16), and limb and digit specializations (HACNS1) . Among the mutations affecting brain evolution in our ancestral genome were duplications to the SRGAP2 gene that is found in all mammals and the human copy of which has been renamed SRGAP2A. This gene is one of the 23 genes that are duplicated in humans but not in other primates. SRGAP2 has been resistant to mutations (highly conserved) throughout mammalian evolution, and the human lineage is the only one in which gene duplications have occurred and they took place at about the time of transition from genus Australopithecus to genus Homo marking the beginning of neocortex expansion. The gene has been duplicated three times in the human genome in the past 3.4 million years: one duplication 3.4 million years ago (mya) called SRGAP2B, a second duplication 2.4 mya (called SRGAP2C), and one final duplication ~1 mya (SRGAP2D). The 2.4 million year-old duplication (SRGAP2C) expresses a shortened version that 100% of humans possess.[10] This shortened version SRGAP2C inhibits the function of the original SRGAP2A gene and allows faster migration of neurons, slows the rate of synaptic maturation and increases the density of synapses in the cerebral cortex. Thus, while delaying development, it allows greater expansion. This is but one of the areas in which the human genome differs from that of other apes, but one author has termed it "The humanity switch: How one gene made us brainier" newscientist.com/article/dn21777-the-humanity-switch-how-one-gene-made-us-brainier/
Randall Wilks --- We creationists prefer to stick with important stuff like, "Show me an example of one kind turning into another kind." Talking about genes, duplications and mutations makes our heads hurt. Besides, anyone who knows the twelve or so laws of thermodynamics knows that all that genetics stuff is just fake news.
Randall Wilks --- if you happen to see the results of any study correlating how people voted in the last election with their belief in creationism, share it with me would you? I have a theory!
No, no, no, Six, You have a HYPOTHESIS, not a theory, there is insufficient evidence for a THEORY. ;-)) But yeah, I get your drift. I, too, would expect a high degree of correlation. Perhaps Pew or Gallup might take up the challenge. The most relevant stats I have are from the May 15, 2017 Gallup Poll that showed the fundamentalist viewpoint is highest among the least educated.and adults over 50; that puts them squarely in Trumps base. Will update you on any new stats.
Randall Wilks In this case I deliberately use the word "theory". It's a legitimate use and I thought you would appreciate a tongue-in-cheek reply. The fact that fundamentalists won't learn the most basic science jargon isn't going to keep me from employing common usage of science jargon words when the word isn't being used as jargon. ... I didn't baby talk to my kids when they were little and I don't baby talk to creationists. Who knows? Maybe someday one of the creationists that I come across will tire of being ignarrogant and choose to learn something.
the video is fine, but I agree the comments of the illiterate that can only misread their bibles are extremely funny. Sadly, they also tell us why we are doomed... can you imagine them choosing between candidates for public office???
NephilimFree LOL, the self-pwning geocentrist has arrived :D BTW, since the _theory of evolution_ makes testable claims, it is a scientific theory, and not pseudoscience. This is as simple as that ;)
*HOW EVOLUTION WORKS* It is helpful to understand that evolution is a molecular process. The random mutations that naturally occur during cell division and replication (mitosis and meiosis) are the raw material for the genetic variation we see in every population of organisms. Mutations are ongoing and continuous for every living species. Those mutations are subjected to a selection process that is performed by whatever environment the organisms find themselves. In this respect, evolution is an ongoing, continuous set of experiments. Those that work get perpetuated, those that don't, perish. It is as if the environment acted as an umpire who says "There are good mutations and there are bad mutations and there are neutral mutations, but they ain't nuthin' until I (the environment) calls 'em." That is Natural Selection. Neutral mutations just go along for the ride without producing immediate benefit (Genetic Drift). The result of those selection processes is organisms best suited for their current environment. Should that environment change, it would put the population under stress. If the population gene pool has sufficient genetic variation it increases the likelihood that at least some offspring should be able to survive and perpetuate the species (albeit one of slightly different genetic makeup). What you should understand is that genetic changes do not occur because of some 'need'. The mutations are RANDOM and get selected if they are USEFUL. That is a process and it is anything BUT random. Let's take the example of the Panda. Bears in general are omnivores, eating plant matter, but with a marked preference for meat when available. The preferred food of the Panda however, is bamboo leaves, which have such low nutritional value that they must eat almost continuously. The Panda would certainly be able to extract more nutrition with a four chambered stomach (as in ungulates and whales) or something akin to a cecal valve, but it has neither in its genetic toolbox. In feeding themselves, pandas are continuously stripping bamboo leaves from their stalks, a process that could be facilitated if they had a thumb. Bears however do not have thumbs, nor do they have genes for them in their genetic toolbox. Nor do new features simply spring into existence. However, if a slightly altered body component provides some benefit, natural selection will perpetuate it. Evolution results in incremental alterations to what is already there. As an analogy, imagine a robot gardener dragging a hose around various obstacles it encounters in a garden until it can go no further. Now an intelligent gardener could simply retrace his steps and take a different path, avoiding those obstacles. The robot gardener (evolution) is not an intelligent force and cannot do that. With a limited tool kit, it can only (figuratively) add more hose to get the job done. While a thumb would be quite useful to a panda for stripping leaves, evolution cannot rewind to produce one. Instead, it has taken "a piece of hose' (a wrist bone) and enlarged it to act as a stand in for a thumb. That is not an elegant solution and not a perfect one, but it gets the job done. Evolution is does not produce perfect solutions, but tweaks here and there to "get the job done". THAT is how evolution operates. Based in part on the fact that no tetrapods, (terrestrial vertebrates) exist in the fossil record prior to about 370 million years ago, the Theory of Evolution would predict that tetrpods evolved from fish. If that were the case, there should have existed at one time a fish with characteristics of both fish and tetrapods. In other words a Transitional Species. Until about 2005, there was little evidence for such a creature. There were however, a class of fish called Sarcopterygians or Lobe Finned Fishes, that dominated Devonian seas. What charracterized those lobe finned fishes was that those fins were supported by external bones and muscles. Those bones, a single bone, connected to two bones conncted to smaller bones, are analogous to the limb bones of all tetrapods, including humans. Most Sarcopterygian Fishes have long been extinct, but they are survied today by two species of coelacnth and six species of lungfish. Still, what was missing was a fossil showing characteristics of fish AND tetrapods. When Neil Shubin and his team decided to search for a fossil that filled the gap between the Lobe Finned Fishes that dominated Devonian Seas and the earliest tetrapod fossils represented by Ichtheostega and Acanthostega dated about 370 mya. Since those fossils were found in geologic deposits indicating a freshwater environment and if the Theory of Evolution is correct in its hypothesis that tetrapods evolved from fish, then transitional fossils should be found in similar deposits somewhat older in age. The problem was that geologic deposits of that age are exposed at few places on the earth's surface. Fortunately, a great deal of geologic exploration has been done throughout the world, financed often times by oil and mining interests. They selected an area in the Canadian Arctic, Ellesmere Island, as having the greatest likelihood of success. It took 4 years of searching during the short summers of that hostile environment but succeeded, returning in 2004 with 9 specimens of the fish they named Tiktaalik. It was exactly what one would expect a transitional fish-tetrapod to look like and was found in deposits dated 375 mya. If this was not the direct ancestor of tetrapods, it was something very much like it.This is a great example of using evolutionary theory as a predictive tool, The genetic variation within a population is referred to as a gene pool. Organisms can move freely within that population breeding with each other perpetuating any new mutations that work and eliminating those that are less than optimal.Each offspring will most resemble its parents, yet will vary slightly genetically because of unique mutations acquired during meiosis. Thus the genetic makeup of a population will change ever so slightly with each successive generation. Populations are not stable, they expand and contract with changing conditions. So long as there is sufficient genetic variation within a population there will be some members capable of surviving those conditions and perpetuating the species. The alternative is extinction. When populations expand and migrate to new territories, some portions of it will become genetically isolated from each other and no longer share a common gene pool. In such cases, each such sub population will carry a subset of the parent population, but subsequent mutations will be unique to each new population (the genotype) that will come to differentiate that population from others (Genetic Drift). To the extent that such populations encounter differing environmental conditions, that environment will exert different evolutionary pressures on that population. New mutations will have a much greater chance of coming to dominance within a smaller population than they would in the larger parent population where they would be one among the many. Over thousands of generations genetic differences accumulate in the different gene pools making interbreeding ever more difficult until at some point speciation can be said to have occurred. Because speciation is a process, rather than an event, it would be no more possible to pinpoint where speciation occurred than to identify where on the color spectrum orange becomes red.
You have major misconceptions of how evolution works. Every organism born will have unique sequences of DNA, You yourself would have between 50 and 100 unique nucleotide bases due to mutations that take place during meiosis of the egg and sperm that produced you. Every organism born will have such mutations accumulated from ancestors, just as you have mutations from your parents, grandparents and other ancestors. Have they made you any different? Genetically, yes; Anything dramatically different from your parents? No, but you are not a clone of them either. It would be helpful for you to understand that evolution is a molecular process. The random mutations that naturally occur during cell division and replication (mitosis and meiosis) are the raw material for the genetic variation we see in every population of organisms. Mutations are ongoing and continuous for every living species. Those mutations are subjected to a selection process that is performed by whatever environment the organisms find themselves. In this respect, evolution is an ongoing, continuous set of experiments. Those that work get perpetuated, those that don't, perish. It is as if the environment acted as an umpire who says "There are good mutations and there are bad mutations and there are neutral mutations, but they ain't nuthin' until I (the environment) calls 'em." That is Natural Selection. Neutral mutations just go along for the ride without producing immediate benefit (Genetic Drift). The result of those selection processes is organisms best suited for their current environment. Should that environment change, it would put the population under stress. If the population gene pool has sufficient genetic variation it increases the likelihood that at least some offspring should be able to survive and perpetuate the species (albeit one of slightly different genetic makeup). What you should understand is that genetic changes do not occur because of some 'need'. The mutations are RANDOM and get selected if they are USEFUL. That is a process and it is anything BUT random. The genetic variation within a population is referred to as a gene pool. Organisms can move freely within that population breeding with each other perpetuating any new mutations that work and eliminating those that are less than optimal.Each offspring will most resemble its parents, yet will vary slightly genetically because of unique mutations acquired during meiosis. Thus the genetic makeup of a population will change ever so slightly with each successive generation. Populations are not stable, they expand and contract with changing conditions. So long as there is sufficient genetic variation within a population there will be some members capable of surviving those conditions and perpetuating the species. The alternative is extinction. When populations expand and migrate to new territories, some portions of it will become genetically isolated from each other and no longer share a common gene pool. In such cases, each such sub population will carry a subset of the parent gene pool, but subsequent mutations will be unique to each new population (the genotype) that will come to differentiate that population from others (Genetic Drift). To the extent that such populations encounter differing environmental conditions, that environment will exert different evolutionary pressures on that population. New mutations will have a much greater chance of coming to dominance within a smaller population than they would in the larger parent population where they would be one among the many. Over thousands of generations genetic differences accumulate in the different gene pools making interbreeding ever more difficult until at some point speciation can be said to have occurred. Because speciation is a PROCESS, rather than an EVENT, it would be no more possible to pinpoint where speciation occurred than to identify where on the color spectrum orange becomes red.
Many thousands of years ago, not long after the dawn of civilization, small tribes of stone-age savages invented colorful creation myths based on wild tales, dreams, lies and insane ravings. Over time, a religious oral tradition developed and the stories got shuffled back and forth from generation to generation and tribe to tribe, with all the inevitable embroidering, garbling, exaggerating and contextualizing. Then, after millenia, the stories were finally written down on animal skins and papyrus leaves. But sadly, these original writings are lost. More centuries followed; copies of copies of copies were made, with accumulated alterations and mistakes. And they were translated through many different languages, badly. Then eventually, these stories were collated and edited by an ancient Roman council to form a creation myth that satisfied the political ambitions of the Emperor Constantine.... and thus The Book of Genesis was born. Today, Creationists feel that when it comes to empirically decoding the bio-chemical functionality of DNA, The Book of Genesis is more scientifically reliable than the universal opinion of the modern scientific community.
Now who or what do I believe? Fossils that have been around for millions of years or some one that stood on a hill, watched a burning bush and heard little voices in his head.
BOTTOM LINE: Humans have created "GODS" throughout history. We are curious intelligent animals that often require closure and explanations for stuff. Things that could not be explained by science were attributed to a GOD or GODS in order to fulfill the need for these explanations or reasons. As humans have evolved, we've been able to explain millions of things (previously thought as a result of higher power) with science...with our discoveries. As we continue to discover more, the evidence and the NEED to believe in a higher power is reduced...this scares many people. Mostly because they want to feel like they are special in some way. Like they have a purpose. The thought of this NOT being true terrifies some so much, that they do anything they can to cling to it. So to me, that is pretty much why so many continue to hold onto asinine beliefs that there is some man in the sky controlling everything. Additionally, it is really easy to claim everything happens because it is god's plan. Example: 1. A woman gives birth to a very ill child. The baby has multiple health impairments and eventually succumbs to them around a month of age. The god fearing individual would say "This was god's plan. They needed another angel in Heaven". NO. Your child was subject to multiple genetic problems that occurred in utero and unfortunately, modern science was not advanced enough to save him/her. This would be called natural selection. 2. A woman gives birth to a very ill child. The baby has multiple health impairments, but through the advances in medical technology and knowledge, doctors are able to save the child, who grows up and all that fun stuff. Again, the god fearing individual would claim "This is god's plan!! My child was saved by god! It's a MIRACLE!!" NO. Your child was saved by SCIENCE. This pretty much goes against natural selection for if the child matures to the age of reproduction and chooses to produce offspring, there is a high probability that he/she will pass on his/her genetics to the offspring - resulting in a similar situation that occurred at the time of his/her birth.
Darwin actually noted that in a later book, the Decent of Man, in that the Human race was the only one on the planet that went out of its way to support the weaker members of its race.
Evolution theory is based on scientific methodology (SM). SM involves hypothesis, experiment, observation, control experiment and conclusion. If anyone wants to debunk evolution theory, he has to also go through the same rigours of SM. Evolution theory debunked and demolished the creationism theory of the bible in 1842. Over more than 150 years since then, evolution theory has been further reinforced by fossil evidence, Genetics, DNA sequencing, cosmology, anthropology, carbon dating etc
You cannot prove any such thing dumbo. And no it didn't debunk creationism. If you knew anything about science you'd know that paleontology has proven a creation event. Why don't you keep up with what your own scientists say? You dummass, you don't have a clue about what the fossils say yet here you are using them for evidence. Here's what the fossils say according to evolution scientists. HERE ARE THE FACTS AS APPROVED BY EVOLUTION SCIENTISTS All of the animals: 1. Suddenly appeared 2. Exploded everywhere 3. Were fully formed 4. No transitions 5. No gradualism 6. No change (stasis) 7. No sign of an evolutionary trend by which they could have emerged from an earlier type So there you have it, empirical scientific evidence indicates that a large number of animals inhabited the Earth beginning years ago. The scientists say they suddenly appeared in masse fully formed and never changed. They have no explanation, no knowledge, or proof of how they came into existence. Since that time they have been going extinct one or more species at a time without a single replacement. NONE NADA ZIP. Eventually we will ALL be extinct. Tell me how that is evolution?
Hey dummass, there IS NO "scientific theory" of evolution and all you have left is "just a theory." Don't blame me, blame your own stubborn ignorance. PWNED BY MAX
+Zach Lang Evolution REALLY does in fact exist and it has NOTHING TO FREAKING to do with atheism or Christianity or religion or God. It is freaking BIOLOGY MAN not theology.
+Steve McRae Correct. It is those who fear truth that attempt to distort science to conform with a fundamentalist religious view. Science takes no stand on the supposed existence of supernatural entities. *'It is a capital mistake to theorize before one has data. Insensibly one begins to twist facts to suit theories, instead of theories to suit facts.'* Sherlock Holmes-A Scandal in Bohemia
Where is there ANY evidence to support creationism?
+Steve McRae
Hey, man, please forget that stuff I was saying in regards to you a few days ago.
These youtube comments can easily get blown out of proportion.
You are a good man, for the reasons I said from the start.
Anyway, I deleted most of the other stuff.
Regardless of how evolution might work for you, I'm still a God believer.
Over and out.
+Richard Hill Accepted. And you should know I literally have NO issue what so ever with the belief or concept of God. I would never try to change a persons religious beliefs. I try to change peoples understanding of proper science and logical thinking...not their ideology. (Granted sometimes they are effected by each other).
I am more than happy to explain to you evolutionary concepts, explain evolutionary facts and basic biology (I'm hardly an expert in the field) or even just science stuff.....I would never try to get someone to stop believing in God as that isn't my agenda at all.
Cheers.
+Steve McRae
Thank you for replying.
All the best.
+Richard Hill No worries man....feel free to keep the dialog open. Maybe we both can learn something.
2012 lecture: imagine if 40% of the people didn't believe in something like germ theory
2020: hold my beer
only idiots drink catpiss
maybe say hold my tea
It's not an accident that we have the Ark Encounter and the Europeans have the Large Hadron Collider.
Sad, true and well said.
Amen!
Dave Steadman Has this been made into a meme yet? It should be.
The biggest difference is, the arc doesn't have to insult you to "appear" to be making a point. If you think it insults your intelligence, you get offended way too easily. BTW...add a baryon and a meson and the Europeans got an awesome 3way. Typical Europeans...lol
It's also "not an accident" that we are 10 times more free and prosperous than Europe
Consider that creationists teach their children a preposterous straw man version of evolutionary theory and teach them to mock it. Your first task is convincing them that evolution says something completely different from what they have been taught.
The problem is dishonesty more that stupidity.
Randy Green In my church they teach that cows changed into whales and amphibians to birds. Is this dishonest?
Brad Davies
Hahahahaha
It's hilarious!!! I'd love to know whom this idiot is, what denomination your church is and how many morons have believe him so far.
AAH Replies
Astonishing.
You read the OP then acted out exactly the sort of distorted lie that creationists repeat. Was that your purpose?
Only slightly, and I think by accident, dinosaur to birds.
You seem quite intelligent for, sorry for the presumption, a theist. Please stretch your intelligence a little further and do a little research. Learn more about mutation. Learn more about gradual evolution. It takes many small changes in the genes to make a physical change within the body, or to enable a change in function. Do not take my word for this. I am a stupid and ill-educated man. I left school aged 15. I've worked in manual labour for 48 years. All I know I've taught myself. I probably had a major advantage over you, by not being born into a religion. Although it is traditional, in my family, and country, when filling in forms, and being asked for your religion to write down a religion. Just habit. Nothing to do with belief. It is easy to brainwash children, They learn from example. It takes a lot to break the conditioning. The main thing is you are using your intelligence. Please just use it a little more.
Every creationist argument ever made summarized in one sentence:
"My misunderstanding of what evolution is conflicts with my misunderstanding of how science works."
Really. Explain the evolution of a cell. Maybe you are the biologist for me
@@spidaman0112
Cells are divided into two main classes, initially defined by whether they contain a nucleus. Prokaryotic cells (bacteria) lack a nuclear envelope, eukaryotic cells do have a nucleus in which the genetic material is separated from the cytoplasm. Prokaryotic cells are generally smaller and simpler than eukaryotic cells, in addition to the absence of a nucleus, the gnomes are less complex and they do not contain cytoplasmic organelles or exoskeleton.
In spite of these differences the main basic molecular mechanisms govern the lives of both eukaryotes and eukaryotes.
Present day cells evolved from a common prokaryotic ancestor long three lines of descent, giving rise to archaebacteria, eubacteria, and eukaryotes.
Life emerged 3.8 million years ago, that’s 750 million years after Earth was formed.
The research seems to be showing that the first life formed from complex chemistry, which had its self evolved over a long period.
Much of this chemical evolution has been studied and is now quite well understood.
Why would anyone reject the theory of evolution? What better transitional forms could you ask for than _Australapethicus afarensis_ and _A. africanus_?
It's depressing that people want to believe in God with no evidence while many of the same people don't consider evolution to be true because they fail to understand the evidence.
Next time I visit my doctor, I plan to ask him a really important question.
"What is the best way of driving out unclean spirits ? " (Mark 7:16)
Everyone arguing about "show me the evidence". Did you not watch the video?
kevin smith I'm not advocating creation but having an opinion on three parts of the body is not evidence. His proof was an educated guess that already had a bias. Anyone could come and look at the same evidence and come with a different opinion. Not only that, what about the thousands of other parts of the body that look and show a purpose.
ericjones33
*Anyone could come and look at the same evidence and come with a different opinion*
Sure, but that does not make them right. Evidence is not opinions.
*Not only that, what about the thousands of other parts of the body that look and show a purpose*
Is it time for the same old "X look complex to me so GOD DID IT!" or the classic "Despite that we know how things evolve, let me argue for how X don't work in its current state if I remove a vital part of it" now?
ericjones33 What are you talking about??? Nobody is asking for proof. People are asking for evidence, which the video is full of
ericjones33 Evidence is: a fact which appears to indicate something (your hypotheses aka evolution) as being true. and this video was LOADED with it. Beyond loaded. I'd say he makes his case very well. Watch the damn video
kevin smith There is no evidence in this video. It is mostly some guy spouting off his beliefs.
The horse is an excellent example of a creature that has lost genetic functions. It has less bones, less tooth density and the jaw has become weaker. Every geneticist knows that it takes more functioning genes to produce more bones. The oldest "horse" has far more joints and bones.
I have never understood why people do not believe in Evolution. If you disagree with evolution, please reply.
Almost all of the people whom I've met who disagree with evolution do so on ideological terms. Even many who believe in evolution do not believe that humans came from apes, because it is (to them) embarrassing.
Steven Conley
Well put.
alot of people have trouble reading a musty old tome that makes ridiculous claims and then taking it on faith without ever seeing any evidence. that is what you guys are always doing with evolution. you haven't ever seen non-living matter miraculously spring to life, and you haven't ever seen living organisms mutate into a new species. in a world where either were possible, you would see both. in the real world, a century of experiments have yet to produce either in a lab.
DrHaz3
You are committing a fallacy that way to many creationists do. Abiogenesis is NOT evolution. God could have created the first life forms and then let them evolve from there. It doesn't matter to the theory of evolution as evolution only cares that life exists. So please stop trying to refute evolution by attacking abiogensis.
Anyways we have seen new species being born. Creationists just dont admit it because its small changes with makes sense to evolutionists because we understand how slow evolution is.
Travis Frazier i can understand why you would want to distance yourself from such crackpot lunacy as spontaneous generation, it is not my fault you atheists pretending to have science on your side keep changing the definition and terminology every time you get debunked.
A year later...and another 500 replies to a comment I've left on some video on RUclips...and yet still not one young Earth creationist has bothered to give actual scientific evidence that supports their position.
Perhaps this year will be the year one actually does...pfff...who am I kidding. Of course none of the ever will.
Steve McRae But muh feelings, Muh emotional truths
Steve McRae ruclips.net/video/nuMvRExazAw/видео.html
Thanks for that list WOW but you forgot Barbara Brennan, the NASA physicist that wrote "Hands of Light" that says we are eternal , holographic, multidimensional, electromagnetic energy and light beings
This book is full of pictures of what we look like out of these electrical bodies as holograms
@Winning Grinn
You are too lazy to read or to even have an opinion of your own You are the one not motivated enough making you the one too boring to read
CONSTANT CREATION was proven by quantum physicists a long time ago I wonder which evolutionist has paid you to write what you write AND evolution is the only pseudo science because without quantum physics it would not exist AND quantum physics says that all of existence is constantly bursting forth as light which are those quarks that spin billions of times a second as 3 points of light forming what are called protons and neutrons These words come from the book "The Quantum World" written by the physicist Kenneth Ford
Grinn that you are an eternal light being or hologram constantly being created proven by many, many physicists over the years I don't mind giving you information that you should have looked up yourself before writing, but then I expect everyone to know E=mcsquared by now
Constant creation has been proven by quantum physicists, especially Barbara Brennan, the physicist that wrote "Hands of Light" which was published in 1987
When I write on youtube sites where evolutionists write mostly, they blast me with such negative demeaning words I wonder if this is all the information they have AND of course it is
Observable and testable science has had many answers for many years---with the words that defy evolutionists Why wouldn't anyone want to know that they are literally eternal energy and light right now? Because they have been so brain washed by nazis that don't understand quantum physics These nazi thinking people don't care who they hurt, so they don't look to quantum physics for answers These nazi thinkers are glad everyone believes in death because they are able to continue to take trillions of dollars from the tax payers of the world based on this belief DEATH IS A BELIEF-----A HIGHLY ERRONEOUS ONE
At the quantum level subatomic particles vibrate and spin and rotate so super fast that nothing can be solid This means that what is called consciousness IS those waves that saturate everything AND it is evident that it takes consciousness to rotate those waves of energy and light into what is called solidity which ARE those quarks from the start
When you so-called "die" you will see yourself out of that holographic body that you have called your own to see that you have been an electrical magnetic energy field set of vibrations the whole time We are all brilliant eternal beings of light right now Don't let anyone tell you anything different From the book "The Quantum World" written by the physicist Kenneth Ford comes these words---'magically bursting forth are quarks spinning billions of times a second as 3 points of light forming protons and neutrons which are the basis of the atom which must also have the electron which vibrates super fast as 1 point of light and of course all of this is the hydrogen atom spinning and vibrating as 7 points of light---electrical magnetic energy field vibrations is what physicists call an atom
Most Americans don't even know science basics such as the Laws of Thermodynamics either. Our science education is insufficient and under assault by religionism.
Religion is the antithesis of science and its greatest impediment. Religion is the practice of training one's mind to ignore evidence, logic and reason, while being able to believe in fairy tales based on faith alone..... and being proud of it rather than ashamed. Science encourages the expansion of one's mind. Religion does nothing of the sort. In science, one goes where the evidence leads, not to someone's preferred outcome. Science provides the only reliable way to determine what is true or not true about the universe. It has not yet answered all the questions, but is the only methodology that has the capacity to do so. Scientific facts are backed by multiple lines of evidence. Science discovers a million times more truth by questioning than all the proponents of the world's religions do by believing. One's inability to understand basic science does not mean 'God did it'
Religion has its roots in the ignorance of ancient peoples and its proponents must perpetuate that ignorance for religion to survive. To accept a religion, one must subordinate their intellect to that of ancient tribalism. Religion then becomes the tribe which must be defended against all outside influence.
I'd agree a lot of Americans don't understand thermodynamics, because a lot of them incorrectly assert biology violates them.
The creationists' caricature of the second law wouldn't even allow lifeforms to grow or reproduce. Of course creationists never bother to learn enough about biology or thermodynamics to understand that.
I know enough to know that scientists say the first law of thermodynamics says matter and energy can never be created or destroyed and yet the same scientists says the big bang was nothing exploding into everything. You can't have it both ways.
Evolution isn't science in the strict sense as it is neither observable nor testable. Observable and testable science has no answers to the hard questions that defy evolution.
Here are a few questions for evolutionists.
1. How did life originate? As Richard Dawkins said, no one has a clue. But life is necessary for evolution.
2. How did the Dna code originate? Dna contains a massive amount of coded, precisely ordered, information. Proteins are made of up of precisely ordered left handed amino acids.
3. How could mutations, random copying errors, create the huge volumes of new information needed for upward evolution? 4. How can random selection, taught as evolution, explain the diversity of life?
5. Living things look like they were designed,. so why do evolutionists know that they weren't designed?
6. Where are the countless millions of missing transitional fossils? If Darwinism predicts gradual change from one type of animal to another there should be a continual parade of slowly changed fossils.
7. If evolution means gradual change over time how come we have so many "living fossils". We observe many animals today that are unchanged from supposed 150 million year old fossils.
8. If the unprovable theory of evolution is so important that our kids must be taught it, where are these scientific breakthroughs?
9. Why is evolution, not a science but a belief system, taught in science classes?
10. Why are these problems with evolution theory not taught to our university students? Why don't our students get the whole story, for and against, evolution? Why is pertinent information withheld?
The fact that we are 2nd from the bottom of that list is downright shameful. Here we are in the 21st Century and people are still believing in magic!
You mean the magic of evolution Cootabux?
BigKWS "You mean the magic of evolution Cootabux?"
--- It probably looks like "magic" to someone with no science background.
Number Six Evolution is nothing more than a dumb theory based on faith. It's never been observed other than at the micro level and really has nothing to do with science either.
BigKWS "Evolution is nothing more than a dumb theory based on faith"
--- Let's see. You and a bunch of religious fundamentalist, non-scientists take that position and virtually all of the earth's career scientists disagree. Give me a few years to decide which group is more credible.
BigKWS
You say it's never been observed, then you give an example of when it has been observed...
I'd be careful using words like "true" in a science claim.
"Fact" is more accurate, and much less vulnerable to being twisted by those who are ignorant about evolution.
Truth as used by theists is in a bionic brain mentally its either absolute or not............very bad to hold a position of absolute truth claims because you have to back engineer and shoehorn what evidence fits you claim and ignore the rest.......on the other hand truth as a result of the scientific method is provisional to the evidence the supports it......that is the only objective path to reality
*****
As far as we can know anything about the physical world, yes, common ancestry of all life on the earth now _is_ a fact.
The sad thing is the people are ignorant because its ok in schools to teach the "theory of evolution" but not the "theory of Christianity". And if you've ever been in a school classroom they only teach evolution and don't even mention the counter arguments.
Isaac Wolvie QUOTE: 'its ok in schools to teach the "theory of evolution" but not the "theory of Christianity". "
That's what churches are for, to teach religious doctrine. Schools are reserved for science.
Simone PleTon The evidence for evolution fills museums and science books. Like an ostrich with its head in the sand, you can ignore what you wish.
So glad that I've taught my daughter so well. She is seven and understands the basics of evolution AND we live in the deep south. She will grow up smarter than most of her peers. There's lots of people in the south that believe in spirits, ghosts, gods, demons, devils, etc. It's an insane place to live.
"She will grow up smarter than most of her peers."
I live in Oklahoma. You are correct, the U.S. South is an insane place to live.
Thanks to you, your seven year old probably knows more about biology than do many of the parents of her peers. I wish I'd had your foresight when my children were your daughter's age!
***** "They think non-believers are idiots. The patients run the asylum and most of the Doctors have left or are in hiding.
I'm a religious person...i think, I was born in a strict Christian family who believes God is the creator of all. When I was 7 i never wanted to go to church, for some reason I would say it made me uncomfortable but they still forced me to go, I would get dragged out of my bed and forced out the door. As I got older I stopped going to crunch all together because I started to believe "why do I have to go to a place to worship with other people I don't know, When I can just do that at home by myself" church for some odd reason has always made me feel weird. when it's usually suppose to do the opposite, I felt like something was up or something wasn't right. But As I'm getting older I realize I am still confused it's like I'm in a grey area right now between faith and realism logic and evolution. listening to this video makes sense to me. I'm starting to stray from the ways my parents taught me and I'm relying more on logic, because everything makes much more sense that way. I always felt something odd with my religion since I was 7 or younger but I ignored it because it was simply "the right thing to do". I'm tired of living in ignorance and not being aware, I don't want to live a lie...
Watch this, this isnt fluffy bullsh*t like youll see on documentaries
ruclips.net/p/PLXJ4dsU0oGMLnubJLPuw0dzD0AvAHAotW
What? So people still exist who don't believe in evolution? LOLOLOLOL
Yes, and at least 100 top scientists as well.You know all of those things you learned in grade school? Fakes, and lies. miller's experiment used the wrong gas mixture, and with the right mixture, you get embalming fluid Darwin's tree of Life was supposed to be something that was supposed to be gradual, but it seems that most of the birds, mammals, reptiles and birds all seemed to spring to life too quickly for that tree as most came to life at the Cambrian period. Haeckel's embryos were not drawn lifelike. They started out, and ended up looking different. Only during a short time in the middle do they look similar, which is different to what is stated. Then, we have the fossils. Well, most of those fossils are "made" by people in china, who are paid well for these finds.Then there is java Man. Everyone thinks that an entire person was found whereas what was found was only a skullcap, a femur, and 3 teeth. Can you show me anything that completely proves that evolution is actually a fact?
lol
fredandpj
Still lying about amino acids in 2014? I suspect that even some creationist webites advise against that! God will _not_ be impressed.
What lie did I say?? Miller's experiment? The experiment did create Amino acids According to most scientists, even evolutionists admit that the chemicals that Miller used to depict the atmosphere, however was not right. had they used the correct chemical makeup, the result would be embalming fluid, not amino acids
fredandpj So what you are saying is that fossils are fake? You're point is seriously flawed, even if they make fake bones they are modeled after a species that did exist lol. Evolution is clearly fact i cant wait for the brainwashed religion freaks to die off. Religious people take all of there facts from a book that was written thousands of years ago as proof god exists. Then they try to disprove science with a fucking book? It's 2014 were not in the 1800's. Atheism is on the rise because the more people that are educated about SCIENCE the more that wisely choose to be atheist.
Here is the timeline of evolution
NOTE-you say that birds mammals and reptiles came to life to quickly just look at the time line. 100 million between reptiles and mammals and 50 million between mammals and birds in case you didn't know that's a SHIT LOAD OF TIME.
In its 4.6 billion years circling the sun, the Earth has harbored an increasing diversity of life forms:
for the last 3.6 billion years, simple cells (prokaryotes);
for the last 3.4 billion years, cyanobacteria performing photosynthesis;
for the last 2 billion years, complex cells (eukaryotes);
for the last 1 billion years, multicellular life;
for the last 600 million years, simple animals;
for the last 550 million years, bilaterians, animals with a front and a back;
for the last 500 million years, fish and proto-amphibians;
for the last 475 million years, land plants;
for the last 400 million years, insects and seeds;
for the last 360 million years, amphibians;
for the last 300 million years, reptiles;
for the last 200 million years, mammals;
for the last 150 million years, birds;
for the last 130 million years, flowers;
for the last 60 million years, the primates,
for the last 20 million years, the family Hominidae (great apes);
for the last 2.5 million years, the genus Homo (human predecessors);
for the last 200,000 years, anatomically modern humans.
Periodic extinctions have temporarily reduced diversity, eliminating:
2.4 billion years ago, many obligate anaerobes, in the oxygen catastrophe;
252 million years ago, the trilobites, in the Permian-Triassic extinction event;
66 million years ago, the pterosaurs and nonavian dinosaurs, in the Cretaceous-Paleogene extinction event.
If evolution is false, why does God provide so much evidence that its real?
james bond "Could it be Satan?" The Church Lady would think so! :P
Anti evolutionist never even bother to look at the overwhelming evidence and yet they for some strange reason continually try to refute evolutionary facts. It's really quite an interesting psychological phenomenon.
What evidence does he provide James? Can you please give me one living example of an evolutionary change in kind?
BigKWS Your question is malformed. There is no taxological classification as "kind'. Care to rephrase?
Steve McRae The closest taxological classification to kind would be family, but not species.
BigKWS So you want to see a family change to another family? Does that even remotely make sense to you in context of how evolution is a branching process?
Millions of Christians accept the fact that organisms evolve.
Mice and rats are RELATED.
That genera branch into MULTIPLE species isn't crazy, its proved beyond all doubt and the BACKBONE of the science of Biology.
Owls and ostriches are RELATED, by blood.
Squirrels are related to mice.
You are the imbecile.
All of science proves you to be WRONG.
***** It is fact. The idea that the random interaction of atoms and molecules lead to what we call life over billions of years is - even if you deny known facts that support evolution - less crazy than everything being designed and placed on earth 6000 years ago... out of nothing. You are a prepubescent servile pleb.
Martin Koch Intelligence is not your forte granted but quit shouting about that fact, trust me everyone gets the point! You are very ignorant on what Creationism teaches - go read up on it then come back. Also it helps little when you have never read all of The Bible even once, never mind studied the original languages - akin to watching the first 20 mins of 'Gone With The Wind' then writing a detailed indepth review of it.
Name calling seems to be your only forte.
Creationism is religion, not science.
Its not science.
And its a total failure.
Martin Koch Evolution is religion.
The Theory of Evolution... an assertion for which there is so much evidence that it would be perverse to deny it.
Wayne Huninghake
" If you are unable to provide observable scientific evidence of "life from non-life" you have proven to yourself that evolution is a man made fairy tale ... Doesn't get any easier than that ."
Um, no. Evolution starts and ends with life. Your thinking of Abiogenesis,Panspermia, or Genesis. What your proposing is like using Hindu texts to disprove Christianity.
Wayne Huninghake said, *_"provide observable scientific evidence of "life from non-life"_*
Sure Wayne, here...
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miller%E2%80%93Urey_experiment
Now, you provide O.S.E that the Christian God is real.
USERNAMEfieldempty sorry, but the miller experiment is not evidence for evolution. it's obvious you don't even know what it is. But at least now you have refuted and debunked evolution yourself because you are unable to provide any observable scientific evidence of "life from non-life" so you are without excuse Romans 1:20
The Resurrection is an Irrefutable fact. Each person should never forget that the empty tomb has proved beyond reasonable doubt that Christ rose from the dead after suffering and dying for his or her personal sins and for the sins of all the world. His resurrection in turn proves that He is the God of all creation, for only God can conquer death.
The Resurrection proves that all His promises and all His warnings are true and will be totally fulfilled when He comes again. Therefore, one great promise is especially fitting in conclusion. "That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus |that is, openly acknowledge Jesus as your Lord|, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead |that is, that He died for all your sins and completely satisfied the terrible debt you incurred before God and thereby demonstrated the sin-debt to be completely settled by His glorious victory over death|, thou shalt be saved |that is, saved from your deserved destiny in hell and given everlasting life with Him in the new earth|" (Romans 10:9). "Blessed are all they that put their trust in him" (Psalm 2:12).
My friend, if you started today as unsaved and you leave here unsaved, I am the worst enemy that you have ever had, because you have been provided the gospel and you can never go into the presence of God and tell Him that you know nothing about the gospel. You have been provided the gospel, and it will be worse for you when God pronounces judgment than for any heathen in the darkest part of the earth today.
Wayne Huninghake said, _"the miller experiment is not evidence for evolution. it's obvious you don't even know what it is. But at least now you have refuted and debunked evolution yourself because you are unable to provide any observable scientific evidence of "life from non-life" so you are without excuse."_
You know what, Wayne? I consider your reply to be seriously downright fucking rude. Really. Just totally plain ignorant, disrespectful and rude. You asked for some evidence for _life from non-life_ (which isn't evolution) I gave you some and you just slapped it away as not "proof of evolution" _(??? you specified life from non-life)_ You didn't explain why it wasn't good enough and then *_you_* mocked *_me_* for my supposed ignorance.
Who the fuck do you think you are, you drooling fat dotard? First you spit in my face, _(because _*_you_*_ are confused about the most basic definitions)_, then you try and stand over me like some doom-laden 21st century Moses, wailing about the fate you have prepared for me? Legs apart like some avenging angel calling down judgement on the wicked???? WTF? You pompous little tit! Are you drunk or something? Avenging angels don't have pizza-stains on their XXXL T-shirts. They don't have a tragic lack of self-awareness either.
Your religion certainly hasn't made you a better person, but it's definitely made you a ruder, more arrogant one. So go fuck yourself, you clownish bumbling hayseed. Learn some fucking manners if you want people to respect your religion. Because right now, you are a brilliant ambassador for the coarse stupidity of fundamentalists. Congratulations.
USERNAMEfieldempty Firstly, First, resorting to offensive language generally occurs when someone has no substance to an argument. Your foolish emotional comments do not change the facts. In no way have I been rude, but you are now without excuse. Romans 1:20 , Hebrews 4:12
Your foolish emotional comments don't change the fact that you have refuted and debunked evolution due to the lack of observable scientific evidence of "life from non-life" ...
The Miller-Urey research argues against abiogenesis and although widely heralded by the popular press for decades as ‘proof’ that life originated on the early earth entirely by natural conditions, the Miller-Urey experiments has actually provided compelling evidence for exactly the opposite conclusion. This set of experiments-more than almost any other carried out by modern science-has done much more to show that abiogenesis is not possible on Earth than to indicate how it could be possible.
My friend, if you leave here unsaved, I am the worst enemy that you have ever had, because you have been provided the gospel and you can never go into the presence of God and tell Him that you know nothing about the gospel. You have been provided the gospel, and it will be worse for you when God pronounces judgment than for any heathen in the darkest part of the earth today.
=================================
The Gospel According To The Author
=================================
Geology shows that fossils are of different ages. Paleontology shows a fossil sequence, the list of species represented changes through time. Taxonomy shows biological relationships among species. Evolution is the explanation that threads it all together. Creationism is the practice of squeezing one's eyes shut and wailing "Does not!"
I'm screen shotting this and posting it....perfection💯
Attacking modern science using a primitive creation-myth is like attacking a fully-armed, modern aircraft-carrier in a dug-out canoe.
So the Korean War without the Soviets?
The Korean War without the North Koreans (and the Soviets or The Chinese).
***** Maybe they're on a suicide mission! ;-)
¨¨
WWhy EVOLUTION is a LIE;ruclips.net/video/pmtVqhr32Vs/видео.htmls
Really? So explain how life came from non- life using "modern science"?
That was a wonderful presentation. I used to be a religious creationist and i wish i could revert my thinking back ans truely watch the presentation as my former self to see how uncomfortable it made me. Fossils of premodern mad used to make me cringe and I would pretty much just say no and then stop thinking about it. Thank god I don't believe in god anymore so i can take in info objectively and not have to be upset when something contradicts what i think i know.
+Heywood Yabloome Just jumping in here. I wouldn't call it brain desease, just rigorous brain training, literally hardwiring sensory input, It physically develops the brain. Practicing religion happens in the temporal lobes, where emotions reside. When someone prays, it lights up like a Christmas tree on scans. The more practice the stronger it gets, sometimes even resulting in cases of epilepsy (those shuddering folk lying on the floor supposedly having revelations). All the time it gets harder to reprogram. Apart from the fact that they don't want to, they are physically hampered. High temporal lobe activity slows or can even completely block frontal lobe activity (logic, reason). The brain simply rejects things too alien without structural reprogramming or some kind of mental shock. When you consider that, installing the Islamic rule that Muslims must pray six times a day, was a brilliant move.
Heywood Yabloome No I am not a scientist. I did have education in psychology/ criminology and effects of drugs when I did police sciences (BSc) for a few years, but this I got from just reading a lot of stuff and watching videos. And I am a track coach that puts heavy emphasis on brain training.
In justice, accountability and responsibility are big things. Intentional, unintentional, premeditated. Forced, tricked or provoked, heat of the moment, emergency, mental instability. Accountability is very case specific, but not responsibility since the offense / crime _was_ committed by said person.
If a religious zealot harms an unbeliever I would say perhaps a small measure of accountability and shared responsibility befalls the teacher(s). But if he was actually taught to harm unbelievers, he is just a pawn. Then full accountability and shared responsibility lies with the teacher and the zealot will probably be acquitted... though he will be forced to get psychiatric help, if he isn't already shocked enough to desire it.
Consider if free will is mere illusion. There are those that argue the universe is pure causality, deterministic. Even if not 100% true, that may still be the case for us. If so, then there is no free will. We just react to sensory input. Current input gets cross-referenced with older input, giving the illusion of consideration. But the path was set.
If one knows a person well, one can predict his/her (re)actions. So, if you were to know both circumstances and person perfectly, can you then perfectly predict them? I am on the fence. At the _very least_ it is a matter of probability. Let's say a kid may steal a pack of gum while the shop is temporarily unattended: e.g. 95% no, 5% yes.
Heywood Yabloome Well, essentially religious rules laws are also human :-) Most of them are common sense and secular in essense. Some of them just tend to be (seriously) outdated.
It isn't so much that the Jesus figure is immoral, though some of his actions and words are quite questionable, it's the way he is (ab)used as you describe. And then well... it's up to you to imagine your "I'm sorry" was good enough. Or you've been 'saved' already and then there are no restraints. Jesus didn't change things much though, forgiveness was first asked directly from Yhwh.
I've noticed that here, it's the 'saved ones' that can be most annoying. So self-rightious, talking down from their imaginary moral high horses. Some of them are extreme religious bigots.
Anyway... artificial intelligence. I expect it will only get more and more sophisticated as better computers are built that can process more data, and while they learn. Just look at robots learning to balance themselves. Coordination is also a form of intelligence. Emotions are probably by far the trickiest to mimic.
Remember that the more lifeforms evolved intelligence, the more emotions and character they show. So basically it comes last. Mankind is the smartest, but (consequently) also the most irrational. We have all these conflicts in interests and emotions, also within ourselves, because we can process and evaluate so much more data. And we think ourselves so rational, but deep down we are still ruled by basic instincts, of which fear / insecurity is arguably the strongest one (apart from the desire to live of course).
+Steven Burdick true freedom :)
+Steven Burdick welcome back to reality!
It's a closed book. Creationists cannot win these types of debates. They never have.
If religious people could reason, they wouldn't be religious.
Fear of disconnection from family and friends.
Fear of death and hellfire.
Fear of being wrong.
I agree. So does the Bible. According to the Bible God also hates religion and people who say they're not religious but, "spiritual". He refers to them as "mentally ill". I call them ''crazy as bat shit". According to the Christian's story, Jesus also hated religion. He cursed religious leaders many times over. Even beat up some of them for turning a church into a den of liars and thieves. So I guess you might have a lot of Christians agreeing with you. That's almost a 1st....lol
@@JamesRichardWiley What would you think if someone was "room temperature" for over an hour, with no signs of life whatsoever including no heartbeat, no breathing, no brain waves, then that person was somehow revived and that person had no brain damage or lasting effects, and that person was able to tell you everything that happened while he was dead with total accuracy including conversation and medical procedures he couldn't possibly know about because he was a farmer not a doctor? And...he also clearly recalled a bald spot on "top" of one of the doctor's heads. One more thing; that person had no opportunity to collude with anyone on any details because no one had left the room since that person woke up. What would you think if the story was verified by world renown neurosurgeons who had nothing to gain and everything to lose by being part of a false story? What would you think? BTW...this is an IQ test as well as a test to see if you are really a researcher or just a big mouth. And I noticed that you list some of the most notorious cults on your channel including the Catholic "religion". You may have been raised Catholic, in which case, with them being the ultimate child abusers, I will make adjustments for your answer.
@BillPrestin Esquire question for you Mr. Pretentious asshole: Where did you see me promoting Jesus or any other religious figure? You're a self assuming moron and BTW....I'd love to see you try to prove that....rof.
@@JamesRichardWiley I'm gonna go ahead and assume that none of that would bother you and you can make that call without the slightest bit of research....That's kinda why people don't commit crimes because they have
Fear of disconnection from family and friends.
Fear of death
Fear of being wrong.
Does that make them stupid?
I get the idea that you're one of these people who is just smart enough to remember what you're told and just dumb enough not to challenge it or complain. Your mother must be proud.
The REAL Genesis: IN THE BEGINNING, a bunch of bored goat herders were sitting around wondering why they didn't know shit and decided to start making up shit so they could tell others about it, and become experts on the shit they made up. Others liked the idea of making up shit, so that they too could become experts on their own shit. Their ideas caught on and people have been doing it ever since.
So this would be Genesis Chapter 1 Shit 1 then?
I don't normally listen to lectures by evolutionists, or read Dawkins' evolution books, because evolution is MIDDLE SCHOOL science! The fact that strenuous efforts have to be made to educate American adults in the 21st century on a subject that most of the rest of the developed and developing world is just basic science is just baffling to me.
+Mike Dyke It's in the OED, look it up. In any case it is at least as legit as the term "creationist", and way more legit than "ïntelligent design"
Amen. I am in 7TH GRADE and looking through these comments... brrrrh... The facts are there but they refuse to believe them.
Kevin
I'm not sure why you brought up 9/11, and I don't know enough about it to debate you on that. Our government is corrupt, yes. But can you send me a link to some info on these civilizations you're speaking of? Also, I'm not sure what you mean by "Evolution is materialism in disguise."
Look, I'm open to hearing your argument, however, from what I have seen at the moment, evolution is the most probable theory.
I think that if enough evidence is given, then the theory of evolution should be rewritten/discarded, just as Dalton's theories on the atom are no longer valid, and we now accept plate tectonics. That's what science is all about. As we gather more information, what is accepted changes.
EVOLUTION is a non existence. Because TIME is a non existence.
Evolution cannot exist as it relies EXCLUSIVELY on acceptance that there is such a thing as the existence of Time.
LIFE IS SIMPLY CYCLES OF REPETITION WITH ONE GOAL: CONTINUE.
You really should some really cool new discoveries keep coming up. Don't need them to prove evolution, although they all support it, but science is cool
The amazing part of this is at an hour in. Income inequality correlates with religious belief. How the ruling class laughs at you; but you'll get yours in the next life, right?
Evolution is true, but it only explains gradual changes, but it doesn't explain major changes, like Cambrian explosion, when many species appeared very suddenly. It does NOT explain origin of life at all. Darwin had admitted it himself. The real issue is: people politicize science, anything different from mainstream position should be dismissed. You shouldn't talk about it. That's not science.
@@seanleith5312 you realize that Darwin died in 1882, right? While he's the father of the Theory of Evolution, the field didn't stagnate with his death. Evolutionary biology has progressed way beyond *just* what Darwin stated. So when anyone says something along the lines of "Even Darwin said....", it's just laughable!
Next, the Theory of Evolution doesn't speak to the origin of life. It only speaks to allele changes over time. There are hypotheses that attempt to answer the origin of life, such as abiogenesis, which has great potential for becoming a theory.
@@seanleith5312 What you call "very suddenly" is actually 20 million years... Your mind simply does not realise how different the time scale is when it comes to life on earth, cosmos and the universe
@@seanleith5312 When we say the cambrian explosion (lasted at least 20 million years) happened suddenly, we mean by that: compared to the life of earth (4 billion years)
I feel like this is only an issue in America. I live in Finland where the assumption is that you don't believe in God unless stated otherwise, and creationists are openly ridiculed. Even my RE teacher (who happens to be religious) said that creationism has given Christianity a bad name, the entire idea is completely ludicrous and he can imagine Jesus face palming in heavens when he sees creationists.
"...from the beginning of the creation, God made them male and female."
Mark 10:6
"Remember Lot's wife."
Luke 17:32
*WHAT THE BIBLE TELLS US - About Morality* Please note the biblical passages that promote morality. Quiz at the end.
1. You can own slaves. You can buy and sell slaves. You can even sell your own daughter (Exodus 21:7-10). If she fails to please her master, you must refund him the purchase price.
WHAT THE BIBLE TELLS US - About Morality Please note the biblical passages that promote morality. Quiz at the end.
2. You can beat the living shit out of your slaves without being punished, as long as they do not die within two days (Exodus 20:20-21). Under what standards of morality is it ever okay to beat another human being like that and not suffer any consequences? It is reassuring the bible endorses property rights, but a source of morality it is not.
3. The bible not only condones slavery but sets prices for them (Leviticus 27:3-7). The bible obviously was concerned about human traffickers getting a fair price for their goods.
4. Surely Jesus had compassion towards slaves. He tells slaves to be obedient and subservient. That is why slave owners in the Americas pushed Christianity onto their slaves and punished those caught practicing their ancient religions.. Very reassuring. It was okay to beat slaves, those who unwittingly made mistakes were to be given few lashes, those who knowingly violated rules were to be given many lashes.
5. Thou shalt not kill. Now THERE is a good one. However, it seems there are exceptions:
No sooner had Moses returned from his first trip up the mountains to find a party to which he had not been invited, in a fit of rage he orders his Levite goon squad to kill "every man his brother, and every man his friend and every man his neighbor." Exodus 32:28 "The Levites did as Moses commanded and that day about 3000 of the people died." 'Tough Love' maybe?
6. But there are others. The bible requires the faithful to put to death by stoning;
Adulterers (Deuteronomy 22:23-24, Leviticus 20:10);
Homosexuals (Leviticus 20:13),
Non virgins (Deuteronomy 22:20-21),
any of your neighbors foolish enough to mow their lawn on the Sabbath (Exodus 31:12-15,Exodus 35:1-3,Numbers 15:32-36).
7. Oh, and speaking of rape, surely that ranks high on the ‘Thou shalt nots’ of the ten commandments. *NO???* It is not even mentioned???
An oversight perhaps? But then it was so important to forbid mixing fabrics or cooking a kid in its mother's milk (so important that it needed to be repeated three times) and such. Take a look at these REALLY important commandments (there are different versions within the bible). Thou shalt not:
Worship other gods
Work on the Sabbath (death penalty crime)
Take the name of the lord in vain (OMG, ANOTHER capital crime)
Make graven images
Covet thy neighbor’s wife or house or ass
And, oh yes, ‘thou shalt not kill’ and ‘thou shalt not steal’ are in there somewhere near the bottom. *But rape? Not one word!!!*
How about elsewhere in the bible? Surely somewhere the bible must condemn rape, no?
Oh, yes, here; Deuteronomy 22:28-29 28 "If a man happens to meet a virgin who is not pledged to be married and rapes her *and they are discovered,* 29 he shall pay her father fifty shekels of silver. He must marry the young woman, for he has violated her. He can never divorce her as long as he lives"
*YESSS! There it is. Rape is a PROPERTY crime*. The rapist has damaged the father’s PROPERTY and it is he that must be compensated. What justice for the victim of the rape? She has to marry her rapist. Surely she lived happily ever after, no? And what if they were not discovered and the girl kept quiet out of fear? The bible is quite clear about the fate of girls who are not virgins on their wedding day. Here, as elsewhere in the bible, women are chattel and have no say in their future.
It is interesting to note that, while the bible mandates death by stoning for adulterers and non virgin brides, raping an unbethrothed virgin incurred only a monetary penalty. This is biblical justice?
8. The bible endorses mass murder and sex slavery. Numbers 31:14-18 "14 Moses was angry with the officers of the army-the commanders of thousands and commanders of hundreds-who returned from the battle. 15 “Have you allowed all the women to live?” he asked them. 16 “They were the ones who followed Balaam’s advice and enticed the Israelites to be unfaithful to the Lord in the Peor incident, so that a plague struck the Lord’s people. *17 Now kill all the boys. And kill every woman who has slept with a man, 18 but save for yourselves every girl who has never slept with a man."*
Numbers 31:35 - "And thirty and two thousand persons in all, of women that had not known man by lying with him." *THIRTY TWO THOUSAND VIRGINS* being divided up to be used by “god’s chosen people” at the same time their mothers and brothers by the tens of thousands were being slaughtered like animals. Many of those women would have been pregnant, their unborn fetus dying inside them. And what would have been the crime of young boys of whatever age? 2? 4? 10? There was no distinction about age. This is GENOCIDE, condemned by civilized nations of the world.
If you fail to feel a deep sense of moral outrage at this, how do you condemn ISIS for doing far less? Genocide in whatever form is an ugly stain on humanity. To claim it to be a moral act is the ultimate evil. Why then, should you regard the bible as a moral guide? Is ISIS any less evil?
So what response do we hear from zealots? Shock? Horror? No! Their predicable response is indifference and a callous “They had it coming to them.” We have heard those words echoed by unrepentant Nazis and the barbaric ISIS. And how does that equate to morality? Are not empathy and compassion the cornerstones of morality? Where then is there any morality here?
Perhaps it was just an oversight that the bible nowhere condemns slavery, or rape or molesting children, but yet it was so important to forbid mixing fabrics or cooking a kid in its mother's milk (so important that it needed to be repeated three times). What does that say about biblical priorities?
If the bible is the source of your 'morality', call a mental health hotline, NOW..
God sends Abraham to murder his own son, clearly an immoral act. Abraham is perfectly willing to do so. And for this, the bible praises Abraham. To a rational person, morality is doing what's right, no matter what one is told. Biblical morality is doing what you are told no matter what.
Although an angel was sent to 'stay Abraham's hand', no such courtesy was given Jephthah's daughter made into a burnt offering to the lord (Judges 11:29-40). That should be enough to turn anyone's stomach. And what of Jephthah? Was this murderer of an innocent child punished in any way? *Was he condemned? NO. He is PRAISED. THE BIBLE APPROVES OF HUMAN SACRIFICE.*
To suggest that morality stems from religion is not only wrong, it is frightening. You don't need religion to have morals. If you can't determine right from wrong, you lack empathy, not religion. And the bible has a special message for women: "STFU". We see at every turn they are denied the rights afforded to men; they were regarded as property, either of their father or their husband. It can be a source of pride for women that apparently not a single one of them participated in the writing of the bible.The rights that women have today were not granted them by the bible, they had to fight for them. The bible endorses misogyny.
Atheists are far more moral than those who espouse religion. They are moral because it is the intelligent way to behave towards our fellow man, not out of expectation of reward or fear of punishment. If you are "moral" because of those constraints, you are a very dangerous person.
Slavery still exists, but it has been made illegal in virtually every part of the world, NOT because of guidance from the bible, but because it was the right thing to do. Morality stems from empathy and concern for our fellow man. Good people will do good things, bad people will do bad things; but for good people to do bad things, that takes religion. Dictators take control of a populace by instilling fear of punishment, how is religion any different than that?
Mark Twain once said "It ain't the parts of the bible I don't understand that bother me, it's the parts I DO understand.
Now the question: Do YOU understand why the bible is said to be the source of morality? Because I sure don't.?
The question regarding which should be taught in public school Evolution or creation is misleading. I would say both should be taught in public school but within the proper context, i.e. Evolution in science class and creation in classes on religion. It's always been astounding to me that creationists bellow about teaching the controversy (creation in science class) but they seem to fail to realize that many schools have classes on religion and even teach bible stories in literature class. There aren't any scientists I'm aware of that are hollering to have evolution taught in classes on religion.
No. Religious accounts are of a private matter and has no place in schools.
Or else, what religion's creation story would be thought? The Hindu creation? The Islamic version? The Jewish account? Scientology maybe? There are so many religions and beliefs that we cannot possibly take only one into account and discriminate all the others. At least, it cannot be imposed during the academic progress.
Childrens are the most malleable people intellectually and we should not be asking them to chose between facts and myths. They cannot possibly understand and make informed choices at this age. Especially when their parents tell them every nights how "Jesus" loves them and how they should have "faith" in these things, how confusing for the children that learns the very mechanisms of the world in biology at the same time. That's why churches have always and will always try to take them young, at school.
So no. Religions has NO place at all in schools, it's a matter of personal beliefs and should remain at a family range, not public school teachings.
We already have classes in public schools that teach students about various world religions which include introducing them to what members of those religions believe. We also have courses on ancient Mythology that teach students about what the ancient Greeks, Romans, Mayans, Aztecs, Egyptians, etc. believed. Are classes in ancient beliefs to be abolished as well? Shouldn't students be taught about historical and current cultures and societies?
***** No! Of course not. Along with ancient cultures and mythologies, the religious account should be taught as a "what people believed in" framework. Not a "here is how it works" stuff. Understand the difference?
I think we may have misunderstood each other. Like you, I'm 100% for the well-oriented education on history and that is why one religion should not be thought as a veridic account of the history. Because you know, in every scriptures of every religions, there are teachings that makes claims about the world (how it was constructed, why, what we should do about it...) but that is only a matter of belief that has nothing to do with what is confirmed with science and history.
Are we clear on that? I don't want you to think that I said we should not inform children about history or the religious beliefs all over the world. I just don't want childrens to be though the entire account of how the world was magically created by a specific religious view. It is irrelevant and confusing for them. If they are interested and wanna know more about a religion, they will find other times outside school to read about it. In schools, there should be only teachings of well studied and confirmed facts about the world.
*****
As a child I was exposed to numerous religions ranging from Christianity to Wicca to Buddhism. I found classes in religion and mythology to some of my favourite subjects, oddly enough without them having a profound impact on my personal beliefs. I would never propose or support the teaching of one specific religious institution as unquestionably true over any other but I do think it's important to teach children about religions in an academic setting. Expose them to a variety of religions while applying critical thinking skills and perhaps they'll be less susceptible to the effects of religious brain washing, e.g. the Branch Davidians and Heaven's Gate.
***** Agreed. Have you had philosophy class? I've has both philosophy class and Ethics and cultures class and I would say it informed me a lot about religions. I made my position much more clear when I learnt about all the other beliefs (from stupid to very dangerous) that people hold during history. It's mind boggling that people still believe in gods in 2013, after all we learned about the world.
Demonstrable, reproducible, testable results with predictive power. That's scientific truth.
So the exact opposite of evolution?
@Winston Grettum Incorrect.
@@ozowen5961 It is very correct.
With you would be a theory of Evolution you can't reproduce any step of this evolution you claim to be able to explain, nor can you predict any future development of actual species.
But you're proud to repeat such a nonsense like the Whales developing from land mammals. Not realizing how retarded this story is.
@@O-Kyklop
What do you mean by "reproduced"?
Experiments on organelles in cells have shown the ID claims of Irreducible Complexity to be nonsense because they can indeed be reduced down by removing genes and still have functioning organelles.
DNA experiments of many sorts of this nature are being done all the time taking the genome as a time capsule.
Predicting the future of a species is not possible because no one can tell what the genomic mutations will be that Natural Selection will respond to the changing environment with.
However, pathways of change are being seen all the time.
Since whales are closely related genetically to other land animals, and their fossil evolution is well noted, your claims that this is somehow bogus are just you scoffing at the science because, well, you are a bit of a mental midget.
@@ozowen5961
Mate. If you don't know what it means to "reproduce" an evolutive process to develop new species from existing ones, then forget it. Try playing chess.
But I try to stand on the shoulders of giants, like you.
I just wonder, where did the whale consulate his mutation from legs to flippers. On land or in Water. Because either way that animal would have been extinct in one or two generations.
But you're the brain here.
The reason people do not like evolutionism is its connection to atheism, eugenics and massmurder racial cleansing. All of which are valid objections against political application.
Bullshit. The only people who see that in a scientific theory are religious fundamentalists. The very people most likely to partake in gendercide and racial cleansing.
@@stephenirving1737 Not really no.
@@stephenirving1737 Tell me. The best adapted survive. Is that RIGHT?
“People cited violation of the First Amendment when a New Jersey schoolteacher asserted that evolution and the Big Bang are not scientific and that Noah's ark carried dinosaurs. This case is not about the need to separate church and state; it's about the need to separate ignorant, scientifically illiterate people from the ranks of teachers.”
― Neil deGrasse Tyson
The Neil deGrasse Tyson who claims that Information has MASS?
Ok. Guess on which side will he stay when the separation takes place.
As for Evolutions theory and BigBang not being scientific theories, well, it is true (let aside the dinos now).
The theory of Evolution is not even a Theory and the BB is a transcription of the Book Genesis of the Bible, just written in scientific nomenclature. It has been even written by a jesuit priest. Don'r even need to go around looking for evidence. the priest IS the evidence.
@@O-Kyklop Your ignorance and gullibility have no limits.
Creatard dipshits do not get to dietermine what is or is not a scientific theory.
Go back to your pedophile priest, crawl back under your rock.
@@O-Kyklop I imagine Sunday school history: how the people came to be? Magic. When was the flood? Who the fuk knows, somewhat (insert number) years ago. How did it happen? Magic. How the earth was repopulated? Well that's a tricky question. When brothers and sisters love each other very much.. How did jesus do miracles? Magic. How everything was created? Should guess by now - MAGIC.
@@smashexentertainment676
Well. How they tell you the BB came about is magic too, if you look a bit closer.
And, the BB being magic, all further explanations about the way Universe works are based on magic too.
@@O-Kyklop roflmao.
Brilliant lecture laying out the wealth of evidence to support evolutionary theory. Clear, concise and powerful.
Dude awesome fine. I watch the whole thing since you recommend it. Water bears ftw!
Darren Carpenter Have fun watching creationists try to refute these obvious facts, "the truth shall set you free'.
All Hail the mighty -Hypnotoad- Tardigrade !
chris prevatt The Scientific Case Against Evolution
by Henry M. Morris, Ph.D.
Belief in evolution is a remarkable phenomenon. It is a belief passionately defended by the scientific establishment, despite the lack of any observable scientific evidence for macroevolution (that is, evolution from one distinct kind of organism into another). This odd situation is briefly documented here by citing recent statements from leading evolutionists admitting their lack of proof. These statements inadvertently show that evolution on any significant scale does not occur at present, and never happened in the past, and could never happen at all.
Evolution Is Not Happening Now
First of all, the lack of a case for evolution is clear from the fact that no one has ever seen it happen. If it were a real process, evolution should still be occurring, and there should be many "transitional" forms that we could observe. What we see instead, of course, is an array of distinct "kinds" of plants and animals with many varieties within each kind, but with very clear and -- apparently -- unbridgeable gaps between the kinds. That is, for example, there are many varieties of dogs and many varieties of cats, but no "dats" or "cogs." Such variation is often called microevolution, and these minor horizontal (or downward) changes occur fairly often, but such changes are not true "vertical" evolution.
Evolutionary geneticists have often experimented on fruit flies and other rapidly reproducing species to induce mutational changes hoping they would lead to new and better species, but these have all failed to accomplish their goal. No truly new species has ever been produced, let alone a new "basic kind."
A current leading evolutionist, Jeffrey Schwartz, professor of anthropology at the University of Pittsburgh, has recently acknowledged that:
. . . it was and still is the case that, with the exception of Dobzhansky's claim about a new species of fruit fly, the formation of a new species, by any mechanism, has never been observed.1
The scientific method traditionally has required experimental observation and replication. The fact that macroevolution (as distinct from microevolution) has never been observed would seem to exclude it from the domain of true science. Even Ernst Mayr, the dean of living evolutionists, longtime professor of biology at Harvard, who has alleged that evolution is a "simple fact," nevertheless agrees that it is an "historical science" for which "laws and experiments are inappropriate techniques"2 by which to explain it. One can never actually see evolution in action.
Evolution Never Happened in the Past
Evolutionists commonly answer the above criticism by claiming that evolution goes too slowly for us to see it happening today. They used to claim that the real evidence for evolution was in the fossil record of the past, but the fact is that the billions of known fossils do not include a single unequivocal transitional form with transitional structures in the process of evolving.
Given that evolution, according to Darwin, was in a continual state of motion . . . it followed logically that the fossil record should be rife with examples of transitional forms leading from the less to the more evolved.3
Even those who believe in rapid evolution recognize that a considerable number of generations would be required for one distinct "kind" to evolve into another more complex kind. There ought, therefore, to be a considerable number of true transitional structures preserved in the fossils -- after all, there are billions of non-transitional structures there! But (with the exception of a few very doubtful creatures such as the controversial feathered dinosaurs and the alleged walking whales), they are not there.
Instead of filling in the gaps in the fossil record with so-called missing links, most paleontologists found themselves facing a situation in which there were only gaps in the fossil record, with no evidence of transformational intermediates between documented fossil species.4
The entire history of evolution from the evolution of life from non-life to the evolution of vertebrates from invertebrates to the evolution of man from the ape is strikingly devoid of intermediates: the links are all missing in the fossil record, just as they are in the present world.
With respect to the origin of life, a leading researcher in this field, Leslie Orgel, after noting that neither proteins nor nucleic acids could have arisen without the other, concludes:
And so, at first glance, one might have to conclude that life could never, in fact, have originated by chemical means.5
Being committed to total evolution as he is, Dr. Orgel cannot accept any such conclusion as that. Therefore, he speculates that RNA may have come first, but then he still has to admit that:
The precise events giving rise to the RNA world remain unclear. . . . investigators have proposed many hypotheses, but evidence in favor of each of them is fragmentary at best.6
Translation: "There is no known way by which life could have arisen naturalistically." Unfortunately, two generations of students have been taught that Stanley Miller's famous experiment on a gaseous mixture, practically proved the naturalistic origin of life. But not so!
Miller put the whole thing in a ball, gave it an electric charge, and waited. He found that amino acids and other fundamental complex molecules were accumulating at the bottom of the apparatus. His discovery gave a huge boost to the scientific investigation of the origin of life. Indeed, for some time it seemed like creation of life in a test tube was within reach of experimental science. Unfortunately, such experiments have not progressed much further than the original prototype, leaving us with a sour aftertaste from the primordial soup.7
Neither is there any clue as to how the one-celled organisms of the primordial world could have evolved into the vast array of complex multi-celled invertebrates of the Cambrian period. Even dogmatic evolutionist Gould admits that:
The Cambrian explosion was the most remarkable and puzzling event in the history of life.8
Equally puzzling, however, is how some invertebrate creature in the ancient ocean, with all its "hard parts" on the outside, managed to evolve into the first vertebrate -- that is, the first fish-- with its hard parts all on the inside.
Yet the transition from spineless invertebrates to the first backboned fishes is still shrouded in mystery, and many theories abound.9
Other gaps are abundant, with no real transitional series anywhere. A very bitter opponent of creation science, paleontologist, Niles Eldredge, has acknowledged that there is little, if any, evidence of evolutionary transitions in the fossil record. Instead, things remain the same!
It is a simple ineluctable truth that virtually all members of a biota remain basically stable, with minor fluctuations, throughout their durations. . . .10
So how do evolutionists arrive at their evolutionary trees from fossils of oganisms which didn't change during their durations?
Fossil discoveries can muddle over attempts to construct simple evolutionary trees -- fossils from key periods are often not intermediates, but rather hodge podges of defining features of many different groups. . . . Generally, it seems that major groups are not assembled in a simple linear or progressive manner -- new features are often "cut and pasted" on different groups at different times.11
As far as ape/human intermediates are concerned, the same is true, although anthropologists have been eagerly searching for them for many years. Many have been proposed, but each has been rejected in turn.
All that paleoanthropologists have to show for more than 100 years of digging are remains from fewer than 2000 of our ancestors. They have used this assortment of jawbones, teeth and fossilized scraps, together with molecular evidence from living species, to piece together a line of human descent going back 5 to 8 million years to the time when humans and chimpanzees diverged from a common ancestor.12
Anthropologists supplemented their extremely fragmentary fossil evidence with DNA and other types of molecular genetic evidence from living animals to try to work out an evolutionary scenario that will fit. But this genetic evidence really doesn't help much either, for it contradicts fossil evidence. Lewin notes that:
The overall effect is that molecular phylogenetics is by no means as straightforward as its pioneers believed. . . . The Byzantine dynamics of genome change has many other consequences for molecular phylogenetics, including the fact that different genes tell different stories.13
Summarizing the genetic data from humans, another author concludes, rather pessimistically:
Even with DNA sequence data, we have no direct access to the processes of evolution, so objective reconstruction of the vanished past can be achieved only by creative imagination.14
Since there is no real scientific evidence that evolution is occurring at present or ever occurred in the past, it is reasonable to conclude that evolution is not a fact of science, as many claim. In fact, it is not even science at all, but an arbitrary system built upon faith in universal naturalism.
Actually, these negative evidences against evolution are, at the same time, strong positive evidences for special creation. They are, in fact, specific predictions based on the creation model of origins.
Creationists would obviously predict ubiquitous gaps between created kinds, though with many varieties capable of arising within each kind, in order to enable each basic kind to cope with changing environments without becoming extinct. Creationists also would anticipate that any "vertical changes" in organized complexity would be downward, since the Creator (by definition) would create things correctly to begin with. Thus, arguments and evidences against evolution are, at the same time, positive evidences for creation.
The Equivocal Evidence from Genetics
Nevertheless, because of the lack of any direct evidence for evolution, evolutionists are increasingly turning to dubious circumstantial evidences, such as similarities in DNA or other biochemical components of organisms as their "proof" that evolution is a scientific fact. A number of evolutionists have even argued that DNA itself is evidence for evolution since it is common to all organisms. More often is the argument used that similar DNA structures in two different organisms proves common evolutionary ancestry.
Neither argument is valid. There is no reason whatever why the Creator could not or would not use the same type of genetic code based on DNA for all His created life forms. This is evidence for intelligent design and creation, not evolution.
The most frequently cited example of DNA commonality is the human/chimpanzee "similarity," noting that chimpanzees have more than 90% of their DNA the same as humans. This is hardly surprising, however, considering the many physiological resemblances between people and chimpanzees. Why shouldn't they have similar DNA structures in comparison, say, to the DNA differences between men and spiders?
Similarities -- whether of DNA, anatomy, embryonic development, or anything else -- are better explained in terms of creation by a common Designer than by evolutionary relationship. The great differences between organisms are of greater significance than the similarities, and evolutionism has no explanation for these if they all are assumed to have had the same ancestor. How could these great gaps between kinds ever arise at all, by any natural process?
The apparently small differences between human and chimpanzee DNA obviously produce very great differences in their respective anatomies, intelligence, etc. The superficial similarities between all apes and human beings are nothing compared to the differences in any practical or observable sense.
Nevertheless, evolutionists, having largely become disenchanted with the fossil record as a witness for evolution because of the ubiquitous gaps where there should be transitions, recently have been promoting DNA and other genetic evidence as proof of evolution. However, as noted above by Roger Lewin, this is often inconsistent with, not only the fossil record, but also with the comparative morphology of the creatures. Lewin also mentions just a few typical contradictions yielded by this type of evidence in relation to more traditional Darwinian "proofs."
The elephant shrew, consigned by traditional analysis to the order insectivores . . . is in fact more closely related to . . . the true elephant. Cows are more closely related to dolphins than they are to horses. The duckbilled platypus . . . is on equal evolutionary footing with . . . kangaroos and koalas.15
There are many even more bizarre comparisons yielded by this approach.
The abundance of so-called "junk DNA" in the genetic code also has been offered as a special type of evidence for evolution, especially those genes which they think have experienced mutations, sometimes called "pseudogenes."16 However, evidence is accumulating rapidly today that these supposedly useless genes do actually perform useful functions.
Enough genes have already been uncovered in the genetic midden to show that what was once thought to be waste is definitely being transmitted into scientific code.17
It is thus wrong to decide that junk DNA, even the socalled "pseudogenes," have no function. That is merely an admission of ignorance and an object for fruitful research. Like the socalled "vestigial organs" in man, once considered as evidence of evolution but now all known to have specific uses, so the junk DNA and pseudogenes most probably are specifically useful to the organism, whether or not those uses have yet been discovered by scientists.
At the very best this type of evidence is strictly circumstantial and can be explained just as well in terms of primeval creation supplemented in some cases by later deterioration, just as expected in the creation model.
The real issue is, as noted before, whether there is any observable evidence that evolution is occurring now or has ever occurred in the past. As we have seen, even evolutionists have to acknowledge that this type of real scientific evidence for evolution does not exist.
A good question to ask is: Why are all observable evolutionary changes either horizontal and trivial (so-called microevolution) or downward toward deterioration and extinction? The answer seems to be found in the universally applicable laws of the science of thermodynamics.
Evolution Could Never Happen at All
The main scientific reason why there is no evidence for evolution in either the present or the past (except in the creative imagination of evolutionary scientists) is because one of the most fundamental laws of nature precludes it. The law of increasing entropy -- also known as the second law of thermodynamics -- stipulates that all systems in the real world tend to go "downhill," as it were, toward disorganization and decreased complexity.
This law of entropy is, by any measure, one of the most universal, bestproved laws of nature. It applies not only in physical and chemical systems, but also in biological and geological systems -- in fact, in all systems, without exception.
No exception to the second law of thermodynamics has ever been found -- not even a tiny one. Like conservation of energy (the "first law"), the existence of a law so precise and so independent of details of models must have a logical foundation that is independent of the fact that matter is composed of interacting particles.18
The author of this quote is referring primarily to physics, but he does point out that the second law is "independent of details of models." Besides, practically all evolutionary biologists are reductionists -- that is, they insist that there are no "vitalist" forces in living systems, and that all biological processes are explicable in terms of physics and chemistry. That being the case, biological processes also must operate in accordance with the laws of thermodynamics, and practically all biologists acknowledge this.
Evolutionists commonly insist, however, that evolution is a fact anyhow, and that the conflict is resolved by noting that the earth is an "open system," with the incoming energy from the sun able to sustain evolution throughout the geological ages in spite of the natural tendency of all systems to deteriorate toward disorganization. That is how an evolutionary entomologist has dismissed W. A. Dembski's impressive recent book, Intelligent Design. This scientist defends what he thinks is "natural processes' ability to increase complexity" by noting what he calls a "flaw" in "the arguments against evolution based on the second law of thermodynamics." And what is this flaw?
Although the overall amount of disorder in a closed system cannot decrease, local order within a larger system can increase even without the actions of an intelligent agent.19
This naive response to the entropy law is typical of evolutionary dissimulation. While it is true that local order can increase in an open system if certain conditions are met, the fact is that evolution does not meet those conditions. Simply saying that the earth is open to the energy from the sun says nothing about how that raw solar heat is converted into increased complexity in any system, open or closed.
The fact is that the best known and most fundamental equation of thermodynamics says that the influx of heat into an open system will increase the entropy of that system, not decrease it. All known cases of decreased entropy (or increased organization) in open systems involve a guiding program of some sort and one or more energy conversion mechanisms.
Evolution has neither of these. Mutations are not "organizing" mechanisms, but disorganizing (in accord with the second law). They are commonly harmful, sometimes neutral, but never beneficial (at least as far as observed mutations are concerned). Natural selection cannot generate order, but can only "sieve out" the disorganizing mutations presented to it, thereby conserving the existing order, but never generating new order. In principle, it may be barely conceivable that evolution could occur in open systems, in spite of the tendency of all systems to disintegrate sooner or later. But no one yet has been able to show that it actually has the ability to overcome this universal tendency, and that is the basic reason why there is still no bona fide proof of evolution, past or present.
From the statements of evolutionists themselves, therefore, we have learned that there is no real scientific evidence for real evolution. The only observable evidence is that of very limited horizontal (or downward) changes within strict limits.
Evolution is Religion -- Not Science
In no way does the idea of particles-to-people evolution meet the long-accepted criteria of a scientific theory. There are no such evolutionary transitions that have ever been observed in the fossil record of the past; and the universal law of entropy seems to make it impossible on any significant scale.
Evolutionists claim that evolution is a scientific fact, but they almost always lose scientific debates with creationist scientists. Accordingly, most evolutionists now decline opportunities for scientific debates, preferring instead to make unilateral attacks on creationists.
Scientists should refuse formal debates because they do more harm than good, but scientists still need to counter the creationist message.20
The question is, just why do they need to counter the creationist message? Why are they so adamantly committed to anti-creationism?
The fact is that evolutionists believe in evolution because they want to. It is their desire at all costs to explain the origin of everything without a Creator. Evolutionism is thus intrinsically an atheistic religion. Some may prefer to call it humanism, and "new age" evolutionists place it in the context of some form of pantheism, but they all amount to the same thing. Whether atheism or humanism (or even pantheism), the purpose is to eliminate a personal God from any active role in the origin of the universe and all its components, including man.
The core of the humanistic philosophy is naturalism -- the proposition that the natural world proceeds according to its own internal dynamics, without divine or supernatural control or guidance, and that we human beings are creations of that process. It is instructive to recall that the philosophers of the early humanistic movement debated as to which term more adequately described their position: humanism or naturalism. The two concepts are complementary and inseparable.21
Since both naturalism and humanism exclude God from science or any other active function in the creation or maintenance of life and the universe in general, it is very obvious that their position is nothing but atheism. And atheism, no less than theism, is a religion! Even doctrinaire-atheistic evolutionist Richard Dawkins admits that atheism cannot be proved to be true.
Of course we can't prove that there isn't a God.22
Therefore, they must believe it, and that makes it a religion.
The atheistic nature of evolution is not only admitted, but insisted upon by most of the leaders of evolutionary thought. Ernst Mayr, for example, says that:
Darwinism rejects all supernatural phenomena and causations.23
A professor in the Department of Biology at Kansas State University says:
Even if all the data point to an intelligent designer, such a hypothesis is excluded from science because it is not naturalistic.24
It is well known by almost everyone in the scientific world today that such influential evolutionists as Stephen Jay Gould and Edward Wilson of Harvard, Richard Dawkins of England, William Provine of Cornell, and numerous other evolutionary spokesmen are dogmatic atheists. Eminent scientific philosopher and ardent Darwinian atheist Michael Ruse has even acknowledged that evolution is their religion!
Evolution is promoted by its practitioners as more than mere science. Evolution is promulgated as an ideology, a secular religion -- a full-fledged alternative to Christianity, with meaning and morality . . . . Evolution is a religion. This was true of evolution in the beginning, and it is true of evolution still today.25
Another way of saying "religion" is "worldview," the whole of reality. The evolutionary worldview applies not only to the evolution of life, but even to that of the entire universe. In the realm of cosmic evolution, our naturalistic scientists depart even further from experimental science than life scientists do, manufacturing a variety of evolutionary cosmologies from esoteric mathematics and metaphysical speculation. Socialist Jeremy Rifkin has commented on this remarkable game.
Cosmologies are made up of small snippets of physical reality that have been remodeled by society into vast cosmic deceptions.26
They must believe in evolution, therefore, in spite of all the evidence, not because of it. And speaking of deceptions, note the following remarkable statement.
We take the side of science in spite of the patent absurdity of some of its constructs, . . . in spite of the tolerance of the scientific community for unsubstantiated commitment to materialism. . . . we are forced by our a priori adherence to material causes to create an apparatus of investigation and set of concepts that produce material explanations, no matter how counterintuitive, no matter how mystifying to the uninitiated. Moreover, that materialism is absolute, for we cannot allow a Divine Foot in the door.27
The author of this frank statement is Richard Lewontin of Harvard. Since evolution is not a laboratory science, there is no way to test its validity, so all sorts of justso stories are contrived to adorn the textbooks. But that doesn't make them true! An evolutionist reviewing a recent book by another (but more critical) evolutionist, says:
We cannot identify ancestors or "missing links," and we cannot devise testable theories to explain how particular episodes of evolution came about. Gee is adamant that all the popular stories about how the first amphibians conquered the dry land, how the birds developed wings and feathers for flying, how the dinosaurs went extinct, and how humans evolved from apes are just products of our imagination, driven by prejudices and preconceptions.28
A fascinatingly honest admission by a physicist indicates the passionate commitment of establishment scientists to naturalism. Speaking of the trust students naturally place in their highly educated college professors, he says:
And I use that trust to effectively brainwash them. . . . our teaching methods are primarily those of propaganda. We appeal -- without demonstration -- to evidence that supports our position. We only introduce arguments and evidence that supports the currently accepted theories and omit or gloss over any evidence to the contrary.29
Creationist students in scientific courses taught by evolutionist professors can testify to the frustrating reality of that statement. Evolution is, indeed, the pseudoscientific basis of religious atheism, as Ruse pointed out. Will Provine at Cornell University is another scientist who frankly acknowledges this.
As the creationists claim, belief in modern evolution makes atheists of people. One can have a religious view that is compatible with evolution only if the religious view is indistinguishable from atheism.30
Once again, we emphasize that evolution is not science, evolutionists' tirades notwithstanding. It is a philosophical worldview, nothing more.
(Evolution) must, they feel, explain everything. . . . A theory that explains everything might just as well be discarded since it has no real explanatory value. Of course, the other thing about evolution is that anything can be said because very little can be disproved. Experimental evidence is minimal.31
Even that statement is too generous. Actual experimental evidence demonstrating true evolution (that is, macroevolution) is not "minimal." It is nonexistent!
The concept of evolution as a form of religion is not new. In my book, The Long War Against God,32 I documented the fact that some form of evolution has been the pseudo-rationale behind every anti-creationist religion since the very beginning of history. This includes all the ancient ethnic religions, as well as such modern world religions as Buddhism, Hinduism, and others, as well as the "liberal" movements in even the creationist religions (Christianity, Judaism, Islam).
As far as the twentieth century is concerned, the leading evolutionist is generally considered to be Sir Julian Huxley, primary architect of modern neo-Darwinism. Huxley called evolution a "religion without revelation" and wrote a book with that title (2nd edition, 1957). In a later book, he said:
Evolution . . . is the most powerful and the most comprehensive idea that has ever arisen on earth.33
Later in the book he argued passionately that we must change "our pattern of religious thought from a God-centered to an evolution-centered pattern."34 Then he went on to say that: "The God hypothesis . . . is becoming an intellectual and moral burden on our thought." Therefore, he concluded that "we must construct something to take its place."35
That something, of course, is the religion of evolutionary humanism, and that is what the leaders of evolutionary humanism are trying to do today.
In closing this survey of the scientific case against evolution (and, therefore, for creation), the reader is reminded again that all quotations in the article are from doctrinaire evolutionists. No Bible references are included, and no statements by creationists. The evolutionists themselves, to all intents and purposes, have shown that evolutionism is not science, but religious faith in atheism.
Dagan Poe Well, he is wrong about "dats and cogs" The hyena resembles a dog in appearance and behavior, but it is genetically more closely related to cats.
Evolution will never become a fact. Because evolution is based on facts. The theory of evolution is the best explanation for the facts observed. Theories never become laws either. So saying I don't believe in the theory of evolution because it is not a fact, is scientific illiteracy.
Gravity is both a law and a theory. The fact observed is that things fall. The law is that things fall at 9.81 meters per second squared. The theory tries to explain why things fall.
Semantics. You're playing games with various definitions of the words theory and law. Layman's definitions vs scientific definitions. Plus your understanding of gravity is superficial.
MMMM how i would i believe a scientist how discovers bone and facts or a boy or girl that sit on there ass all day IM GOING WITH THE FUCKING SCIENTIST
dothedeed
Laurent Jade clearly used the word 'theory' in exactly *one* sense: the scientific one. If using language accurately _is_ a game, then you finished a poor second (out of two!)
jeff isthebest
You mean the "FUCKING BRAINWASHER" right? Cuz thats all evolutionists are.
Isaac Wolvie And creationism is not brainwash? How come creationists have the highest church-attendance among Christians? "Evolutionists" don't go to no Creation Museum to sit in front of a charlatan spewing pseudo-scientific bullshit as truth. But they give you hope, they enforce your faith, and that makes you feel good. You creationists blindly trust all the lies your mega-church, multi-millionnaire preachers vomit. I'll trust the scientists....
*EVIDENCE FOR EVOLUTION - Our Common Ancestry* with chimps is based on more than physical or genetic similarity. although those are pieces of evidence. Just as you have in your genome a defective gene you inherited from your parents who inherited it from their ancestors.That gene, named GULO, is what allows most other animals to produce vitamin C which is essential for good health. That gene has a specific mutation which prevents it from completing the final stage of vitamin C production and it is now a pseudo gene. Humans who do not get vitamin C in their diet (from fresh fruits and vegetables) get Scurvy, a disease that decimated the crews of sailing ships.
It turns out that chimps have that same defective gene, disabled by exactly the same mutation. That fact does not bother chimpanzees in the least, because their diet of mostly leaves and fruit provide all the vitamin C they need. Living chimps today of course got that defective gene from their parents who got it from their ancestors who happen to be our ancestors as well. Not only does every ape have that same pseudo gene with the same disabling mutation so in fact does every other primate in the sub order Haplorhini. That is Old World monkeys, New World monkeys, even Tarsiers, which are close to basal primates but not ancestral to the Strepsirrhini sub order (Lemurs, Lorises et al). That places the origin of that mutation to be about 63 million years ago and underscores their common ancestry.
And that is just one of the many pseudo genes passed from generation to generation from ancestors to present day organisms that are evidence for common ancestry. But those are just part of the problem for creationists and "intelligent design" advocates. Evolution explains pseudo genes very well. Explaining why some "creative entity" would leave such things "on the cutting room floor" is quite another matter.
And as if that were not enough, there is the matter of Endogenous Retroviruses (ERV's), the genetic 'fossils' of ancient retroviral infections. The thing about retroviruses is that when they enter a host organism's cell, they always insert DNA copies of their RNA into a random location of that host's genome. When that cell divides and replicates, the viral DNA will be replicated at that same location. If that cell is a germ cell, that DNA sequence will be replicated and passed through millions of generations and found in present day species. Again, that is also evidence of common ancestry. As always, the creationist/'intelligent design' people have no good explanation for them.
Those ERV's make up 8% of the human genome which is an awful lot of DNA compared to just 2% that code for proteins. That expanse of DNA may be something of a 'Scrap Pile' of disabled viruses, but that doesn't mean that certain useful snippets can't be found and put to use. They certainly have. One such snippet is a segment of Human Endogenous Retrovirus W (HERV-W), named Synctin 1 which in humans aids the formation of the placenta.
See: "Syncytin is a captive retroviral envelope protein involved in human placental morphogenesis" www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10693809 Now, other placental mammals use other versions of synctins for placental development, but they are derived from different ERV's. The one utilized by the human genome is the same one used by the other apes and Old World monkeys, but not New World monkeys, which places common ancestry of those species (Catarrhini) more than 25 million years ago.
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*EVIDENCE FOR EVOLUTION - The Predictive Ability of the Theory - Part II* The defining characteristic of all scientific knowledge, including theories, is the ability to make falsifiable or testable predictions. The best test of any scientific theory is its usefulness as a predictive tool. In that respect, the Theory of Evolution performs admirably. The Theory of Evolution would predict that, IF birds evolved from dinosaurs, there should be a progression of derived traits in dinosaurs leading up to the origin of birds and that is exactly what we see.
Perhaps the most complete transitional sequence in the fossil record is that from dinosaurs to birds. Birds didn’t just evolve from dinosaurs overnight, but the features of birds evolved one by one; first light bones and bipedal locomotion, then feathers, then a wishbone, then more complex feathers that look like quill-pen feathers, then wings. Yes, wings evolved before flight. Just as there are birds today such as ostriches, emus, rheas, etc. that no longer fly, yet still use their wings for other purposes, there were winged theropod dinosaurs that may have used them to shelter young, for mating displays, or intimidating a predator or rival just as do birds of today.
Long before wings, the forelimbs of theropods evolved to allow them to reach forward to grasp prey with their claws. Those are the Maniraptors. That movement is exactly the same as that required for flapping wings. Archaeopteryx still had those grasping claws as did other early birds. The young chicks of the Hoatzin still retain them. Claws are also evident on many bird species; Emus, Cassowarys and Kiwis still have them on vestigial wings.
Feathers and scales are formed from the same material, keratin. Birds retain scales on their legs; the japanese Silkie chicken has been bred for fully feathered legs, indicating that only slight genetic modification is necessary. Take a look at an Emu; its legs are exactly what would be expected on a dinosaur. It too, has a useless nub of a wing with an equally useless claw. Vestigial remnants are always confusing to creationists
There is a succession of feathered dinosaur fossils with increasingly bird like characteristics i.e. Xiaotingia, Sinosauropteryx prima, Caudipteryx, Sinovenator and others. Any of these fossils showing such a mix of traits can be considered transitional. The whole lineage of feathered dinosaurs could be considered transitional. The fossil record even shows the stages of feather evolution from simple spikes to down to contour feathers and ultimately to quilled flight feathers. Today we have lots of feathered dinosaur fossils; so many feathered theropod fossils in fact, that most paleontologists now think ALL theropods were probably feathered.
There were dinosaurs with wings that couldn't possibly fly, like 5 foot 40 pound Zhenyuanlong suni. There were a great many almost-birds and not-quite-birds, until about 150 million years ago, birds ultimately took flight. Birds or almost birds like Auronis, Archaeopteryx, Shenzhouraptor, Rahonavis, Yandangornis Jixiangornis, Sapeornis, Omnivoropteryx, Confuciusornis and Changchengornis retain some dinosaur-like features such as teeth and long bony tails. Evolution is NOT a linear process. Many of these species lived at the same time, displaying a matrix of characteristics. Evolution is a natural experiment. Some things work and get perpetuated, others may enjoy brief success before extinction.
Any organism that can exploit a new environment or food source has an evolutionary advantage.When birds took to the air it vastly expanded their ability to move through and into new environments and rapid diversification followed.
With so many transitional fossils displaying both bird-like and dinosaur-like features, there is an almost seamless transition from dinosaur to bird (as well as a great number of dead end evolutionary experiments) and it is often difficult to separate the two. Doing so requires statistical analysis of nearly 1000 inherited and derived characteristics.
Lest you think of evolution as being a linear process, feathered non-avian dinosaurs continued to pursue differing evolutionary paths. About 25 million years after the origin of birds saw new evolutionary experiments in Microraptors, four winged dromeosaurs with pinnaceous flight feathers on both arms and legs that were capable of gliding and possibly powered flight as well. Their fossils indicate that for a while at least, they were quite successful. There are some 300 of these fossil 'experiments' in museum collections around the world.
Coinciding with the demise of the dinosaurs, a great many lineages of birds (excuse me, Avian Dinosaurs) and mammals also perished. However, so many environmental niches were opened to mammals and birds that, again, rapid diversification followed in both groups.
The Theory of Evolution predicted that, IF birds evolved from dinosaurs, there should be a progression of derived traits in dinosaurs leading up to the origin of birds and that is exactly what we see. It is not just that birds descended from theropod dinosaurs, they ARE theropod dinosaurs,... AND Amniotes AND Sarcopterygians AND Vertebrates AND Animals AND Eucaryotes, because ones ancestry is never lost.
Science for the win.
Scientific belief and Religious belief are two entirely separate things. The scientific use of theory and the common vernacular of theory also mean two entirely separate things. Too many people, however, assume that belief trumps fact or truth, when in reality, fact and truth do not require belief to exist. Too many people are willing to dismiss fact and truth as 'That is your belief' when they disagree. Then they will exaggerate to back up their statement. As a result, it brings me to my singular point: If you have to fight so hard to reinforce your beliefs to the point that you will ignore all evidence that contradicts your beliefs, perhaps you need to reexamine your philosophical existence in order to achieve a solution that works for everyone and not just yourself.
There is a difference between not understanding the evolution
and denying it. Evolution is supported by evidences, although in some cases those evidences are not available for all animals, but they proof it for sure.
Most scientifically literate creation scientists accept the fact of micro-evolution but deny macro-evolution. I'm reminded of the joke
Would you sleep with me for a $100.
"No!!"
Would you sleep with me for 1billion dollars dollars?
"Uhh, maybe"
OK we've established what you are, now we're just arguing price
Mark Jefferson "creation scientist" is an oxymoron.
Randall Wilks
Hey Randall. Actually I must respectfully disagree. Dr. Michael Behe is a real scientist and admits "Evolution works". Creation scientists have also reputed the Moondust theory and Pulaxy Man. Even a stopped clock is right twice a day ;)
You are essentially right though.
Mark Jefferson By "creation scientists" I assume you mean both of them.
I don't get the whole micro vs macro evolution debate is small change can happen over a small amount of time then large change can happen over a large amount of time. That is just pure logical sense.
Mark Jefferson I consider a "creation scientist" to be someone who uses his scientific credentials to push creationism.
Evolution makes sense and explains many problems with how we got here and the diversity of life on Earth. In fact makes way more sense then the nonsense creationism is explaining.
+Omar Abuaita Evolution explains death, diversity and deformity. Religion explains those as the wages of sin (inherited from one's parents of course), makes zero predictions from that stance other than the ones they choose to make up (none of which are verifiable at all), and usually prefers to to fabricate such answers to recruit more followers.
+ExtantFrodo2 Thanks for the info on point! :D
Omar Abuaita
You're welcome. Some of the finer points I've picked up along the way. :-)
+Omar Abuaita fishes becoming humans. makes fucking sense
+sarud durdstrom WTF!!!!!! Were you home schooled or just naturally stupid? Whoever told you that was evolution was dumber than a box of rocks. Get an education, it beats the hell out of ignorance.
Im curious, when do we get to see all these "fossils" that show us the steps of evolution.
Fossilization is an extremely rare process. We are lucky to even have the fossils we have. And in the absence of DNA in fossils (we call the ones that contain DNA "subfossils"), we can never _know_ whether a fossilized organism is the ancestor of another, or they are just distant cousins.
Note: even if we didn't have any fossils at all, Genetics alone (the distribution of ERVs) provides conclusive evidence for past evolution hands down.
And any observed instance of a speciation event (there are more than 30 so far, both in lab, and in Nature) shows that evolution happens continuously.
Silas Cole When you expend the slightest effort on your part to look it up.
Describe these speciation events if you don't mind or tell me were I can go to study them. And how in the world does "the distribution of ERVs" point toward evolution when cats can only produce cats, dogs can only produce dogs, pigs can only produce pigs, and so on. See, animals can only produce toward its own "kind' and can never produce something in the slightest of differences. Sure you can have mutated animals, but name one instance where mutation was beneficial, and mutation still only produces out of it's own "kind."
Silas Cole
I gave you the site where you can learn more, but seems like you have to be spoonfed:
Two scientific studies describing speciation events (of the many):
[Weinberg, J. R., V. R. Starczak and P. Jora. 1992. Evidence for rapid speciation following a founder event in the laboratory. Evolution. 46:1214-1220.]
[Schluter, D. and L. M. Nagel. 1995. Parallel speciation by natural selection. American Naturalist. 146:292-301.]
A prediction of the ToE is that we can find identical Endogenous retroviral gene insertions in the exact same spot of different species which we suspect to be of common ancestry (e.g. humans and other apes). Genetic studies in the 90s already found such ERV gene insertions, providing conclusive evidence for the claim that humans and all other apes share common ancestors. See:
[Welkin E. Johnson and John M. Coffin. 1999. "Constructing primate phylogenies from ancient retrovirus sequences" Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 1999 August 31; 96(18): 10254-10260.]
"point toward evolution when cats can only produce cats, dogs can only produce dogs, pigs can only produce pigs, and so on. "
You know, "cat" is a big category; a taxonomic family (Felidae), "pig" is a genus (Sus), and "dog" is a subspecies of wolves (Canis lupus familiaris). And we know well that dogs were bred from ancient wolves (wolves producing dogs).
"See, animals can only produce toward its own "kind' and can never produce something in the slightest of differences. "
Define "kind". Be specific. I won't accept examples, only a clear, single-sentence definition.
"Sure you can have mutated animals, but name one instance where mutation was beneficial,"
White skin was originally a mutation, and it is pretty beneficial in cloudy, foggy areas because it is better at producing vitamin D.
Another example is the appearance of the Nylonase enzyme (you probably heard about this one) See:
[Ohno S (April 1984). "Birth of a unique enzyme from an alternative reading frame of the preexisted, internally repetitious coding sequence"]
"and mutation still only produces out of it's own "kind.""
We will get back to this after you will be able to define "kind", but let it be suffice now that different mutations can accumulate over generations, and after 10, 1000, or even 100.000 generations, the accumulated mutations can result in pretty radical changes (See genetic drift).
Museums.
there is only one good: knowledge
and only one evil: ignorance
gasp! so little red riding hood was evil, and the wolf was the good guy? You are wise my friend.
truthseeker1973 Or your parable is crippled and isn't impressive.
SaunaJaakko Actually it was a pretty smart parable to make a very black-white statement more complex.
internetsurfer777 whatever advise you give, make it short. so arguing with an age old greek sayings which are true the majority of times and therefor trying to adjust them and make them more complex, isn't always a good thing ;)
Trying to explain the integrity of the scientific method to someone who believes dinosaurs and people coexisted is like trying to explain vector calculus to someone who just learned to count to ten.
Although someone who learned how count count to ten have an edge to learn vector calculus, an hardcore creationists will have barely a chance to understand that the little world he's been indoctrinated to believe in all his life is in fact not real.
This debate is really getting mind numbing with science experts pseudo experts, believers, theologians, and charlatans talking over and past one another. Whether the science is flawed or not, it is science, and its study belongs in public schools. Whether there is a god or not, it is a belief, and belongs in church and sunday school. As long as neither venue teaches the controversy, there is no harm and no foul, and the kids can figure it out for themselves. I did.
Macro evolution brought about by unguided natural selection cannot be proven scientifically, yet it is still accepted as "science" by godless scientists. If the evidence leads to an intelligent cause as the best explanation, it cannot ever be accepted as real "science" because it is a threat to the New Atheist religion and its "spaghetti monster" god.
55k3v1n You are the greatest threat to yourself ... nuff said.
I do not need to tell you what will happen if you keep drinking the "kool aid" being fed to you by your creationist sources of education.
that is a completely cogent and sensible argument.
I ought to be public policy ... but school boards are loaded with Fundamentalist Christians who forget that they are NOT teaching in a religious school.
HarleyDrummer1 The Scientific Case Against Evolution
by Henry M. Morris, Ph.D.
Belief in evolution is a remarkable phenomenon. It is a belief passionately defended by the scientific establishment, despite the lack of any observable scientific evidence for macroevolution (that is, evolution from one distinct kind of organism into another). This odd situation is briefly documented here by citing recent statements from leading evolutionists admitting their lack of proof. These statements inadvertently show that evolution on any significant scale does not occur at present, and never happened in the past, and could never happen at all.
Evolution Is Not Happening Now
First of all, the lack of a case for evolution is clear from the fact that no one has ever seen it happen. If it were a real process, evolution should still be occurring, and there should be many "transitional" forms that we could observe. What we see instead, of course, is an array of distinct "kinds" of plants and animals with many varieties within each kind, but with very clear and -- apparently -- unbridgeable gaps between the kinds. That is, for example, there are many varieties of dogs and many varieties of cats, but no "dats" or "cogs." Such variation is often called microevolution, and these minor horizontal (or downward) changes occur fairly often, but such changes are not true "vertical" evolution.
Evolutionary geneticists have often experimented on fruit flies and other rapidly reproducing species to induce mutational changes hoping they would lead to new and better species, but these have all failed to accomplish their goal. No truly new species has ever been produced, let alone a new "basic kind."
A current leading evolutionist, Jeffrey Schwartz, professor of anthropology at the University of Pittsburgh, has recently acknowledged that:
. . . it was and still is the case that, with the exception of Dobzhansky's claim about a new species of fruit fly, the formation of a new species, by any mechanism, has never been observed.1
The scientific method traditionally has required experimental observation and replication. The fact that macroevolution (as distinct from microevolution) has never been observed would seem to exclude it from the domain of true science. Even Ernst Mayr, the dean of living evolutionists, longtime professor of biology at Harvard, who has alleged that evolution is a "simple fact," nevertheless agrees that it is an "historical science" for which "laws and experiments are inappropriate techniques"2 by which to explain it. One can never actually see evolution in action.
Evolution Never Happened in the Past
Evolutionists commonly answer the above criticism by claiming that evolution goes too slowly for us to see it happening today. They used to claim that the real evidence for evolution was in the fossil record of the past, but the fact is that the billions of known fossils do not include a single unequivocal transitional form with transitional structures in the process of evolving.
Given that evolution, according to Darwin, was in a continual state of motion . . . it followed logically that the fossil record should be rife with examples of transitional forms leading from the less to the more evolved.3
Even those who believe in rapid evolution recognize that a considerable number of generations would be required for one distinct "kind" to evolve into another more complex kind. There ought, therefore, to be a considerable number of true transitional structures preserved in the fossils -- after all, there are billions of non-transitional structures there! But (with the exception of a few very doubtful creatures such as the controversial feathered dinosaurs and the alleged walking whales), they are not there.
Instead of filling in the gaps in the fossil record with so-called missing links, most paleontologists found themselves facing a situation in which there were only gaps in the fossil record, with no evidence of transformational intermediates between documented fossil species.4
The entire history of evolution from the evolution of life from non-life to the evolution of vertebrates from invertebrates to the evolution of man from the ape is strikingly devoid of intermediates: the links are all missing in the fossil record, just as they are in the present world.
With respect to the origin of life, a leading researcher in this field, Leslie Orgel, after noting that neither proteins nor nucleic acids could have arisen without the other, concludes:
And so, at first glance, one might have to conclude that life could never, in fact, have originated by chemical means.5
Being committed to total evolution as he is, Dr. Orgel cannot accept any such conclusion as that. Therefore, he speculates that RNA may have come first, but then he still has to admit that:
The precise events giving rise to the RNA world remain unclear. . . . investigators have proposed many hypotheses, but evidence in favor of each of them is fragmentary at best.6
Translation: "There is no known way by which life could have arisen naturalistically." Unfortunately, two generations of students have been taught that Stanley Miller's famous experiment on a gaseous mixture, practically proved the naturalistic origin of life. But not so!
Miller put the whole thing in a ball, gave it an electric charge, and waited. He found that amino acids and other fundamental complex molecules were accumulating at the bottom of the apparatus. His discovery gave a huge boost to the scientific investigation of the origin of life. Indeed, for some time it seemed like creation of life in a test tube was within reach of experimental science. Unfortunately, such experiments have not progressed much further than the original prototype, leaving us with a sour aftertaste from the primordial soup.7
Neither is there any clue as to how the one-celled organisms of the primordial world could have evolved into the vast array of complex multi-celled invertebrates of the Cambrian period. Even dogmatic evolutionist Gould admits that:
The Cambrian explosion was the most remarkable and puzzling event in the history of life.8
Equally puzzling, however, is how some invertebrate creature in the ancient ocean, with all its "hard parts" on the outside, managed to evolve into the first vertebrate -- that is, the first fish-- with its hard parts all on the inside.
Yet the transition from spineless invertebrates to the first backboned fishes is still shrouded in mystery, and many theories abound.9
Other gaps are abundant, with no real transitional series anywhere. A very bitter opponent of creation science, paleontologist, Niles Eldredge, has acknowledged that there is little, if any, evidence of evolutionary transitions in the fossil record. Instead, things remain the same!
It is a simple ineluctable truth that virtually all members of a biota remain basically stable, with minor fluctuations, throughout their durations. . . .10
So how do evolutionists arrive at their evolutionary trees from fossils of oganisms which didn't change during their durations?
Fossil discoveries can muddle over attempts to construct simple evolutionary trees -- fossils from key periods are often not intermediates, but rather hodge podges of defining features of many different groups. . . . Generally, it seems that major groups are not assembled in a simple linear or progressive manner -- new features are often "cut and pasted" on different groups at different times.11
As far as ape/human intermediates are concerned, the same is true, although anthropologists have been eagerly searching for them for many years. Many have been proposed, but each has been rejected in turn.
All that paleoanthropologists have to show for more than 100 years of digging are remains from fewer than 2000 of our ancestors. They have used this assortment of jawbones, teeth and fossilized scraps, together with molecular evidence from living species, to piece together a line of human descent going back 5 to 8 million years to the time when humans and chimpanzees diverged from a common ancestor.12
Anthropologists supplemented their extremely fragmentary fossil evidence with DNA and other types of molecular genetic evidence from living animals to try to work out an evolutionary scenario that will fit. But this genetic evidence really doesn't help much either, for it contradicts fossil evidence. Lewin notes that:
The overall effect is that molecular phylogenetics is by no means as straightforward as its pioneers believed. . . . The Byzantine dynamics of genome change has many other consequences for molecular phylogenetics, including the fact that different genes tell different stories.13
Summarizing the genetic data from humans, another author concludes, rather pessimistically:
Even with DNA sequence data, we have no direct access to the processes of evolution, so objective reconstruction of the vanished past can be achieved only by creative imagination.14
Since there is no real scientific evidence that evolution is occurring at present or ever occurred in the past, it is reasonable to conclude that evolution is not a fact of science, as many claim. In fact, it is not even science at all, but an arbitrary system built upon faith in universal naturalism.
Actually, these negative evidences against evolution are, at the same time, strong positive evidences for special creation. They are, in fact, specific predictions based on the creation model of origins.
Creationists would obviously predict ubiquitous gaps between created kinds, though with many varieties capable of arising within each kind, in order to enable each basic kind to cope with changing environments without becoming extinct. Creationists also would anticipate that any "vertical changes" in organized complexity would be downward, since the Creator (by definition) would create things correctly to begin with. Thus, arguments and evidences against evolution are, at the same time, positive evidences for creation.
The Equivocal Evidence from Genetics
Nevertheless, because of the lack of any direct evidence for evolution, evolutionists are increasingly turning to dubious circumstantial evidences, such as similarities in DNA or other biochemical components of organisms as their "proof" that evolution is a scientific fact. A number of evolutionists have even argued that DNA itself is evidence for evolution since it is common to all organisms. More often is the argument used that similar DNA structures in two different organisms proves common evolutionary ancestry.
Neither argument is valid. There is no reason whatever why the Creator could not or would not use the same type of genetic code based on DNA for all His created life forms. This is evidence for intelligent design and creation, not evolution.
The most frequently cited example of DNA commonality is the human/chimpanzee "similarity," noting that chimpanzees have more than 90% of their DNA the same as humans. This is hardly surprising, however, considering the many physiological resemblances between people and chimpanzees. Why shouldn't they have similar DNA structures in comparison, say, to the DNA differences between men and spiders?
Similarities -- whether of DNA, anatomy, embryonic development, or anything else -- are better explained in terms of creation by a common Designer than by evolutionary relationship. The great differences between organisms are of greater significance than the similarities, and evolutionism has no explanation for these if they all are assumed to have had the same ancestor. How could these great gaps between kinds ever arise at all, by any natural process?
The apparently small differences between human and chimpanzee DNA obviously produce very great differences in their respective anatomies, intelligence, etc. The superficial similarities between all apes and human beings are nothing compared to the differences in any practical or observable sense.
Nevertheless, evolutionists, having largely become disenchanted with the fossil record as a witness for evolution because of the ubiquitous gaps where there should be transitions, recently have been promoting DNA and other genetic evidence as proof of evolution. However, as noted above by Roger Lewin, this is often inconsistent with, not only the fossil record, but also with the comparative morphology of the creatures. Lewin also mentions just a few typical contradictions yielded by this type of evidence in relation to more traditional Darwinian "proofs."
The elephant shrew, consigned by traditional analysis to the order insectivores . . . is in fact more closely related to . . . the true elephant. Cows are more closely related to dolphins than they are to horses. The duckbilled platypus . . . is on equal evolutionary footing with . . . kangaroos and koalas.15
There are many even more bizarre comparisons yielded by this approach.
The abundance of so-called "junk DNA" in the genetic code also has been offered as a special type of evidence for evolution, especially those genes which they think have experienced mutations, sometimes called "pseudogenes."16 However, evidence is accumulating rapidly today that these supposedly useless genes do actually perform useful functions.
Enough genes have already been uncovered in the genetic midden to show that what was once thought to be waste is definitely being transmitted into scientific code.17
It is thus wrong to decide that junk DNA, even the socalled "pseudogenes," have no function. That is merely an admission of ignorance and an object for fruitful research. Like the socalled "vestigial organs" in man, once considered as evidence of evolution but now all known to have specific uses, so the junk DNA and pseudogenes most probably are specifically useful to the organism, whether or not those uses have yet been discovered by scientists.
At the very best this type of evidence is strictly circumstantial and can be explained just as well in terms of primeval creation supplemented in some cases by later deterioration, just as expected in the creation model.
The real issue is, as noted before, whether there is any observable evidence that evolution is occurring now or has ever occurred in the past. As we have seen, even evolutionists have to acknowledge that this type of real scientific evidence for evolution does not exist.
A good question to ask is: Why are all observable evolutionary changes either horizontal and trivial (so-called microevolution) or downward toward deterioration and extinction? The answer seems to be found in the universally applicable laws of the science of thermodynamics.
Evolution Could Never Happen at All
The main scientific reason why there is no evidence for evolution in either the present or the past (except in the creative imagination of evolutionary scientists) is because one of the most fundamental laws of nature precludes it. The law of increasing entropy -- also known as the second law of thermodynamics -- stipulates that all systems in the real world tend to go "downhill," as it were, toward disorganization and decreased complexity.
This law of entropy is, by any measure, one of the most universal, bestproved laws of nature. It applies not only in physical and chemical systems, but also in biological and geological systems -- in fact, in all systems, without exception.
No exception to the second law of thermodynamics has ever been found -- not even a tiny one. Like conservation of energy (the "first law"), the existence of a law so precise and so independent of details of models must have a logical foundation that is independent of the fact that matter is composed of interacting particles.18
The author of this quote is referring primarily to physics, but he does point out that the second law is "independent of details of models." Besides, practically all evolutionary biologists are reductionists -- that is, they insist that there are no "vitalist" forces in living systems, and that all biological processes are explicable in terms of physics and chemistry. That being the case, biological processes also must operate in accordance with the laws of thermodynamics, and practically all biologists acknowledge this.
Evolutionists commonly insist, however, that evolution is a fact anyhow, and that the conflict is resolved by noting that the earth is an "open system," with the incoming energy from the sun able to sustain evolution throughout the geological ages in spite of the natural tendency of all systems to deteriorate toward disorganization. That is how an evolutionary entomologist has dismissed W. A. Dembski's impressive recent book, Intelligent Design. This scientist defends what he thinks is "natural processes' ability to increase complexity" by noting what he calls a "flaw" in "the arguments against evolution based on the second law of thermodynamics." And what is this flaw?
Although the overall amount of disorder in a closed system cannot decrease, local order within a larger system can increase even without the actions of an intelligent agent.19
This naive response to the entropy law is typical of evolutionary dissimulation. While it is true that local order can increase in an open system if certain conditions are met, the fact is that evolution does not meet those conditions. Simply saying that the earth is open to the energy from the sun says nothing about how that raw solar heat is converted into increased complexity in any system, open or closed.
The fact is that the best known and most fundamental equation of thermodynamics says that the influx of heat into an open system will increase the entropy of that system, not decrease it. All known cases of decreased entropy (or increased organization) in open systems involve a guiding program of some sort and one or more energy conversion mechanisms.
Evolution has neither of these. Mutations are not "organizing" mechanisms, but disorganizing (in accord with the second law). They are commonly harmful, sometimes neutral, but never beneficial (at least as far as observed mutations are concerned). Natural selection cannot generate order, but can only "sieve out" the disorganizing mutations presented to it, thereby conserving the existing order, but never generating new order. In principle, it may be barely conceivable that evolution could occur in open systems, in spite of the tendency of all systems to disintegrate sooner or later. But no one yet has been able to show that it actually has the ability to overcome this universal tendency, and that is the basic reason why there is still no bona fide proof of evolution, past or present.
From the statements of evolutionists themselves, therefore, we have learned that there is no real scientific evidence for real evolution. The only observable evidence is that of very limited horizontal (or downward) changes within strict limits.
Evolution is Religion -- Not Science
In no way does the idea of particles-to-people evolution meet the long-accepted criteria of a scientific theory. There are no such evolutionary transitions that have ever been observed in the fossil record of the past; and the universal law of entropy seems to make it impossible on any significant scale.
Evolutionists claim that evolution is a scientific fact, but they almost always lose scientific debates with creationist scientists. Accordingly, most evolutionists now decline opportunities for scientific debates, preferring instead to make unilateral attacks on creationists.
Scientists should refuse formal debates because they do more harm than good, but scientists still need to counter the creationist message.20
The question is, just why do they need to counter the creationist message? Why are they so adamantly committed to anti-creationism?
The fact is that evolutionists believe in evolution because they want to. It is their desire at all costs to explain the origin of everything without a Creator. Evolutionism is thus intrinsically an atheistic religion. Some may prefer to call it humanism, and "new age" evolutionists place it in the context of some form of pantheism, but they all amount to the same thing. Whether atheism or humanism (or even pantheism), the purpose is to eliminate a personal God from any active role in the origin of the universe and all its components, including man.
The core of the humanistic philosophy is naturalism -- the proposition that the natural world proceeds according to its own internal dynamics, without divine or supernatural control or guidance, and that we human beings are creations of that process. It is instructive to recall that the philosophers of the early humanistic movement debated as to which term more adequately described their position: humanism or naturalism. The two concepts are complementary and inseparable.21
Since both naturalism and humanism exclude God from science or any other active function in the creation or maintenance of life and the universe in general, it is very obvious that their position is nothing but atheism. And atheism, no less than theism, is a religion! Even doctrinaire-atheistic evolutionist Richard Dawkins admits that atheism cannot be proved to be true.
Of course we can't prove that there isn't a God.22
Therefore, they must believe it, and that makes it a religion.
The atheistic nature of evolution is not only admitted, but insisted upon by most of the leaders of evolutionary thought. Ernst Mayr, for example, says that:
Darwinism rejects all supernatural phenomena and causations.23
A professor in the Department of Biology at Kansas State University says:
Even if all the data point to an intelligent designer, such a hypothesis is excluded from science because it is not naturalistic.24
It is well known by almost everyone in the scientific world today that such influential evolutionists as Stephen Jay Gould and Edward Wilson of Harvard, Richard Dawkins of England, William Provine of Cornell, and numerous other evolutionary spokesmen are dogmatic atheists. Eminent scientific philosopher and ardent Darwinian atheist Michael Ruse has even acknowledged that evolution is their religion!
Evolution is promoted by its practitioners as more than mere science. Evolution is promulgated as an ideology, a secular religion -- a full-fledged alternative to Christianity, with meaning and morality . . . . Evolution is a religion. This was true of evolution in the beginning, and it is true of evolution still today.25
Another way of saying "religion" is "worldview," the whole of reality. The evolutionary worldview applies not only to the evolution of life, but even to that of the entire universe. In the realm of cosmic evolution, our naturalistic scientists depart even further from experimental science than life scientists do, manufacturing a variety of evolutionary cosmologies from esoteric mathematics and metaphysical speculation. Socialist Jeremy Rifkin has commented on this remarkable game.
Cosmologies are made up of small snippets of physical reality that have been remodeled by society into vast cosmic deceptions.26
They must believe in evolution, therefore, in spite of all the evidence, not because of it. And speaking of deceptions, note the following remarkable statement.
We take the side of science in spite of the patent absurdity of some of its constructs, . . . in spite of the tolerance of the scientific community for unsubstantiated commitment to materialism. . . . we are forced by our a priori adherence to material causes to create an apparatus of investigation and set of concepts that produce material explanations, no matter how counterintuitive, no matter how mystifying to the uninitiated. Moreover, that materialism is absolute, for we cannot allow a Divine Foot in the door.27
The author of this frank statement is Richard Lewontin of Harvard. Since evolution is not a laboratory science, there is no way to test its validity, so all sorts of justso stories are contrived to adorn the textbooks. But that doesn't make them true! An evolutionist reviewing a recent book by another (but more critical) evolutionist, says:
We cannot identify ancestors or "missing links," and we cannot devise testable theories to explain how particular episodes of evolution came about. Gee is adamant that all the popular stories about how the first amphibians conquered the dry land, how the birds developed wings and feathers for flying, how the dinosaurs went extinct, and how humans evolved from apes are just products of our imagination, driven by prejudices and preconceptions.28
A fascinatingly honest admission by a physicist indicates the passionate commitment of establishment scientists to naturalism. Speaking of the trust students naturally place in their highly educated college professors, he says:
And I use that trust to effectively brainwash them. . . . our teaching methods are primarily those of propaganda. We appeal -- without demonstration -- to evidence that supports our position. We only introduce arguments and evidence that supports the currently accepted theories and omit or gloss over any evidence to the contrary.29
Creationist students in scientific courses taught by evolutionist professors can testify to the frustrating reality of that statement. Evolution is, indeed, the pseudoscientific basis of religious atheism, as Ruse pointed out. Will Provine at Cornell University is another scientist who frankly acknowledges this.
As the creationists claim, belief in modern evolution makes atheists of people. One can have a religious view that is compatible with evolution only if the religious view is indistinguishable from atheism.30
Once again, we emphasize that evolution is not science, evolutionists' tirades notwithstanding. It is a philosophical worldview, nothing more.
(Evolution) must, they feel, explain everything. . . . A theory that explains everything might just as well be discarded since it has no real explanatory value. Of course, the other thing about evolution is that anything can be said because very little can be disproved. Experimental evidence is minimal.31
Even that statement is too generous. Actual experimental evidence demonstrating true evolution (that is, macroevolution) is not "minimal." It is nonexistent!
The concept of evolution as a form of religion is not new. In my book, The Long War Against God,32 I documented the fact that some form of evolution has been the pseudo-rationale behind every anti-creationist religion since the very beginning of history. This includes all the ancient ethnic religions, as well as such modern world religions as Buddhism, Hinduism, and others, as well as the "liberal" movements in even the creationist religions (Christianity, Judaism, Islam).
As far as the twentieth century is concerned, the leading evolutionist is generally considered to be Sir Julian Huxley, primary architect of modern neo-Darwinism. Huxley called evolution a "religion without revelation" and wrote a book with that title (2nd edition, 1957). In a later book, he said:
Evolution . . . is the most powerful and the most comprehensive idea that has ever arisen on earth.33
Later in the book he argued passionately that we must change "our pattern of religious thought from a God-centered to an evolution-centered pattern."34 Then he went on to say that: "The God hypothesis . . . is becoming an intellectual and moral burden on our thought." Therefore, he concluded that "we must construct something to take its place."35
That something, of course, is the religion of evolutionary humanism, and that is what the leaders of evolutionary humanism are trying to do today.
In closing this survey of the scientific case against evolution (and, therefore, for creation), the reader is reminded again that all quotations in the article are from doctrinaire evolutionists. No Bible references are included, and no statements by creationists. The evolutionists themselves, to all intents and purposes, have shown that evolutionism is not science, but religious faith in atheism.
I do hope those more intuitive people observed what Mr Coyne was concluding.
His presuppositions were based on the folliwing:
1. vivid imagination
2. unprovable assumptions
3. biased interpretations
4. outlandish speculation and all wrapped up in
5. CONJECTURE
These are what the Theory hides behind and labels it as science, that's not science that's anti-science.
It´s so miserable . Every site you come to about evolution or just common sense you have these ju-ju people going on about some ridiculous religious fable.
KbcBerlin It is extremely difficult for anyone to overcome childhood conditioning. That is why it is necessary for religious adherents to indoctrinate children before they have the ability to think for themselves. If a child can be made to feel guilty for doubting, he is not likely to ask many questions. When a child is surrounded by authority figures; parents, aunts, uncles, church members, and/or clergy, the message of what to believe is pounded home. Enforcement does not require physical threat or even a verbal rebuke, to an impressionable child a scowl speaks volumes. All that carries over into adulthood so that when evidence is presented that conflicts with belief, gut wrenching cognitive dissonance results. Reason would dictate that perhaps the belief is wrong, but fear of a thought crime circumvents that avenue and the only remaining option is to attack and deny the evidence. Evolution deniers expend a great deal of time and energy doing just that and have been doing so for 150 years without having any discernible effect.
There is no free will in religion. Free will does not serve the interests of religion and it is to be discouraged. With very few exceptions, children grow up in the religion of their parents. That is not free will, that is following the path of least resistance. That is the path that sheep take.
Randall Wilks In many psychology tests it is clear those who like to think for themselves is a small minority. Authority worshippers will go to great lengths to defend, and appease authority
.In this world to be, and do as you are told has great advantages. You will go the furthest for your abilities. Starting in school and continuing through career. It is such a successful tactic I sometimes wonder if that is the social evolutionary destination of mankind. Ants or bees. Nothing wrong with ants or bees, but with our individual mental capacity it seems a waste.
I believe groups of human well educated enough can also live harmoniously while thinking independently. . For anarchy to work you need very well educated people, and no, or very few psychopaths.
***** What an ignorant dishonest thing to write. "so many people who just believe what they are told about evolution" because a vast body of scientific evidence supports it.
So many people who just believe what they are told about religion, and that is the end of evidence. I was told therefore I believe it.Is all religion is. "I want to believe it because my group believe it. I want to believe it because I can cope with life and death more easily. Still not evidence of truth.
***** 1. Science does not yet have the answer to how life started and neither do you. Unlike religion, science will not pretend to know the answer to something when there is insufficient evidence to form a conclusion.
2. No rational person ever claimed one animal turned into another. That is a creationist straw man.
3. Science makes no claims as to the existence or non-existence of any god, gods or any supernatural entity or event. Since you claim the existence of such, the onus is on you to provide supporting evidence. You DO have real empirical evidence, do you not?
Randall Wilks Correct, but reasoning with the deluded is total frustration.
Adult cancer is up well over 60 times the incidents or 6000% since 1900. Cancer now kills 1 in 3 ages 15 to 64. The statistics on childhood cancer rising is beyond numbers because it did not exist in the 1800's to do a chart on it in percentage. but it is well over 30,000% rise from obscure to common now. There were no child hospitals needed because there were no pandemic childhood genetic diseases.
Childhood cancer is now the number one disease cause of death of children ages 1 to 15. Cancer is now proven beyond all doubts to be genetic in over 700,000 medical studies. Mutations destroying our children.
Second is genetic deformity. The body parts are messed up from mutations. Mutations destroying our children.
Third is genetic, congenital heart disease. That is up by 200% in the last 34 years. Mutations destroying our children.
Is that evolution?
Hey fucktard cancer existed in all life millions of years before the 1800's. Cancer isn't even in the top 10 of childhood disease. Suicide, homicide and accidental death account for over 85 percent.(In the US) Where the fuck do you get your facts? Cancer is in fact a genetic disorder what else would it be? The problem here is you don't know what cancer is. You think cancer is inherited. Without inheritance there is no evolution. To answer your question No. Cancer is not evolution.
Tyrannosaur Rex My data comes from credited sources. Where do you get you data? Out of your ass? Cancer is the NUMBER ONE DISEASE killer of children.
Number two is genetic deformity.
Number 3 is congenital heart disease.
Oh man, not you again. When will it finally get it into that religiously armour plated skull of yours that the increase of cancer is due to a LACK OF selective pressure? This while evolution heavily relies on the PRESENCE of selective pressure?
Your data isn't incorrect, but your conclusions are downright idiotic.
MrMezmerized The increase in ALL genetic diseases is caused by INFECTED REPRODUCTION. There is no other cause for the rapid human degradation.
I'd love to have some scientific paperwork indicating that STD's are the primary cause of genetic deterioration, oh Holey Prophet of Swift Extinction. Either that, or the admission that you are full of shit.
Truth is, evolution is a fact. Close-minded creationists cannot see that.
*EVOLUTION OF THE HUMAN BRAIN* - While the human brain is the largest in relation to body size of any animal, it came about in response to a series of environmental pressures. When we look at endocasts of early mammal skulls, we see rapid brain expansion, particularly in the area of the Olfactory Lobe. A highly developed sense of smell was obviously a tremendous survival advantage to early mammals as it enabled the avoidance of predatory dinosaurs as well as finding food and mates. When we look at modern mammalian genomes, we find a large number of different odor receptor genes, (as many as 1,000) approximately 3% of the total number of genes in the genome. Each olfactory gene codes for a protein that is sensitive to a specific range of chemical signatures (odorants). Each olfactory receptor (OR) triggers a nerve response sending a message to the brain. As olfactory receptors proliferated, a larger brain was required to process them.
When ancestral primates took to the trees, hand-eye coordination became of paramount importance, again necessitating a larger brain to process that information. Any individual deficient in that area, or lacking depth perception stood a greater likelihood of falling to its death, thus eliminating its genes from the gene pool. Monkeys had larger cranial capacity than prosimians, and apes larger still. It has long been known that human brains go through a rapid expansion in connectivity during childhood. What was not known was whether humans were unique in that respect, or if it was also found in other apes. In Japan, researchers did MRI brain scans of three baby chimps over their first 6 years. That data was compared with previously existing brain scans for six macaque monkeys and 28 Japanese children. They found that brain development in early life for both chimpanzees and humans greatly exceeded that of macaques. "The increase in total cerebral volume during early infancy and the juvenile stage in chimpanzees and humans was approximately three times greater than that in macaques," the researchers wrote in the Proceedings of the Royal Society B article. It showed however that, during early childhood, human brain expansion was twice that of Chimpanzees, due to rapid growth of connections between brain cells (white matter).
In terms of calorie consumption the brain is a very expensive organ. The adult human brain weighs about 3 pounds and constitutes about 2% of average human body mass, yet it uses 20% of total caloric intake. In human infants undergoing rapid brain expansion the figure is even more dramatic; 60% of caloric intake go to neural development. For most animals, life is a daily struggle to secure sufficient calories for survival. Having to nourish a larger brain would not enhance their survival. Humans, with hands capable of manipulating objects, and perhaps a more cooperative nature, could have put extra brain power to use and improve the odds of survival, IF they were able to provide the necessary calories. The diet of today's chimpanzees is largely leaves, which their forest environment supplies in great quantity, supplemented by fruit in season and the meat of small animals when the opportunity presented itself. Leaves are low in nutrient value and chimps must consume them in large quantities. It has been observed that chimps spend about a third of their waking hours just chewing.
Ape physiology is well adapted to that diet; large teeth, powerful jaw muscles that wrap around the skull and a long gut to enable maximum nutrient extraction from a nutrient poor diet. The ape rib cage flares outward to accommodate the large gut, unlike the tucked-in rib cage of modern humans. Since the discovery of the fossil hominid "Lucy" (Austalopithecus afarensis) in 1974, there have been many other discoveries of both her species Australopithecus afarensis and perhaps a dozen other species of australopithecenes, including several with rather complete skeletons. From them, it has been determined that they were fully bipedal, but retained rather long arms for climbing. The skull was ape-like in that it projected forward (prognathic) and cranial capacity was like that of chimps. One major difference was that the teeth were much smaller and the huge fighting canines found on chimpanzees were much reduced in size. That suggests that Australopithecus had adopted a more cooperative life style.
While much of the sub cranial skeleton was more human-like than ape-like, the rib cage flared outward, indicating they had much the same low quality diet as did chimps. Analysis of phytoliths and isotopes extracted from tartar on fossil teeth indicates they too had a plant based diet, but the chemical signatures were those of grasses and sedges, perhaps roots and bulbs. Savanna baboons subsist on such a diet today. Those savanna dwelling hominids were surrounded by high quality protein in the huge herds of ungulates; unfortunately they had not the means to harvest it. At some point, however, they must have found a way. We know they began to use flake tools, the primitive Oldowan technology, to cut meat from bone. It is unlikely they had become killers at that point, but they could have become adept at scavenging lion kills. Lions will make a kill, gorging themselves on the flesh, then find a shady area to sleep it off during the heat of the day. Cagey hominids could have exploited that opportunity to make off with some leftovers. Lions don't have the same bone crushing capability as hyenas so, even if they had pretty much stripped the carcass, leg bones rich in marrow and the brains inside skulls would have been a calorie and protein bonanza for intrepid, cooperative hominids. That scenario is speculative, but we do know they were using flake tools to butcher meat and whatever mutations favored larger brains would have been useless without the calories to fuel it.
Homo erectus had a skeleton with all the hallmarks of a diet that provided that fuel. Double the cranial capacity of his predecessors, lean, tall, long legged and capable of running. It is speculative to suggest they engaged in persistence hunting, but it is used by Kalahari Bushmen even today. We know that H. erectus used fire, and eventually learned how to make it. Cooking food would have made it easier to chew and digest allowing greater extraction of nutrients.
Physical evidence for early man's use of fire is patchy and there is no doubt they witnessed lightning strike fires and learned how to retrieve glowing coals from them and nurture a more or less continuous flame. There was a movie made on this theme; “Quest for Fire”; perhaps 45 years ago, but should be available from multiple sources; perhaps even RUclips as copyright has expired. What that movie illustrates is that early man's use of fire depended on maintaining glowing coals over long periods of time and that was very tenuous. The ability to make fire occurred much later.
A larger brain is need for swinging through trees, I GIVE YOU THE LEMUR THAT PUTS YOUR FUCKING CLIAM WHERE IT BELONGS IN THE CREATIONIST CAMP WITH ALL THE OTHER SOON TO BE EXTINCT MORONS.
I've understood what this comment is talking about but I regret pressing "see more"
*Some people who post to this forum have no idea what the word THEORY means*.
*"A scientific theory is a well-substantiated explanation of some aspect of the natural world that is acquired through the scientific method* and repeatedly tested and confirmed through observation and experimentation. As with most (if not all) forms of scientific knowledge, *scientific theories are inductive in nature and aim for predictive power and explanatory capability*.
The strength of a scientific theory is related to the diversity of phenomena it can explain, and to its elegance and simplicity (Occam's razor). As additional scientific evidence is gathered, a scientific theory may be rejected or modified if it does not fit the new empirical findings- in such circumstances, a more accurate theory is then desired and free of confirmation bias. In certain cases, the less-accurate unmodified scientific theory can still be treated as a theory if it is useful (due to its sheer simplicity) as an approximation under specific conditions (e.g. Newton's laws of motion as an approximation to special relativity at velocities which are small relative to the speed of light).
*Scientific theories are testable and make falsifiable predictions*. They describe the causal elements responsible for a particular natural phenomenon, and are used to explain and predict aspects of the physical universe or specific areas of inquiry (e.g. electricity, chemistry, astronomy). Scientists use theories as a foundation to gain further scientific knowledge, as well as to accomplish goals such as inventing technology or curing disease. *Scientific theories are the most reliable, rigorous, and comprehensive form of scientific knowledge*. This is significantly different from the common usage of the word "theory", which implies that something is a conjecture, hypothesis, or guess (i.e., unsubstantiated and speculative)." en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_theory
The following quotes come from eminent scientists and eminent evolutionists themselves:
1) Charles Darwin: “Long before the reader has arrived at this part of my work, a crowd of difficulties will have occurred to him. Some of them are so serious that to this day I can hardly reflect on them without being in some degree staggered; but, to the best of my judgment, the greater number are only apparent, and those that are real are not, I think fatal to the theory.”
Toward the end of his life, Darwin openly admitted: “Not one change of species into another is on record…. We cannot prove that a single species has changed into another.” Darwin, Charles, My life and Letters, Vol. 1. Page 2 10.
2) Thomas Huxley said that “evolution was not an established theory but a tentative hypothesis, an extremely valuable and even probable hypothesis, but a hypothesis none the less.” Himmelfarb, Gertrude, Darwin and the Darwinian Revolution, Doubleday and Co., New York, 1859, page 366.
3) Dr. Austin H. Clark, noted biologist of the Smithsonian Institute, stated: “There is no evidence which would show man developing step by step from lower forms of life. There is nothing to show that man was in any way connected with monkeys…. He appeared SUDDENLY and in substantially the same form as he is today…. There are no such things as missing links.”
He also said, “So far as concerns the major groups of animals, the creationists appear to have the best of the argument. There is NOT THE SLIGHTEST EVIDENCE THAT ANY ONE OF THE MAJOR GROUPS AROSE FROM ANY OTHER. Each is a special animal complex, related more or less closely to all the rest, and appearing therefore as a species and distinct creation.” Meldau, Fred John, Witness Against Evolution, Christian Victory Publishing Co., Denver, Colo., 1953, page 39, 40, 73.
4) Professor Albert Fleischman, professor of Comparative Anatomy at Erlangen University, said, “The theory of evolution suffers from grave defects, which are becoming more and more apparent as time advances. It can no longer square with practical scientific knowledge, nor does it suffice for our theoretical grasp of the facts. The Darwinian theory of descent has not a single fact to confirm it in the realm of nature. It is not the result of scientific research, but purely the product of imagination.” Fleishman, Albert, Victoria Institute, Vol. 65, pages 194, 195.
5) Sir William Dawson, Canada’s great geologist, said of evolution: “It is one of the strangest phenomena of humanity; it is utterly destitute of proof.” Dawson, Sir William, Story of Earth and Man, page 317.
6) Dr. Robert A. Millikan, famous physicist and Nobel prize winner, said, “Everyone who reflects believes in God.” Millikan, Robert A., The Commentator, June 1937.
In an address to the American Chemical Society, he said: “The pathetic thing about it is that many scientists are trying to prove the doctrine of evolution, which no scientists can do.”
7) Dr. George Wald, a Nobel prize winner, chooses to believe in evolution even though he said he regards it as a scientific impossibility. He says, “The only alternative to a spontaneous generation is a belief in supernatural creation….” Wald, George, “Innovation and Biology,” Scientific American, Vol. 199, Sept. 1958, page 100.
8) Dr. Wernher Von Braun, who masterminded the V-2 rocket of Germany in World War II and the space program of the United States for two decades, said in a speech at Taylor University: “The idea of an orderly universe is inconceivable without God - the grandeur of the cosmos confirms the certainty of creation. One can’t be exposed to the law and order of the universe without becoming aware of a divine intent.” Keith, Bill, Scopes II the Great Debate, Huntington House, 1985, page 55.
9) Richard Goldschmidt, Ph.D., professor of zoology, University of California, said, “Geographic variation as a model of species formation will not stand under thorough scientific investigation. Darwin’s theory of natural selection has never had any proof .. yet it has been universally accepted. There may be wide diversification within the species … but the gap (between species) cannot be bridged …. Sub-species do not merge into the species either actually or ideally.” Keith, Bill, Scopes II the Great Debate, Huntington House, 1985, pages 55-56.
10) Dr. Warren Weaver, formerly chairman of the board of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, said, “Every new discovery of science is a further ‘revelation’ of the order which God has built into His universe.” Weaver, Warren, Look Magazine, April 5, 1955, page 30.
11) Antonio Lazcano, professor, National Autonomous University of Mexico and president of the International Society for the Study of the Origins of Life, “The Never-Ending Story,” American Scientist vol. 91, no. 5, 2003, “…those trying to discover the origins of life and study the earliest stages of biological evolution have an uphill quest: Over and over it happens that a theory or explanation believed to be well established has to be abandoned or rethought in the light of new findings.”
12) Evolutionist Richard Lewontin, “The New York Review,” January, 1997, p. 31
Evolutionary Pride:
“We take the side of science in spite of the patent absurdity of some of its constructs, in spite of the failure to fulfill many of its extravagant promises of health and life, in spite of the tolerance of the scientific community for unsubstantiated just-so-stories, because we have a prior commitment, a commitment to materialism. It is not that the methods and institutions of science somehow compel us to accept a material explanation of the phenomenal world, but, on the contrary, that we are forced by our a priori adherence to material causes to create an apparatus of investigation and a set of concepts that produce material explanations, no matter how mystifying to the uninitiated. Moreover, that materialism is an absolute, for we cannot allow a Divine Foot in the door.”
The fool says in his heart, “"There is no God".” (Psalm 14:1)
It seems apparent that rather than having read any of the material from which you quote, you merely copy from creationist sources. “Long before the reader has arrived at this part of my work, a crowd of difficulties will have occurred to him. Some of them are so serious that to this day I can hardly reflect on them without being in some degree staggered; but, to the best of my judgment, the greater number are only apparent, and those that are real are not, I think fatal to the theory.” Is correctly quoted but loses context in isolation.
Anyone familiar with Darwin's teaching methods will tell you that it was his habit to first propose possible objections to his theory, then answer them. Your quotation is at least more honest than that of many creationists who omit the last part.
As for the second supposed quotation, Darwin never wrote a book titled "My life and Letters", proof of your creationist source. Were you to fact check the other supposed quotations, you would find
similar distortions. You cannot lie and say "prove it's not true"
Randall Wilks Genesis 1:
The History of Creation
1 In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. 2 The earth was without form, and void; and darkness was[a] on the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters.
3 Then God said, “Let there be light”; and there was light. 4 And God saw the light, that it was good; and God divided the light from the darkness. 5 God called the light Day, and the darkness He called Night. So the evening and the morning were the first day.
6 Then God said, “Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters.” 7 Thus God made the firmament, and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament; and it was so. 8 And God called the firmament Heaven. So the evening and the morning were the second day.
9 Then God said, “Let the waters under the heavens be gathered together into one place, and let the dry land appear”; and it was so. 10 And God called the dry land Earth, and the gathering together of the waters He called Seas. And God saw that it was good.
11 Then God said, “Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb that yields seed, and the fruit tree that yields fruit according to its kind, whose seed is in itself, on the earth”; and it was so. 12 And the earth brought forth grass, the herb that yields seed according to its kind, and the tree that yields fruit, whose seed is in itself according to its kind. And God saw that it was good. 13 So the evening and the morning were the third day.
14 Then God said, “Let there be lights in the firmament of the heavens to divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs and seasons, and for days and years; 15 and let them be for lights in the firmament of the heavens to give light on the earth”; and it was so. 16 Then God made two great lights: the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night. He made the stars also. 17 God set them in the firmament of the heavens to give light on the earth, 18 and to rule over the day and over the night, and to divide the light from the darkness. And God saw that it was good. 19 So the evening and the morning were the fourth day.
20 Then God said, “Let the waters abound with an abundance of living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth across the face of the firmament of the heavens.” 21 So God created great sea creatures and every living thing that moves, with which the waters abounded, according to their kind, and every winged bird according to its kind. And God saw that it was good. 22 And God blessed them, saying, “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the waters in the seas, and let birds multiply on the earth.” 23 So the evening and the morning were the fifth day.
24 Then God said, “Let the earth bring forth the living creature according to its kind: cattle and creeping thing and beast of the earth, each according to its kind”; and it was so. 25 And God made the beast of the earth according to its kind, cattle according to its kind, and everything that creeps on the earth according to its kind. And God saw that it was good.
26 Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, over all[b] the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” 27 So God created man in His own image; in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them. 28 Then God blessed them, and God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply; fill the earth and subdue it; have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over every living thing that moves on the earth.”
29 And God said, “See, I have given you every herb that yields seed which is on the face of all the earth, and every tree whose fruit yields seed; to you it shall be for food. 30 Also, to every beast of the earth, to every bird of the air, and to everything that creeps on the earth, in which there is life, I have given every green herb for food”; and it was so. 31 Then God saw everything that He had made, and indeed it was very good. So the evening and the morning were the sixth day.
Not quite. IN THE BEGINNING, a bunch of bored goat herders were sitting around wondering why they didn't know shit and decided to start making up shit so they could tell others about it, and become experts on the shit they made up. Others liked the idea of making up shit, so that they too could become experts on their own shit. Their ideas caught on and people have been doing it ever since.
Randall Wilks You won't be calling God "shit" when you stand before Him at the Great White Throne Judgment after you croak. Your "evolution" theory is shit that came out of Darwin's rear orifice.
wtom04 +Randall Wilks You won't be calling God "shit" when you stand before Him at the Great White Throne Judgment after you croak.
--- Good point! A god that is willing to torture Randall for eternity is certainly the kind of god who would make a quarter of a billion men color blind. Thank you for not dodging my question.
I dare *any biblical creationist* to provide *one single evidence* for the Genesis account of creation. I want a *rational* discussion.
*****
--- The creationists seem to be avoiding your question like the plague. That astonishes me. They're normally so vocal about their science and their evidence.
Number Six Oh don't be astonished, I'm even lucky this thread hasn't been flooded already by right wing conservative christians trying to spit out what they learned at Sunday school.
God created Adam and Eve and they were married and it is a picture of Jesus the bridegroom and the church the bride by blood covenant.You cannot deny this evidence because marriage between a virgin man and woman is sealed in blood when they twain become one flesh. This is true no matter the race,culture,etc marriage between a man and a woman is a picture of Jesus and the church by blood covenant.Every Christian knows we were saved by the blood of Jesus and this proves that our God is the true God.
***** Humans were indeed created in the image of God.
abelcainsbrother I see the claim, now where is the evidence?
*Here is how creationist logic fails:*
Let’s assume that you, with no prior knowledge of amphibians, were to discover a pool of water with a large number of tadpoles. You take them home and place them in an aquarium. Upon examination you determine that they have no limbs but do have a tail that is used for propulsion and gills for extracting oxygen from the water. You might then reasonably assume that either they were fish or something akin to fish.
Lets further assume that for whatever reason, your attention was diverted for a couple of weeks. Upon again seeing the aquarium, you are surprised to find not tadpoles, but frogs. This would no doubt come as a great surprise. Since the aquarium was covered, there was no way the tadpoles could have escaped, nor any way the frogs could have entered. Two possibilities exist; either the tadpoles had somehow transitioned into frogs, or that some form of magic had occurred. Now, someone might argue that since intervening stages were not observed, no transition is possible. The conclusion for such people would be that it must have been magic.
The incredulity of such people would be understandable. The change in morphology was HUGE; lungs developed, gills shrank, limbs developed and the tail absorbed.
To the uninitiated, tadpoles and frogs would appear to be different KINDS of animals, yet they are products of the same genome. The tadpoles and the frogs had identical genes, but different genes were expressed (activated) at different times and durations. Now, this is metamorphosis, not evolution, but it does demonstrate that genes, under epigenetic control can dramatically effect different morphology and organ function. That is something creationists claim is impossible.
I feel sorry for creationists.... we get one life and unfortunately they waste theirs.
Parents who force creationism on children should be punished.
Hell, I had Christian parents and not once did they ever try to teach me genesis as fact, or that evolution was a lie.
Religion is its own problem, but creationists REALLY need to GROW UP and embrace REALITY.
'We all bound to die'- this is reality. atheist or not. The BOOK of Ecc.9;5,6 mentioned this. At death we are back to non-existent. No hellfire, no immortal soul, no life after death in hell, purgatory or in heaven, no rapture, no reincarnation. Even we enjoy or not enjoy our life today, we all bound to die, no difference, for that reason. What though makes difference, if the True God of the Bible will intervene in human affairs? There is resurrection for our dead love ones-bringing them back to life by God, not Jesus as per say. And for us who were living . Millions "will not taste death", they will NOT DIE- see John 5:28,29; 11:26.This is the Good NEWS of the COMING KINGDOM OF GOD to replace the kingdom of imperfect human. see Daniel 2:44. Questions? Inbox me please.
Caregiver The Bible says this? Well it MUST be true! You have saved me dear friend!
rankjoo. NO, not me, but God, the BIBLE IS A MESSAGE FROM God, that many profess religious leaders, even involving themselves for a worldprayer that looks like a rally or protest, just KEEP IGNORING. IM just sharing to you. God does not listen to a protest like prayer, says Jesus Christ.
Caregiver I'm interested in how you know the Bible is from God? Considering there are many holy books that make similar claims like the Koran.
+ rankjoo History and Chronology of religions does help and how the Bible explained the main reason why human had different languages. Before Qur'an, Greek Scriptures already in writing. and even Qur'an acknowledges the Torah and the Injil as original. But not all Muslim reading their books, juts like some profess CHRISTIAN does, that's why, they were being mislead and also mislead people.
I wonder if people were like this when it was first discovered that the earth was round and orbited the sun
Priesthoodagitator: Foucault pendulum.
Priesthoodagitator are you a flat earther or just a geocentrist
could be the obvious---days and nights
+Priesthoodagitator
So Earth is stationary and yet every other one of the billions of planets happens to be orbiting a star and rotating. Pretty amazing our planet is the only one not following the laws of physics.
@Dark Room Staring, Undoubtably the same principles applied. Religious beliefs are contingent upon a feeling of uniqueness. The Earth was considered the center of the universe and discovering we aren't as special as previously supposed causes extreme cognitive dissonance.
Did God create evolution to make a better product, or did evolution create God in the minds of men so they could cope with awe? Perhaps humanity will evolve beyond superstition one day.
So much non-critical thinking. You make an unwarranted assumption that God and superstition are part of the same.
There are superstitions concerning God or gods, granted. To answer your first question, "no" and "no." If you're humble and hungry enough you might actually think of the right question, eventually...
Dolt.
Rod Martin, Jr. You don't think much, do you?
That is one of the most reasonable questions I've heard in a while. In my opinion, evolution made god.
+RU Kiddingme -Neither nor. God created DNA with coded and stored genetic information invented and designed by him. People with atheistic naturalistic mind shutters of materialism interpret that as 'evolution' and believe Life pulled itself into being on its own bootstraps.
Hey, did you hear of the creationist who won a Nobel Prize after thoroughly disproving evolution? No, neither have I.
Well, I did: www.nobelprize.org/prizes/chemistry/2015/press-release/
SORRY!
@@miguelfalcao
--- Miguel, the Nobel Prize in the paper you cited said the prize was awarded "for mechanistic studies of DNA repair." That's a falsification of the theory of evolution in the same way that Einstein receiving a Nobel Prize was a falsification of gravity theory!
--- SORRY!
@@numbersix9477 For mechanistic studies of DNA repair on random mutations, which is the very core of the neo-Darwinian theory or Modern Synthesis. How could that holy entity Natural Selection allow a toolbox inside the cell that would prevent the very process of evolution? Weird, isn´t? The tail wagging the dog wagging the tail wagging the dog, in an infinite regression. And by the way, Einstein never received any Nobel prize for gravity theory, but the Nobel Prize in Physics 1921 was awarded to Albert Einstein "for his services to Theoretical Physics, and especially for his discovery of the law of the photoelectric effect." Maybe you are confusing him with Isaac Newton, but he didn´t have Nobel Prize on his days. www.nobelprize.org/prizes/physics/1921/summary/
@@miguelfalcao
In 2015, according to your argument, Tomas Lindahl, Paul Modrich and Aziz Sancar were awarded the Nobel Prize for work that effectively falsified the theory of evolution. The responses of the scientific community, the news media and the theistic community were SO MUTED than no one even noticed. Universities teach evolution just as they did before, newspapers published no front page articles about the death of evolution and the theistic community still uses arguments about junkyards, tornadoes and perfect eyes.
I've no more time to waste discussing your silly hypothesis. B' bye.
My two concepts:
1.Evolution seems to give an explanation that suits this chaotic world we live in(so I can accept it).
2. The creation model depicts a world to be very simplistic(too simplistic, to be honest), but the magician God makes it too unbelievable.
What to accept then? A world based on chaos and random changes which are rarely benefical(or else utterly demaging) or a world which is ruled by a God of order, but that God seems to hide from us without one single scientific proof to be ever found up to now?
accept something only when there is concrete evidence for it not when it explains something you want explained.
To me, evolution is the most beautiful and poetic true story about nature and planet Earth. Who needs the bible with all the fake characters murdering each other over power and moral dogmas, when you have this precious tale of adaptation and how life makes its way through obstacles and changes.
*"Human Beings Did Not Just Appear At The Top Of The Evolutionary Ladder To Reap The Benefits Of Those Millions Of Years Of Evolution Without Having To Live Through It. In Other Words You Were Those Other Animals. Someone Had To Be Them." ~ From Page 1 Of "The Present" At TruthContest♥Com*
..WWhy evolution is a lie;ruclips.net/video/pmtVqhr32Vs/видео.html
A wonderfully articulate presentation of a little over an hour to answer two questions that can be satisfied by one line: "It is, but people are stupid".
My understanding of science is it should not be about believing but observable facts .
In the American vernacular, "theory" often means "imperfect fact"--part of a hierarchy of confidence running downhill from fact to theory to hypothesis to guess. Thus the power of the creationist argument: evolution is "only" a theory and intense debate now rages about many aspects of the theory. If evolution is worse than a fact, and scientists can't even make up their minds about the theory, then what confidence can we have in it? Indeed, President Reagan echoed this argument before an evangelical group in Dallas when he said (in what I devoutly hope was campaign rhetoric): "Well, it is a theory. It is a scientific theory only, and it has in recent years been challenged in the world of science--that is, not believed in the scientific community to be as infallible as it once was."
Well evolution is a theory. It is also a fact. And facts and theories are different things, not rungs in a hierarchy of increasing certainty. Facts are the world's data. Theories are structures of ideas that explain and interpret facts. Facts don't go away when scientists debate rival theories to explain them. Einstein's theory of gravitation replaced Newton's in this century, but apples didn't suspend themselves in midair, pending the outcome. And humans evolved from ape-like ancestors whether they did so by Darwin's proposed mechanism or by some other yet to be discovered.
Moreover, "fact" doesn't mean "absolute certainty"; there ain't no such animal in an exciting and complex world. The final proofs of logic and mathematics flow deductively from stated premises and achieve certainty only because they are not about the empirical world. Evolutionists make no claim for perpetual truth, though creationists often do (and then attack us falsely for a style of argument that they themselves favor). In science "fact" can only mean "confirmed to such a degree that it would be perverse to withhold provisional consent." I suppose that apples might start to rise tomorrow, but the possibility does not merit equal time in physics classrooms.
Evolutionists have been very clear about this distinction of fact and theory from the very beginning, if only because we have always acknowledged how far we are from completely understanding the mechanisms (theory) by which evolution (fact) occurred. Darwin continually emphasized the difference between his two great and separate accomplishments: establishing the fact of evolution, and proposing a theory--natural selection--to explain the mechanism of evolution.
- Stephen J. Gould, " Evolution as Fact and Theory"; Discover, May 1981
these comments are demoralizing. jerry coyne may be too complicated for some of you - if you don't understand, maybe try something remedial and work your way up to this.
Let's have a debate.
*EVIDENCE FOR EVOLUTION - Geographic Distribution of Species* As one travels from one isolated landmass, to another, one sees patterns that fit with evolutionary theory. The mammals populating the Australasian landmass (including New Guinea) prior to man's arrival were virtually all Marsupials; kangaroos, wombats, koalas, quolls, thylacenes, et al; found nowhere else in the world, and egg laying Monotremes (Platypus and Echidnas) also found nowhere else in the world. Indeed, prior to the coming of man who brought the dingo, the only placental mammals were those that could swim there (seal) and those that could fly there (bats). It is very obvious that mammalian evolution took a quite different turn in that isolated landmass.
New Zealand as well tells of a different evolutionary history. With no native mammals, except again for those able to fly (bats) or swim (seals) there, birds assumed the ecological roles filled by mammals elsewhere. In the absence of ground dwelling predators, many birds abandoned energy consuming flight, the Kakapo, Kiwi and Moa among them. The wing of the kiwi is a mere vestige, no bigger than your little finger, with an equally useless claw at its end.
Other isolated islands, Mauritania and Madagascar, also had their own unique flora and fauna, as did geologically recent islands such as the Hawaiian Archipelago. There, the science of comparative genomics shows that another species of finch underwent adaptive radiation into the at one time 55 species of Honey creepers of which only 18 survive. The same is true of many plants whose ancestral seeds found their way to these islands. The many species of the beautiful Hawaiian Silver Sword and their relatives, collectively known as the Hawaiian Silver Sword Alliance, are an example of adaptive radiation in plants over millions of years from an ancestral pacific coast tarweed.
Charles Darwin made remarkable observations 150 years ago and since then biologists, geneticists, geologists, biochemists and other related fields have continued to do so and in every case further evidence is accumulated in support of what is now called the Modern Synthesis of Evolution.?
God made animals that way to test our faith
- Creationists
In evolution, the terms micro and macro are merely quantitative. There is no mechanism that would halt evolution at any
arbitrary point because evolution is ongoing and continuous for all living species. Evolution is molecular in that the random errors that occur during cell division and replication (observed) are the raw material for the genetic variation we see in any population of organisms. If this were not so there would be no value in DNA tests. Each organism varies slightly genetically from its parent. In any population, those offspring who survive long enough to reproduce add their genetic variation to the population gene pool. Those survivors are the ones whose genes best suit them for their current environment. Environmental change will put any population under stress. If there is sufficient genetic variation within the gene pool, successive generations may be able to adapt to new conditions.
When a segment (or segments) of a population become genetically isolated from the parent population a new gene pool is thus formed, no longer sharing with the parent gene pool. Random mutations continue as before, but will henceforth be unique to each population, and subject to perhaps different environmental pressures. Over generations, differing mutations continue to accumulate in such populations, reducing the chances of future interbreeding attempts being successful. Speciation thus occurs over a continuum not at some particular point on it.
Loss of body hair could be considered 'micro' evolution, as could the development of sweat glands that enabled that loss. Like wise, each of the adaptations to bipedalism; length of muscles, shapes of the femur and other bones enabled further changes
to the point where the cumulative effect is 'macro' evolution. Furred animals have to deal with excess body heat, larger animals even more so, which is why elephants, rhinos and other big animals are largely hairless. Most furred animals must dispose of excess heat by panting, which is not that efficient for cooling as compared to sweating. A sweating savanna hominid could move around during the day would have an advantage over animals that needed to seek shade.
Jerry Coyne doesn't even understand what religion is, yet here he is preaching about his own religious beliefs on evolution. The video shows an Indian Mongoose and a Cane Toad, but no signs of any transitions in either creature...Jerry seems to me that he's just another one of those guys that like to hear themselves talk...
Creation cannot be asserted or defended with honesty.
--- Asserted? Defended? It can't even be consistently defined by its own proponents.
Gary
E=mcsquared. Energy is the same as mass. Exactly. Energy is always moving, spinning, rotating, oscillating, resonating and bursting forth. Energy must always be created for it to move. Or else how are quarks bursting forth spinning billions of times a second as 3 points of light, forming what are called protons and neutrons? I found these words in the book "The Quantum World" written by the physicist Kenneth Ford.
Nor can evolution
@@LukeMAXM evolution is possible but god isnt possible
*"Dawn of Humanity"* the outstanding NOVA presentation that debuted September 16 on PBS, is now streaming at
www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/evolution/dawn-of-humanity.html
There will be discussion of fossil hominids, including the recent discoveries of Australopithecus sediba and Homo dinaledi. Creationists are not only welcome, they are encouraged to do so.
You are very welcome too! David Berlinski Explains Problems With Evolution. Z6ElA0--JNg
Adam and Eve (Genesis) = fairy tale
Hansel and Gretel = fairy tale
Talking Snakes (Genesis) = fairy tale
Talking rabbit (Alice in Wonderland) = fairy tale
Talking Donkey (Genesis) = fairy tale
Talking wolf (Little Red Riding Hood) = fairy tale
Whale swallowing Jonah (Genesis) = fairy tale
Noah and the Ark (Genesis) = fairy tale
Jack and the Beanstalk = fairy tale
Talking Cat (Puss in Boots) = fairy tale
The Emperor's New Clothes (Hans Christian Andersen) = fairy tale
There is not a single piece of evidence for any of them, but credulous people will swallow such stories hook line and sinker because they have
been conditioned to believe them since their earliest childhood. Rational people will have no part of it.
--- I'm glad that you didn't disavow the tooth fairy. She's real! I have a jar containing three quarters that proves it (I spent the others).
you=fairytale
+Randall Wilks
It looks like your comment succeeded in annoying a couple of clueless god freaks :) .
Well done indeed.
The truth that sets man free is the truth that will piss him off. Truth is established by EVIDENCE, NOT someone's say-so.
waihi houkamau
Grow up!
I listened to most of Coyne's lecture.
1. It's a cheap insult to characterize people who don't believe what he believes as "perverse" or "dumb". That's just a childish name-calling tactic.
2. Coyne neglected to mention that he gets paid to promote evolution and if he challenged evolution he would be fired and ridiculed.
3. Coyne neglected to mention a key element of contemporary evolutionism - that DNA mutations are alleged to cause functional genetic code which is expressed into traits, which if function are then subjected to selective pressure. Selection cannot create a genetic code, selection only operates on the resulting trait and only if the resulting trait is functional. This is a key omission on Coyne's part because nobody has observed a mutation creating a new functional code. And without that observation - the key evolutionist mechanism relies on speculation and imagination.
4. There are many problems with Coyne's "horse evolution". Coyne neglected to mention that creationist sites claim that modern horses are found in layers below ancient horses, that hyracotherium was not a horse, that south american fossils indicate a progression from 3 toes to 1, that nobody has actually observed the evolved horses in that order, and that 3 toed and 1 toed horses were found together. Why does Coyne omit contrary evidence raised by the creationists?
5. Coyne neglects to mention several bird evolution issues. For example, the "Chinese" fossils that Coyne referred to were later found to have been manufactured for sale by a fraud factory. Plus, feathered dinosaurs appear in the fossil record after the first so-called "bird" archeopterix. As for Coyne's claim about the "probability" of evolution - without any mathematical calculation his claim is speculation. Coyne also misrepresents the most powerful anti-evolution arguments (presumably to promote his own belief). The fact is that Coyne neglects the impossibility of random genetic mutations and the impossibility of highly complex biochemical systems. Instead, he's focused on old bones which can be interpreted to suit his belief.
6. Coyne mentioned "Whale evolution" but neglected to mention that whale fossil exhibits were created in fraud and publicized. The "blow hole" that Coyne mentioned was found to have been artificially located by the fossil re-construction expert in order to support the theory - but not as a result of actual evidence of the true location. The pakicetus "blow hole" was later found to have been completely wrong and the creature was given a "nose" and determined to be a land creature.
Why did Coyne neglect to mention this?
7. Coyne mentioned Tictaalik. He neglected to mention the controversy - that the creature was hailed as predictive proof for evolution, only to be dethroned when earlier terapods were discovered.
8. Coyne mentioned australopithecus. He neglects to mention the controversy that australopithecus was merely a monkey that went extinct and did not evolve into anything.
9. Coyne mentions embryology. But Coyne neglects to mention that evolutionism was spawned by many decades of fraudulent embryology due to Haeckel whose fraudulent drawings are still published for the school kids today. In response to Coyne's claims on this lecture, I visited a creationist site which indicates that the "yolk sac" is now known to have many important functions. And the mere fact that Coyne cannot fathom an explanation other than evolution to fit his observations does not mean that he is right. It may be, that Coyne has been brain-washed into the false belief that evolution is the only answer. Solomon Asch showed that people will conform to the beliefs of their peer-group.
10. Coyne mentions that Darwin "deduced" facts. NO. Darwin used "imaginary illustrations" and speculation. Darwin repeatedly referred to "probability" but never once actually calculated the probability of his claims.
11. Coynes claim that vestiges result from genetic mutation is not supported by fact. It's entirely possible that the structures are not vestigial - but are functional. It may be that the structures were designed on purpose and that Coyne cannot understand it because he believes only in evolution. Coyne's claim that genetic mutation caused repression is speculation to support his belief - it's not science. Similarly so-called "junk DNA" was debunked.
12. Coyne mentions falsification of the theory of evolution. But Coyne neglected to mention 2 of the most powerful falsifications, possibly because of his prejudice against the opposing view. First, it is mathematically impossible for genetic mutations to occur in the DNA molecule in a way that creates new functional code. Secondly, nobody has observed a genetic mutation creating a new functional genetic code. Third, there is no evolutionist explanation for the observation of highly complex biochemical systems which do not function in the absence of any missing part, which means they could not evolve. These arguments falsify evolution and are ignored by Coyne.
I was disappointed by Coynes lecture.
So Joe is "disappointed" with Jerry Coyne's lecture? What a surprise. Coyne is a Professor of Biology. It is his job to explain biology of which evolution is an integral part and for which there is abundant evidence. Joe seems to think he should espouse creationism which is a religious view, an opinion, for which there is no evidence whatsoever. That's what Joe "thinks"
So Joe is "disappointed" with Jerry Coyne's lecture? What a surprise. Coyne is a Professor of Biology. It is his job to explain biology of which evolution is an integral part and for which there is abundant evidence. Joe seems to think he should espouse creationism which is a religious view, an opinion, for which there is no evidence whatsoever. That's what Joe "thinks"
Randall Wilks So Coyne is some sort of paid propagandist?
Joe is a proud graduate of the Humpty Dumpty School of Language and Logic; "When I use a word," Humpty Dumpty said, in rather a scornful tone, "it means just what I choose it to mean-neither more nor less."
Randall Wilks Oh Randall your ad hominem attack is boring.
*****
"no one has any evidence for evolution."
Definition: *Evolution is the change in the inherited characteristics of biological populations over successive generations* (It is a fact that this happens)
The theory of evolution is not about _whether_ evolution happens, but about _how_ it happens.
*EVIDENCE FOR EVOLUTION - The Predictive Ability of the Theory - Part II* The best test of any scientific theory is its usefulness as a predictive tool. In that respect, the Theory of Evolution performs admirably. The Theory of Evolution would predict that, IF birds evolved from dinosaurs, there should be a progression of derived traits in dinosaurs leading up to the origin of birds and that is exactly what we see.
Perhaps the most complete transitional sequence in the fossil record is that from dinosaurs to birds. Birds didn’t just evolve from dinosaurs overnight, but the features of birds evolved one by one; first light bones and bipedal locomotion, then feathers, then a wishbone, then more complex feathers that look like quill-pen feathers, then wings. Yes, wings evolved before flight. Just as there are birds today such as ostriches, emus, rheas, etc. that no longer fly, yet still use their wings for other purposes, there were winged theropod dinosaurs that may have used them to shelter young, for mating displays, or intimidating a predator or rival just as do birds of today.
Long before wings, the forelimbs of theropods evolved to allow them to reach forward to grasp prey with their claws. Those are the Maniraptors. That movement is exactly the same as that required for flapping wings. Archaeopteryx still had those grasping claws as did other early birds. The young chicks of the Hoatzin still retain them. Claws are also evident on many bird species; Emus, Cassowarys and Kiwis still have them on vestigial wings.
Feathers and scales are formed from the same material, keratin. Birds retain scales on their legs; the japanese Silkie chicken has been bred for fully feathered legs, indicating that only slight genetic modification is necessary. Take a look at an Emu; its legs are exactly what would be expected on a dinosaur. It too, has a useless nub of a wing with an equally useless claw. Vestigial remnants are always confusing to creationists
There is a succession of feathered dinosaur fossils with increasingly bird like characteristics i.e. Xiaotingia, Sinosauropteryx prima, Caudipteryx, Sinovenator and others. Any of these fossils showing such a mix of traits can be considered transitional. The whole lineage of feathered dinosaurs could be considered transitional. The fossil record even shows the stages of feather evolution from simple spikes to down to contour feathers and ultimately to quilled flight feathers. Today we have lots of feathered dinosaur fossils; so many feathered theropod fossils in fact, that most paleontologists now think ALL theropods were probably feathered.
There were dinosaurs with wings that couldn't possibly fly, like 5 foot 40 pound Zhenyuanlong suni and little ones like Microraptor that could fly. There were a great many almost-birds and not-quite-birds. And birds like Auronis, Archaeopteryx, Shenzhouraptor, Rahonavis, Yandangornis Jixiangornis, Sapeornis, Omnivoropteryx, Confuciusornis and Changchengornis that retain some dinosaur-like features such as teeth and long bony tails. Evolution is NOT a linear process. Many of these species lived at the same time, displaying a matrix of characteristics. Evolution is a natural experiment. Some things work and get perpetuated, others may enjoy brief success before extinction.
With so many transitional fossils displaying both bird-like and dinosaur-like features, there is an almost seamless transition from dinosaur to bird (as well as a great number of dead end evolutionary experiments) and it is often difficult to separate the two. Doing so requires statistical analysis of nearly 1000 inherited and derived characteristics.
if religion hasnt got its claws into you you're a very lucky person
*The fossil record is not a video or even a photo album.* When an organism dies there is only a minuscule chance of any trace of it being preserved. Fossilization is dependent on the geological forces of erosion and deposition which are ongoing and have occurred in varying amounts throughout earth's history. Soils are eroded by wind or water and deposited elsewhere. There is no chance of fossils forming if they are not covered and protected by deposition soon after death, otherwise scavengers, rodents, fungi and UV light work to break down the remains to the point where nothing is left to preserve. Teeth are the hardest part of a vertebrate skeleton, and it is no coincidence that teeth are the most numerous fossils. Any fossils that do form can be lost by subsequent erosion. Even if a fossil survives millions of years in a stratigraphic layer, it will not be available for study unless it is discovered at just the right time by a sharp eyed paleontologist or other knowledgeable person as erosion briefly exposes them. There are nowhere near enough such people to be on hand as this happens, and any fossils thus exposed soon turn to dust from UV exposure and other weather elements. Exposed fossils are often the consistency of chalk and must be coated with hardening chemicals before extraction. For fossilization to take place entails a great deal of luck, and still more luck for some knowledgeable person to be at the right place and time when the forces of nature reveal it. We are indeed fortunate to have those we do have, and although more fossils are continuously being discovered, there will always be gaps in the fossil record. The correct environment, sediment type, climate, and luck needed for fossil preservation is often hard to come by in just the right combination. Today, through over a century of study of both the Earth’s surface and the the fossil record that does exist, paleontologists have been able to determine that while the record will never be complete and always has preservation biases, we often have more than enough evidence to draw strong evolutionary conclusions about the history of many groups, both living and extinct.
"Only a small portion of the world has been geologically explored. Only organic beings of certain classes can be preserved in a fossil condition, at least in any great number. Many species when once formed never undergo any further change, but become extinct without leaving modified descendants; and the periods, during which species have undergone modification, though long as measured by years, have probably been. short in comparison with the periods during which they have retained the same form. It is the dominant and. widely ranging species which vary most frequently and vary most, and varieties are often at first local-both causes rendering the discovery of intermediate links in any one formation less likely. Local varieties will not spread into other and distant regions until they are consider-ably modified and improved ; and when they do spread, if discovered in a geological formation, they will appear as if suddenly created there, and will be simply classed as new species. Most formations have been intermittent in their accumulation; and their duration has probably been shorter than the average duration of specific forms.." (Charles Darwin - Origin of Species first edition 1859)
In Darwin's time, and for long afterwards, fossils were discovered largely by accident, incidental to other human activities such as mining, road and rail construction, et al. Since then, as improved knowledge of where fossils are likely to be discovered, the fossil record has expanded exponentially. Paleontology no longer relies on accidental discoveries, since the geologic maps produced by mineral and oil exploration have made the identification of potential fossil sites much easier. Fossil explorations using that information are planned well in advance of undertaking them.
You can basically match up a US map that teaches creationism to lowest test grades and get a complete match...the reason this is not a bigger deal is because the states that teach creationism don't know what statistics even means...
+Patrick Kilduff
The infamous bible/stroke/diabetes/drop-out belt. Hell, even I have heard about it, and I live in Europe.
+albedoshader I've lived in it before, as does my son now. It really IS that bad.
+Patrick Kilduff
I saw a t-shirt that had an outline of the continental United States. In the north-east and south-west (California) it had "United States of America". All the rest (north west to south east) had "Dumbfuckistan".
I had to LOL.
but there is less crime in those states lol
I forgot to mention, it’s also the homicide belt, if you believe the FBI statistics. So much about low crime rates ;)
“Questioning Darwin,” a documentary on HBO, presets a novel approach to a subject that many consider at odds with their religious views."The film, by Antony Thomas, traces Charles Darwin’s personal evolution as he slowly formed his theory of evolution, fleshing out the portrait with excerpts from his writings (read by the actor Sam West). These biographical segments are juxtaposed with
comments from creationist Christians, presented non-judgmentally. Mr. Thomas for the most part lets these opposing worldviews speak for themselves." - NEIL GENZLINGER, New York Times
Evolution is religion
Your ignorance is showing.
The Watchmaker
While walking through the park, I found a watch. Watches (in my experience) do not simply spring into existence alongside the path. Someone of fairly high intelligence must have made the watch, then left it there. Wondering why someone might do such a thing, I decided to find the Watchmaker.
Luck was with me. On the way home I saw an advertisement for similar watches available free (with the purchase of a meal) at a popular fast-food chain. I went to the nearest franchise and asked to see the Watchmaker. The counter-person was not helpful. "Dude, there's no Watchmaker here, we just pull 'em out of a box."
I expressed my conviction that the watch could not simply happen. There must be a Watchmaker. The manager (who took an interest when I began to raise my voice) was able to shed some light on the matter. "Sir, we receive these watches from corporate headquarters in Vermont. If you want to find the Watchmaker, you will have to contact them."
A very nice person at corporate headquarters was able to refer me to her contact at an import company, who referred me to his contact at a Far-Eastern manufacturing firm. Once I convinced him that I was not investigating his company's employment practices, he was kind enough to provide me with a description of their manufacturing process.
The watches were assembled by unskilled workers paid the equivalent of about two dollars a day. (For some reason my contact thought it was important to point out that this is nearly one-and-a-half times the local minimum wage.) The watch band, case, and face were injection molded in an automated process. The electronic portion of the watch was purchased in bulk from another company.
Contacting that company, I found that the electronic portions were produced on an assembly-line using a combination of industrial robots and semi-skilled labor.
The microchips were cut from blanks grown from vats of molten silicon and traces of other elements. The machinery that did this is impressive, but it did not build the blanks so much as control the environment so that the silicon could assemble itself.
The control circuitry is photo etched on to the silicon chips. The photo etchers are fairly complex, as machines go, but hardly intelligent. The operators of these machines are better trained than the laborers who assemble the finished product. However, their knowledge is limited to running the machines. They had nothing to do with the design of the watch.
The doohickey that counts off the seconds is a small bit of quartz. Quartz is a naturally occurring crystal that vibrates at a constant rate when an electric current passes through it.
I'm sure all the folks involved in the manufacture of the watch were quite competent. Many of the folks I talked to seemed quite intelligent; but none of the people directly involved in the watch's manufacture would have been able to make a watch themselves from scratch. No one I had talked to so far was truly the Watchmaker.
The engineer who actually produced the design was knowledgeable and helpful. Unfortunately, his enthusiastic description of the process of circuit design was largely beyond me. I was able to glean two important facts: First, he used a computer aided design system. Second, his design was an enhancement of a previous design by another engineer, who based her design on an even earlier design, and so on; back through several decades.
The engineer was also able to provide me with a very interesting pamphlet entitled A brief history of time-keeping. This pamphlet traced the development of quartz clocks and watches back to a team of designers in the sixties. It went on to trace time-pieces in general back to the water-clocks of the ancient Greeks. It even contained a little speculation about the prehistoric people who built Stonehenge.
The watch was the product of intelligent design and construction, but there was no single Watchmaker. The watch embodies the combined intelligence of countless entities over the course of millennia, from the geniuses who invented the semi-conductor, to the minuscule "intellect" of the silicon and quartz crystals, back to the Babylonian scribe who invented astronomy, and even the purely mechanical motions of the heavenly bodies that inspired him.
Seeking respite from thoughts of watches and Watchmakers, I returned to the park. As I walked along, I found a flower. Flowers (in my experience) do simply spring into existence. The flower grew from a seed, which grew on a flower, which grew from a seed, and so on. The flower is its own manufacturer. This makes the initial design of the flower all the more impressive.
Before researching the Watchmaker, I might have supposed the flower had a single, super-human designer. With the Watchmakers firmly in mind, I contacted the nursery that produced the flower.
A staff member described the process. The flowers indeed grew from seeds. When I asked about the design of the flower, I was surprised to hear that they were a patented variety developed by a midwestern firm specializing in such things.
A botanist developed this variety from existing varieties by selective breeding. The botanist knew what he wanted, but had no way of making the design changes directly. There was also no way to communicate his desires directly to the plant. For that matter, there was no way for the plant to make the changes had there been a method of communication. There were small changes in each generation of plant, but these mutations were random.
Together the botanist and the plants were able to make deliberate, intelligent changes through a process similar to a game of twenty questions. The variations in each new generation were the previous generation's way of asking "How should I change?" The botanist supplied the answer by growing the next generation using seeds from the plants representing the closest guess.
In times past, gardeners made it a practice to save seeds from the best flowers to use in planting next year's garden. In hindsight, I saw that this was a kind of selective breeding.
Again the development was a cooperative effort between humans, and the existing varieties of flower. The gardeners had only a general idea of what they wanted, namely better flowers. The variety still asked the question "How should I change?" Humans still supplied the answer by growing the next generation using seeds from the plants representing the best guess.
There was a blight at the turn of the century that nearly caused this species of flower to become extinct in North America. For several years the American population of this flower declined, then it leveled out, then it started a slow climb. Eventually the flower returned to its previous numbers. Seeds imported from Europe continued to do poorly against the blight. Americans had to rely on their new, blight-resistant varieties.
There was no intelligent botanist or gardener, but the development of blight resistance was, in a sense, still an intelligent design choice. The variety still asked the question "How should I change?" The blight supplied the answer by destroying a greater proportion of the plants representing the wrong answer, leaving a greater proportion of plants representing the correct answer to provide the seeds that would grow into the next generation.
Blight was not the only non-human quiz master. Insects, other plants, higher animals, cooperative microbes, and many, many others all contributed their limited intelligence to the plants' design. Even the Sun, rain, and soil (literally dirt-dumb) made a contribution.
Even discounting the human intellect of the botanists and gardeners, the flower is the product of intelligent design and construction of a sort. There was no single Designer. The flower embodies the combined intelligence of countless entities, over the course of billions of years; from the tiny intelligence of the bee, to the minuscule "intellect" of various microbes; and even the nearly mechanical actions of wind and rain.
Returning to the park I contemplated this process of evolution. I marveled at the diversity and complexity of the life it creates. I considered the process of evolution itself. I meditated on its elegant simplicity, and sublime design.
Old habits die hard. Soon I found myself wondering if there wasn't some subtle intelligence behind the design of evolution. Suspecting the answer almost at once, I was able to complete my research quickly.
Sexual reproduction, one of the key elements in the whole process, was itself a mechanism that evolved from a simpler process of asexual reproduction. If the process of evolution itself can evolve, it requires no great leap of imagination to trace the process back through the ages to processes so basic that they are none other than the laws of physics.
The process goes the other way, too. The learning ability of higher animals is essentially an improved form of evolution; able to make improvements in less than a single generation. Our own natural intellects are yet a further enhancement. Beyond even that, we develop better ways of learning, and of sharing our knowledge, nearly every day.
I am able to make it back to the park before nightfall. I watch the Sun set, then I watch the stars come out. I am a direct descendant of the laws of physics, the product of intelligent design and construction, but with no single Creator. I embody the combined intelligence of countless entities since the beginning of time, from the first primates who used stone tools, back to the first creatures to experiment with sex, forward to my college instructors, and back again to the laws of physics themselves.
The stars are out in all their glory. As I stargaze, I think how lucky I am that the universe is a place where the laws of physics allow life and intelligence to evolve. I wonder, for just a moment, if those laws just happened, or if they were the product of intelligent design. I laugh, and go back to stargazing. I do catch-on eventually; given enough time
LONG, but nicely put. Thanks.
Not enough evidence for evolution.
An overwhelming majority of the scientific community accepts evolution as the dominant scientific theory of biological diversity.[1][2] Nearly every scientific society, representing hundreds of thousands of scientists, has issued statements rejecting intelligent design[2] and a petition supporting the teaching of evolutionary biology was endorsed by 72 US Nobel Prize winners.[3]
en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Level_of_support_for_evolution
+The Froggy Vines Tell me what's a 'spirit'?
+The Froggy Vines if you are defending the Christian position - then don't sink to their level with cursing - that's the way rabid saliva dripping atheists communicate.
+whiteliketar
Hi.
What's your best evidence for the existence of the God of the Bible?
Thanks.
'rabid saliva dripping atheists'
Ironically hateful choice of words.
Down Spacey+ What are u talking about not enuf evidence for evolution there Loads of of it, very compelling evidence, u Really mean there's NO evidence for any 'god'.
Judging by some replies below, some people absolutely refused to actually watch this video! :D LOL Brilliant! even though I knew much, I learnt a lot of details, it all came together, thank you for sharing!
I taught science in rural Missouri for 25 years- students stated I was the first and only to teach evolution.
Schools here are sports facilities that teach on the side. The teaching is third rate in most cases.
Hey, followers of Christ: Why don't you refute Jerry Coynes assertions made in this video instead of calling me names?
Eh?
Or has Jesus changed his stance on slander.
You guys are unbelievable...the question was posed where are the signs for evolution right now, and I offered 3 examples, previously I offered multiple species and genus of human evolution over the past 6-7 mya and if you want more "macro" look into the Devonian tetrapod, which I mentioned earlier. Also, where does this distinction between micro and macro come from? Who even mentions it except bible literalists and creationists that probably don't even know wtf they are talking about.
creationists want evidence when they have no evidence themselves.
creationists criticize evolution because "unscientific" when their hypothesis isn't it too.
Luca
I see proof as the constant creation of energy. Energy is always bursting forth as quarks which spin billions of times a second as 3 points of light, forming what are called protons and neutrons. I read these words in the book "The Quantum World" by the physicist Kenneth Ford.
The Department of Geosciences at conservative Baptist Baylor University has issued this statement:
*"The fossil record clearly indicates a progression in complexity of organisms from very simple fossil forms in the oldest rocks (>3.5 billion years old) to a broad spectrum from simple to complex forms in younger rocks, that some organisms that were once common are now extinct, and that the living organisms inhabiting our world today are similar (but generally not the same) as organisms represented as fossils in young sedimentary deposits, which in turn have evolutionary ancestors represented as fossils in yet older rocks.*
*Mammals, for example, are prevalent today and can be traced back in the fossil record for approximately 200 million years, but are not present as mammals in the fossil record before that; however, fossil forms that have reasonably been interpreted to be associated with the evolutionary precursors to mammals are found in older rocks. Whether biological evolution occurs has not been a matter of scientific debate for more than a century. It is considered a proven fact. The specific mechanisms of biological change over time continue to be a topic of active research, and include mechanisms proposed by Charles Darwin as well as more recently developed ideas based on our growing knowledge of genetics and molecular biology. Using the methods of modern science, our knowledge of the fundamental mechanisms of life has grown enormously since the initial characterization of the role of DNA in reproduction, inheritance and evolution in the mid-1950s.*
*The American Geological Institute and The Paleontological Society, partnering with the most respected geoscience societies in America including the Geological Society of America, the American Geophysical Union, and the American Association of Petroleum Geologists (among others), have produced a booklet on evolution and the fossil record that can be downloaded as a PDF file. This booklet was written for the general public by people who have worked with the fossil record throughout their careers, and was thoroughly reviewed by other professional geologists and paleontologists."*
www.baylor.edu/geology/index.php?id=62340
That site also has a link to download above referenced "Evolution and the Fossil Record" by Pojeta and Springer. (1 MB PDF file). It also provides links to the position statements from other scientific organizations.
*Genetic Differences Between Humans and Apes* While geneticists are still working to resolve the genetic differences between humans and apes, certain genes stand out as being particularly important in human evolution. Included among them are those involved in the development of language (FOXP2), changes in the musculature of the jaw (MYH16), and limb and digit specializations (HACNS1) .
Among the mutations affecting brain evolution in our ancestral genome were duplications to the SRGAP2 gene that is found in all mammals and the human copy of which has been renamed SRGAP2A. This gene is one of the 23 genes that are duplicated in humans but not in other primates. SRGAP2 has been resistant to mutations (highly conserved) throughout mammalian evolution, and the human lineage is the only one in which gene duplications have occurred and they took place at about the time of transition from genus Australopithecus to genus Homo marking the beginning of neocortex expansion.
The gene has been duplicated three times in the human genome in the past 3.4 million years: one duplication 3.4 million years ago (mya) called SRGAP2B, a second duplication 2.4 mya (called SRGAP2C), and one final duplication ~1 mya (SRGAP2D).
The 2.4 million year-old duplication (SRGAP2C) expresses a shortened version that 100% of humans possess.[10] This shortened version SRGAP2C inhibits the function of the original SRGAP2A gene and allows faster migration of neurons, slows the rate of synaptic maturation and increases the density of synapses in the cerebral cortex. Thus, while delaying development, it allows greater expansion.
This is but one of the areas in which the human genome differs from that of other apes, but one author has termed it "The humanity switch: How one gene made us brainier" newscientist.com/article/dn21777-the-humanity-switch-how-one-gene-made-us-brainier/
Randall Wilks
--- We creationists prefer to stick with important stuff like, "Show me an example of one kind turning into another kind." Talking about genes, duplications and mutations makes our heads hurt. Besides, anyone who knows the twelve or so laws of thermodynamics knows that all that genetics stuff is just fake news.
Any creationists so afflicted should consider a brain transplant.
Randall Wilks
--- if you happen to see the results of any study correlating how people voted in the last election with their belief in creationism, share it with me would you? I have a theory!
No, no, no, Six, You have a HYPOTHESIS, not a theory, there is insufficient evidence for a THEORY. ;-)) But yeah, I get your drift. I, too, would expect a high degree of correlation. Perhaps Pew or Gallup might take up the challenge. The most relevant stats I have are from the May 15, 2017 Gallup Poll that showed the fundamentalist viewpoint is highest among the least educated.and adults over 50; that puts them squarely in Trumps base. Will update you on any new stats.
Randall Wilks
In this case I deliberately use the word "theory". It's a legitimate use and I thought you would appreciate a tongue-in-cheek reply. The fact that fundamentalists won't learn the most basic science jargon isn't going to keep me from employing common usage of science jargon words when the word isn't being used as jargon. ... I didn't baby talk to my kids when they were little and I don't baby talk to creationists. Who knows? Maybe someday one of the creationists that I come across will tire of being ignarrogant and choose to learn something.
Didn't even watch the video. Just here to chuckle at the comments from uninformed religious people.
the video is fine, but I agree the comments of the illiterate that can only misread their bibles are extremely funny. Sadly, they also tell us why we are doomed... can you imagine them choosing between candidates for public office???
NephilimFree
LOL, the self-pwning geocentrist has arrived :D
BTW, since the _theory of evolution_ makes testable claims, it is a scientific theory, and not pseudoscience.
This is as simple as that ;)
*HOW EVOLUTION WORKS* It is helpful to understand that evolution is a molecular process. The random mutations that naturally occur during cell division and replication (mitosis and meiosis) are the raw material for the genetic variation we see in every population of organisms. Mutations are ongoing and continuous for every living species.
Those mutations are subjected to a selection process that is performed by whatever environment the organisms find themselves. In this respect, evolution is an ongoing, continuous set of experiments. Those that work get perpetuated, those that don't, perish. It is as if the environment acted as an umpire who says "There are good mutations and there are bad mutations and there are neutral mutations, but they ain't nuthin' until I (the environment) calls 'em." That is Natural Selection. Neutral mutations just go along for the ride without producing immediate benefit (Genetic Drift).
The result of those selection processes is organisms best suited for their current environment. Should that environment change, it would put the population under stress. If the population gene pool has sufficient genetic variation it increases the likelihood that at least some offspring should be able to survive and perpetuate the species (albeit one of slightly different genetic makeup).
What you should understand is that genetic changes do not occur because of some 'need'. The mutations are RANDOM and get selected if they are USEFUL. That is a process and it is anything BUT random. Let's take the example of the Panda. Bears in general are omnivores, eating plant matter, but with a marked preference for meat when available. The preferred food of the Panda however, is bamboo leaves, which have such low nutritional value that they must eat almost continuously. The Panda would certainly be able to extract more nutrition with a four chambered stomach (as in ungulates and whales) or something akin to a cecal valve, but it has neither in its genetic toolbox. In feeding themselves, pandas are continuously stripping bamboo leaves from their stalks, a process that could be facilitated if they had a thumb.
Bears however do not have thumbs, nor do they have genes for them in their genetic toolbox. Nor do new features simply spring into existence. However, if a slightly altered body component provides some benefit, natural selection will perpetuate it. Evolution results in incremental alterations to what is already there.
As an analogy, imagine a robot gardener dragging a hose around various obstacles it encounters in a garden until it can go no further. Now an intelligent gardener could simply retrace his steps and take a different path, avoiding those obstacles. The robot gardener (evolution) is not an intelligent force and cannot do that. With a limited tool kit, it can only (figuratively) add more hose to get the job done.
While a thumb would be quite useful to a panda for stripping leaves, evolution cannot rewind to produce one. Instead, it has taken "a piece of hose' (a wrist bone) and enlarged it to act as a stand in for a thumb. That is not an elegant solution and not a perfect one, but it gets the job done. Evolution is does not produce perfect solutions, but tweaks here and there to "get the job done". THAT is how evolution operates.
Based in part on the fact that no tetrapods, (terrestrial vertebrates) exist in the fossil record prior to about 370 million years ago, the Theory of Evolution would predict that tetrpods evolved from fish. If that were the case, there should have existed at one time a fish with characteristics of both fish and tetrapods. In other words a Transitional Species. Until about 2005, there was little evidence for such a creature. There were however, a class of fish called Sarcopterygians or Lobe Finned Fishes, that dominated Devonian seas. What charracterized those lobe finned fishes was that those fins were supported by external bones and muscles. Those bones, a single bone, connected to two bones conncted to smaller bones, are analogous to the limb bones of all tetrapods, including humans. Most Sarcopterygian Fishes have long been extinct, but they are survied today by two species of coelacnth and six species of lungfish.
Still, what was missing was a fossil showing characteristics of fish AND tetrapods. When Neil Shubin and his team decided to search for a fossil that filled the gap between the Lobe Finned Fishes that dominated Devonian Seas and the earliest tetrapod fossils represented by Ichtheostega and Acanthostega dated about 370 mya. Since those fossils were found in geologic deposits indicating a freshwater environment and if the Theory of Evolution is correct in its hypothesis that tetrapods evolved from fish, then transitional fossils should be found in similar deposits somewhat older in age. The problem was that geologic deposits of that age are exposed at few places on the earth's surface. Fortunately, a great deal of geologic exploration has been done throughout the world, financed often times by oil and mining interests. They selected an area in the Canadian Arctic, Ellesmere Island, as having the greatest likelihood of success. It took 4 years of searching during the short summers of that hostile environment but succeeded, returning in 2004 with 9 specimens of the fish they named Tiktaalik. It was exactly what one would expect a transitional fish-tetrapod to look like and was found in deposits dated 375 mya. If this was not the direct ancestor of tetrapods, it was something very much like it.This is a great example of using evolutionary theory as a predictive tool,
The genetic variation within a population is referred to as a gene pool. Organisms can move freely within that population breeding with each other perpetuating any new mutations that work and eliminating those that are less than optimal.Each offspring will most resemble its parents, yet will vary slightly genetically because of unique mutations acquired during meiosis. Thus the genetic makeup of a population will change ever so slightly with each successive generation.
Populations are not stable, they expand and contract with changing conditions. So long as there is sufficient genetic variation within a population there will be some members capable of surviving those conditions and perpetuating the species. The alternative is extinction.
When populations expand and migrate to new territories, some portions of it will become genetically isolated from each other and no longer share a common gene pool. In such cases, each such sub population will carry a subset of the parent population, but subsequent mutations will be unique to each new population (the genotype) that will come to differentiate that population from others (Genetic Drift).
To the extent that such populations encounter differing environmental conditions, that environment will exert different evolutionary pressures on that population. New mutations will have a much greater chance of coming to dominance within a smaller population than they would in the larger parent population where they would be one among the many. Over thousands of generations genetic differences accumulate in the different gene pools making interbreeding ever more difficult until at some point speciation can be said to have occurred. Because speciation is a process, rather than an event, it would be no more possible to pinpoint where speciation occurred than to identify where on the color spectrum orange becomes red.
You have major misconceptions of how evolution works. Every organism born will have unique sequences of DNA, You yourself would have between 50 and 100 unique nucleotide bases due to mutations that take place during meiosis of the egg and sperm that produced you. Every organism born will have such mutations accumulated from ancestors, just as you have mutations from your parents, grandparents and other ancestors. Have they made you any different? Genetically, yes; Anything dramatically different from your parents? No, but you are not a clone of them either.
It would be helpful for you to understand that evolution is a molecular process. The random mutations that naturally occur during cell division and replication (mitosis and meiosis) are the raw material for the genetic variation we see in every population of organisms. Mutations are ongoing and continuous for every living species.
Those mutations are subjected to a selection process that is performed by whatever environment the organisms find themselves. In this respect, evolution is an ongoing, continuous set of experiments. Those that work get perpetuated, those that don't, perish. It is as if the environment acted as an umpire who says "There are good mutations and there are bad mutations and there are neutral mutations, but they ain't nuthin' until I (the environment) calls 'em." That is Natural Selection. Neutral mutations just go along for the ride without producing immediate benefit (Genetic Drift).
The result of those selection processes is organisms best suited for their current environment. Should that environment change, it would put the population under stress. If the population gene pool has sufficient genetic variation it increases the likelihood that at least some offspring should be able to survive and perpetuate the species (albeit one of slightly different genetic makeup).
What you should understand is that genetic changes do not occur because of some 'need'. The mutations are RANDOM and get selected if they are USEFUL. That is a process and it is anything BUT random.
The genetic variation within a population is referred to as a gene pool. Organisms can move freely within that population breeding with each other perpetuating any new mutations that work and eliminating those that are less than optimal.Each offspring will most resemble its parents, yet will vary slightly genetically because of unique mutations acquired during meiosis. Thus the genetic makeup of a population will change ever so slightly with each successive generation.
Populations are not stable, they expand and contract with changing conditions. So long as there is sufficient genetic variation within a population there will be some members capable of surviving those conditions and perpetuating the species. The alternative is extinction.
When populations expand and migrate to new territories, some portions of it will become genetically isolated from each other and no longer share a common gene pool. In such cases, each such sub population will carry a subset of the parent gene pool, but subsequent mutations will be unique to each new population (the genotype) that will come to differentiate that population from others (Genetic Drift).
To the extent that such populations encounter differing environmental conditions, that environment will exert different evolutionary pressures on that population. New mutations will have a much greater chance of coming to dominance within a smaller population than they would in the larger parent population where they would be one among the many. Over thousands of generations genetic differences accumulate in the different gene pools making interbreeding ever more difficult until at some point speciation can be said to have occurred. Because speciation is a PROCESS, rather than an EVENT, it would be no more possible to pinpoint where speciation occurred than to identify where on the color spectrum orange becomes red.
Many thousands of years ago, not long after the dawn of civilization, small tribes of stone-age savages invented colorful creation myths based on wild tales, dreams, lies and insane ravings. Over time, a religious oral tradition developed and the stories got shuffled back and forth from generation to generation and tribe to tribe, with all the inevitable embroidering, garbling, exaggerating and contextualizing. Then, after millenia, the stories were finally written down on animal skins and papyrus leaves. But sadly, these original writings are lost.
More centuries followed; copies of copies of copies were made, with accumulated alterations and mistakes. And they were translated through many different languages, badly. Then eventually, these stories were collated and edited by an ancient Roman council to form a creation myth that satisfied the political ambitions of the Emperor Constantine.... and thus The Book of Genesis was born.
Today, Creationists feel that when it comes to empirically decoding the bio-chemical functionality of DNA, The Book of Genesis is more scientifically reliable than the universal opinion of the modern scientific community.
And man created God in his own image and saw that it was good.
Now who or what do I believe? Fossils that have been around for millions of years or some one that stood on a hill, watched a burning bush and heard little voices in his head.
Not to mention talking snakes. Too much, really.
Loved every second of this
*Scrolls to comment section*
*Loses hope in humanity*
BOTTOM LINE: Humans have created "GODS" throughout history. We are curious intelligent animals that often require closure and explanations for stuff. Things that could not be explained by science were attributed to a GOD or GODS in order to fulfill the need for these explanations or reasons. As humans have evolved, we've been able to explain millions of things (previously thought as a result of higher power) with science...with our discoveries. As we continue to discover more, the evidence and the NEED to believe in a higher power is reduced...this scares many people. Mostly because they want to feel like they are special in some way. Like they have a purpose. The thought of this NOT being true terrifies some so much, that they do anything they can to cling to it. So to me, that is pretty much why so many continue to hold onto asinine beliefs that there is some man in the sky controlling everything. Additionally, it is really easy to claim everything happens because it is god's plan.
Example:
1. A woman gives birth to a very ill child. The baby has multiple health impairments and eventually succumbs to them around a month of age. The god fearing individual would say "This was god's plan. They needed another angel in Heaven".
NO. Your child was subject to multiple genetic problems that occurred in utero and unfortunately, modern science was not advanced enough to save him/her. This would be called natural selection.
2. A woman gives birth to a very ill child. The baby has multiple health impairments, but through the advances in medical technology and knowledge, doctors are able to save the child, who grows up and all that fun stuff. Again, the god fearing individual would claim "This is god's plan!! My child was saved by god! It's a MIRACLE!!"
NO. Your child was saved by SCIENCE. This pretty much goes against natural selection for if the child matures to the age of reproduction and chooses to produce offspring, there is a high probability that he/she will pass on his/her genetics to the offspring - resulting in a similar situation that occurred at the time of his/her birth.
Darwin actually noted that in a later book, the Decent of Man, in that the Human race was the only one on the planet that went out of its way to support the weaker members of its race.
Evolution theory is based on scientific methodology (SM). SM involves hypothesis, experiment, observation, control experiment and conclusion. If anyone wants to debunk evolution theory, he has to also go through the same rigours of SM. Evolution theory debunked and demolished the creationism theory of the bible in 1842. Over more than 150 years since then, evolution theory has been further reinforced by fossil evidence, Genetics, DNA sequencing, cosmology, anthropology, carbon dating etc
You cannot prove any such thing dumbo. And no it didn't debunk creationism. If you knew anything about science you'd know that paleontology has proven a creation event. Why don't you keep up with what your own scientists say? You dummass, you don't have a clue about what the fossils say yet here you are using them for evidence.
Here's what the fossils say according to evolution scientists.
HERE ARE THE FACTS AS APPROVED BY EVOLUTION SCIENTISTS
All of the animals:
1. Suddenly appeared
2. Exploded everywhere
3. Were fully formed
4. No transitions
5. No gradualism
6. No change (stasis)
7. No sign of an evolutionary trend by which they could have emerged from an earlier type
So there you have it, empirical scientific evidence indicates that a large number of animals inhabited the Earth beginning years ago. The scientists say they suddenly appeared in masse fully formed and never changed. They have no explanation, no knowledge, or proof of how they came into existence. Since that time they have been going extinct one or more species at a time without a single replacement. NONE NADA ZIP. Eventually we will ALL be extinct. Tell me how that is evolution?
Hey dummass, there IS NO "scientific theory" of evolution and all you have left is "just a theory." Don't blame me, blame your own stubborn ignorance.
PWNED BY MAX
Well said, MK!
MK
It hasn't been proven with quantum physics.
MK
But evolution has been debunked by quantum physics over and over again---you just did not want to read it