@Q
I wish I could say I don't what you are talking about...but I do:)
Here are some lyrics from lit:
Can we forget about the things I said when I was drunk?
I didn't mean to call you that
I can't remember what was said or what you threw at me
Please tell me
Please tell me why? ...
My car is in the front yard
And I'm sleeping with my clothes on
I came in through the window last night
And you're gone
Gone
It's no surprise to me I am my own worst enemy,
Cuz every now and then I kick the living shit out of me
The smoke alarm is going off when there's a cigarette
Still burning
Please tell me why ...
My car is in the front yard
And I'm sleeping with my clothes on
I came in through the window last night
And you're gone gone
(Instrumental)
Please tell me why ...
My car is in the front yard
And I'm sleeping with my clothes on
I came in through the window last night
It's no surprise to me I am my own worst enemy
Cuz every now and then I kick the living shit out of me
Can we forget about the things I said when I was drunk
I didn't mean to call you that
Ok, a lot of this is not relavant, but who cares?
As for superstition, I would try to not worry about any of that.
All the facts for evolution
@TheDude
"Ok, but I don't understand what this has to do with the topic beyond that you are implying that I may be prone to dislike randomness in my life and it may sit less well with people who "don't feel in control of their life"."
Sorry, I should have worded it more carefully. I didn't want to imply that you dislike randomness, but in some people it may be a factor.
I just went "hey an article about why people accept or reject evolution and TheDude just asked a question about that! I'll post it in the thread". Didn't think it through though.
If there are any specific points of evolution that you have doubts about, please fire away. It could make discussion easier and more focused, and with all the scientists here you're sure to get some answers from smarter bears than me.
"Ok, but I don't understand what this has to do with the topic beyond that you are implying that I may be prone to dislike randomness in my life and it may sit less well with people who "don't feel in control of their life"."
Sorry, I should have worded it more carefully. I didn't want to imply that you dislike randomness, but in some people it may be a factor.
I just went "hey an article about why people accept or reject evolution and TheDude just asked a question about that! I'll post it in the thread". Didn't think it through though.
If there are any specific points of evolution that you have doubts about, please fire away. It could make discussion easier and more focused, and with all the scientists here you're sure to get some answers from smarter bears than me.
@Marius -- thanks for posting that study link.
Ironically, some scientists think believing in religion is evolutionary advantageous:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/stor ... =129528196
Ironically, some scientists think believing in religion is evolutionary advantageous:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/stor ... =129528196
Apologies if I seem belligerent on the subject, but it does push my buttons a bit when people start putting out claims that evolution (and even climate change) is a conspiracy. Especially when such imply that 'the government' is forcefully putting out these conspiracies. To me I often see government as pushing exactly the opposite and forcing religious views on us over even science and human rights (everything from the Kansas BoE to stem cells to DOMA). After all there is only 1 congressman who is a declared atheist (and no senators), all the rest universally ascribe to some religion. So from where I stand, the conspiracy is on the other side.
@The Dude
Hopefully I'm not too pestering, but after reading your response, I've got questions.
How does evolution require the belief in something spontaneously happening (I'm assuming you don't mean mutations which happen commonly)? Do you mean the initial idea of abiogenesis (which evolutionary theory doesn't say anything about)?
Also I'd say evolution is observable just like physics, but you seem to ascribe to the micro/macro evolution dichotomy. I've never quite understood that, doesn't one imply the other, and where exactly is the cutoff point? Also pressing the point on observable/recorded examples of evolution, aren't domestication and farming examples of that? We've certainly managed to drastically alter some species through our own artificial selection, teacup dogs, continuously milk-able cows, crops which ignore weed killer chemicals?
Finally, another 'aha' idea for me, maybe not be a completely related to evolution, but it did shape my views on complex systems. Conway's game of life. It's an incredibly simple ruleset (exactly 3 rules), yet it spawns a vastly complex system. It can be beautiful in a strange way (if you're a geek like that), from the simple glider to a Gosper gun or just a chaotic mess dancing around. It really got me thinking about about emergent systems and complexity.
@The Dude
Hopefully I'm not too pestering, but after reading your response, I've got questions.
How does evolution require the belief in something spontaneously happening (I'm assuming you don't mean mutations which happen commonly)? Do you mean the initial idea of abiogenesis (which evolutionary theory doesn't say anything about)?
Also I'd say evolution is observable just like physics, but you seem to ascribe to the micro/macro evolution dichotomy. I've never quite understood that, doesn't one imply the other, and where exactly is the cutoff point? Also pressing the point on observable/recorded examples of evolution, aren't domestication and farming examples of that? We've certainly managed to drastically alter some species through our own artificial selection, teacup dogs, continuously milk-able cows, crops which ignore weed killer chemicals?
Finally, another 'aha' idea for me, maybe not be a completely related to evolution, but it did shape my views on complex systems. Conway's game of life. It's an incredibly simple ruleset (exactly 3 rules), yet it spawns a vastly complex system. It can be beautiful in a strange way (if you're a geek like that), from the simple glider to a Gosper gun or just a chaotic mess dancing around. It really got me thinking about about emergent systems and complexity.
@photoguy
I spent a little time trying. I couldn't find anything. All I could find was that evolutionists make no distinction between micro and macro.
http://atheism.about.com/od/evolutionex ... _macro.htm
What keeps me from logically being able to assume macro from micro is the vast lack of observable proof to support that micro indeed becomes macro. I would think there should be endless fossil records for the limitless changes that should have happened over millions of years. Tons upon tons of examples for the variations that are sketched for the evolution of man.
I also find it puzzling that there are no animals we can communicate with using human speech. I would think at least a few transition species with the intellect and vocal abilities should still be around today?
@csdx
Spontaneous as in “big bang” not mutations. As for abiogenesis, that is a whole other can of worms.
I think a lot of farming examples are humans playing with “God’s stuff”, but I think the science is great. I just don’t know if we should be planting these crops in such vast quantity and maybe not at all without emergency. It gets rid of biodiversity. Everything in life from my perspective seems to be losing diversity. I will not be surprised if we eventually make a talking horseman if we splice enough DNA:) The hard question for me then will be “Does it have a human soul?”.
As for breeding, and to reference the article, I have never seen a dog give birth to anything but a dog. I have seen tall people, small people, handicap people (one of my struggles with creation along with starvation), and athletic people. They are all still people.
“Also I'd say evolution is observable just like physics, but you seem to ascribe to the micro/macro evolution dichotomy. I've never quite understood that, doesn't one imply the other, and where exactly is the cutoff point?”
That is a good point, but also the problem. I don’t believe the color of my hair or eye’s is evolution in the sense that given enough generations I will develop an exoskeleton. I do believe that our body can “adapt” to amazing things, but I think more often things die. This is why I don’t understand the lack of evidence on earth for all the transitions between species. Without this evidence, and IMHO there should be MILLIONS if not BILLIONS of examples, macro evolution does not hold water for me. I don't accept a few “this might be a monkey human” after they collect bones from a large area. I don’t see how we can conclude that something gradually turned into something else without tons of solid examples. All I have seen are a bunch of extinct animals.
The wiki of conway’s game looks interesting. I will have to give this more thought in how I think this applies to my life.
I spent a little time trying. I couldn't find anything. All I could find was that evolutionists make no distinction between micro and macro.
http://atheism.about.com/od/evolutionex ... _macro.htm
What keeps me from logically being able to assume macro from micro is the vast lack of observable proof to support that micro indeed becomes macro. I would think there should be endless fossil records for the limitless changes that should have happened over millions of years. Tons upon tons of examples for the variations that are sketched for the evolution of man.
I also find it puzzling that there are no animals we can communicate with using human speech. I would think at least a few transition species with the intellect and vocal abilities should still be around today?
@csdx
Spontaneous as in “big bang” not mutations. As for abiogenesis, that is a whole other can of worms.
I think a lot of farming examples are humans playing with “God’s stuff”, but I think the science is great. I just don’t know if we should be planting these crops in such vast quantity and maybe not at all without emergency. It gets rid of biodiversity. Everything in life from my perspective seems to be losing diversity. I will not be surprised if we eventually make a talking horseman if we splice enough DNA:) The hard question for me then will be “Does it have a human soul?”.
As for breeding, and to reference the article, I have never seen a dog give birth to anything but a dog. I have seen tall people, small people, handicap people (one of my struggles with creation along with starvation), and athletic people. They are all still people.
“Also I'd say evolution is observable just like physics, but you seem to ascribe to the micro/macro evolution dichotomy. I've never quite understood that, doesn't one imply the other, and where exactly is the cutoff point?”
That is a good point, but also the problem. I don’t believe the color of my hair or eye’s is evolution in the sense that given enough generations I will develop an exoskeleton. I do believe that our body can “adapt” to amazing things, but I think more often things die. This is why I don’t understand the lack of evidence on earth for all the transitions between species. Without this evidence, and IMHO there should be MILLIONS if not BILLIONS of examples, macro evolution does not hold water for me. I don't accept a few “this might be a monkey human” after they collect bones from a large area. I don’t see how we can conclude that something gradually turned into something else without tons of solid examples. All I have seen are a bunch of extinct animals.
The wiki of conway’s game looks interesting. I will have to give this more thought in how I think this applies to my life.
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AlexOliver
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RobBennett
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"It wouldn't bother me one bit if a public school elementary teacher was fired for teaching intelligent design to impressionable children, not one bit. It incredibly bothers me that people would be fired for citing research in a paper or something else."
Thanks for your response, Alex. I appreciate the significance of the distinction you are making.
Rob
Thanks for your response, Alex. I appreciate the significance of the distinction you are making.
Rob
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RobBennett
- Posts: 120
- Joined: Wed Aug 11, 2010 8:09 pm
- Contact:
"I think how the Catholic faith has adopted evolution to be insane"
I am a Catholic. My understanding is that Catholics are permitted to believe in evolution or not, as they see fit; there is no Church dogma on this question. A Catholic must believe that God created man. But there is no dogma on how this was done (so far as I know).
It might be that you are making reference here to some statements that were made by Pope John Paul II that acknowledged the validity of the evolution theory (I think that is generally what they did, I have not studied the actual words of the statements). The Pope was not speaking infallibly when he made these statements. So Catholics are not required to agree with them (at least that's my understanding). It is certainly a significant event for the Pope to have made these statements and it could be that over time the tradition of the Church will move closer and closer to a pro-evolution position (that's certainly the trend, given the statements). But my understanding is that this is not written in stone; my sense of things is that it is still possible that there could be a reversal.
The big picture here (again, this is according to my limited understanding, I am certainly no expert) is that the Catholic Church has never gotten too hung up in either direction re the evolution question. I think it might be more of a bigger deal to fundamentalists because of their focus on the Bible. Catholics read the Bible and believe that it is inspired by God but it is not given nearly as much stress. So we don't tend to worry so much about whether certain passages are literally true or not.
I personally don't have any concern about evolution being proven true or being proven false. I am glad that people on both sides are studying things and trying to figure things out. I wish them all luck and I think they are helping us all out with their efforts.
"but I am not Catholic and most Christians would not call me a practicing Christian because I like to down a few…too many:) "
I grew up with a lot of Irish Catholics. I think it could be said of a good number of them that "downing a few too many" counts in their minds as the eight sacrament! I have a funny feeling that it wasn't Catholics were were primarily responsible for Prohibition. Some would argue that, if you are a Catholic, you HAVE to drink to have any real hope of making it through the day!
Rob
I am a Catholic. My understanding is that Catholics are permitted to believe in evolution or not, as they see fit; there is no Church dogma on this question. A Catholic must believe that God created man. But there is no dogma on how this was done (so far as I know).
It might be that you are making reference here to some statements that were made by Pope John Paul II that acknowledged the validity of the evolution theory (I think that is generally what they did, I have not studied the actual words of the statements). The Pope was not speaking infallibly when he made these statements. So Catholics are not required to agree with them (at least that's my understanding). It is certainly a significant event for the Pope to have made these statements and it could be that over time the tradition of the Church will move closer and closer to a pro-evolution position (that's certainly the trend, given the statements). But my understanding is that this is not written in stone; my sense of things is that it is still possible that there could be a reversal.
The big picture here (again, this is according to my limited understanding, I am certainly no expert) is that the Catholic Church has never gotten too hung up in either direction re the evolution question. I think it might be more of a bigger deal to fundamentalists because of their focus on the Bible. Catholics read the Bible and believe that it is inspired by God but it is not given nearly as much stress. So we don't tend to worry so much about whether certain passages are literally true or not.
I personally don't have any concern about evolution being proven true or being proven false. I am glad that people on both sides are studying things and trying to figure things out. I wish them all luck and I think they are helping us all out with their efforts.
"but I am not Catholic and most Christians would not call me a practicing Christian because I like to down a few…too many:) "
I grew up with a lot of Irish Catholics. I think it could be said of a good number of them that "downing a few too many" counts in their minds as the eight sacrament! I have a funny feeling that it wasn't Catholics were were primarily responsible for Prohibition. Some would argue that, if you are a Catholic, you HAVE to drink to have any real hope of making it through the day!
Rob
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George the original one
- Posts: 5406
- Joined: Wed Jul 28, 2010 3:28 am
- Location: Wettest corner of Orygun
@The Dude - not sure what this has to do with ERE, but, I'll respond to your original post:
* I am an atheist raised in a Methodist family (maternal greatgrandfather was a missionary to China). By 4th grade, I was definitely atheist... it was the selfrealization that I was in charge of my own life and I don't need to lay any blame/direction/fate to a supernatural being. "All I really need to know I learned in kindergarten" pretty well sums up my awakening to atheism.
* I find evolution (& geological time scales) best fits facts, far better than what is in the bible. Some of what you're looking for in transitional species isn't going to be found in the fossil record as genetic mutations can make a rather on/off appearance: scale/feather/hair is a well-documented example.
* I can't raise any enthusiasm for ID or Creationism as they both have roots in the Judea-Christian-Islamic faith and use nothing from the other faiths (e.g. Hindu, Budist, Native North American, Aztec, Inca, Zulu, Northern European, etc. cultural religions). Thus, to me, it is a thinly veiled attempt to pass on one particular religion's view over other religions.
* I am an atheist raised in a Methodist family (maternal greatgrandfather was a missionary to China). By 4th grade, I was definitely atheist... it was the selfrealization that I was in charge of my own life and I don't need to lay any blame/direction/fate to a supernatural being. "All I really need to know I learned in kindergarten" pretty well sums up my awakening to atheism.
* I find evolution (& geological time scales) best fits facts, far better than what is in the bible. Some of what you're looking for in transitional species isn't going to be found in the fossil record as genetic mutations can make a rather on/off appearance: scale/feather/hair is a well-documented example.
* I can't raise any enthusiasm for ID or Creationism as they both have roots in the Judea-Christian-Islamic faith and use nothing from the other faiths (e.g. Hindu, Budist, Native North American, Aztec, Inca, Zulu, Northern European, etc. cultural religions). Thus, to me, it is a thinly veiled attempt to pass on one particular religion's view over other religions.
@ George
"The Dude - not sure what this has to do with ERE"
Awwww. I like you (and all the rest of you) too much to continue all this for my own benefit if this is annoying people.
In answer to the statement, not too much, but some people choose to make religion or charity their lifetime goals. Others give all their possessions away at points in their lives because of extreme belief (my parents did this and became missionairies. We lived in a converted school bus at this point in their lives. I like to think this would qualify as minimalist and non materialistic).
I tend to post a lot of irrelevant topics because I have a sense of community here and I think in terms of a lot philosophical topics and interests. If my brain farts on this are too far off posting this topic then I will call this to an end on my part unless people have questions for me. I was just curious what convinced people.
"The Dude - not sure what this has to do with ERE"
Awwww. I like you (and all the rest of you) too much to continue all this for my own benefit if this is annoying people.
In answer to the statement, not too much, but some people choose to make religion or charity their lifetime goals. Others give all their possessions away at points in their lives because of extreme belief (my parents did this and became missionairies. We lived in a converted school bus at this point in their lives. I like to think this would qualify as minimalist and non materialistic).
I tend to post a lot of irrelevant topics because I have a sense of community here and I think in terms of a lot philosophical topics and interests. If my brain farts on this are too far off posting this topic then I will call this to an end on my part unless people have questions for me. I was just curious what convinced people.
@TheDude
"no animals can communicate using human speech"
I suppose our brain, our speech and our linguistic capabilities evolved over time and in the beginning there wasn’t more than simple grunts.
Animals can also communicate in complex ways, it doesn’t happen to all species, but some end up being better suited to it. Example some birds have complex whistling skillz http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/20 ... 125101.htm
So I can imagine that someday there have been pre-humans who were a bit better at some the necessary characteristics to develop something slighly more complex than simple grunts.
Language and intelligence probably stimulate eachother a lot, so they may have gotten increasingly better at it in later generations.
It seems logical that the more specialised we got in human language, the less other species were compatible with our way of communicating.
But a number of animals have learned to somewhat use human speech anyway. Though generally they have an extremely limited vocabulary.
Most just seem to “parrot” words without understanding them, but others can be taught to understand a very limited subset of human language (dolphins), and some (esp. birds) seem to be capable of using some human language somewhat intelligently.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talking_bird
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talking_animal
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human-animal_communication
I suppose animals in general lack the required vocal abilities, intelligence and human-specific brain circuits to master human language. But if you’d create a breeding program with super-intelligent talking parrots, combined with language training, I bet they’d be able to have pretty good conversations after many hundred thousands of years.
"I will not be surprised if we eventually make a talking horseman if we splice enough DNA:) The hard question for me then will be “Does it have a human soul?”."
I’m rather sceptical to the existance of souls.
"As for breeding, and to reference the article, I have never seen a dog give birth to anything but a dog."
Me neither. But you’ve only given the dog a number of months to produce a puppy. Maybe if you give it millions of years there will be so many mutations and variations that there will be very little resemblance with what we call a dog and the result won’t be able to breed with dogs anymore.
From the Wikipedia page on speciation:
“One example of natural speciation is the diversity of the three-spined stickleback, a marine fish that, after the last ice age, has undergone speciation into new freshwater colonies in isolated lakes and streams. Over an estimated 10,000 generations, the sticklebacks show structural differences that are greater than those seen between different genera of fish including variations in fins, changes in the number or size of their bony plates, variable jaw structure, and color differences.” (Kingsley, D.M. (January 2009) "From Atoms to Traits," Scientific American, p. 57)
There’s also allopatric speciation, during which a population is split geographically , for example because of geographic changes, and becomes so dissimilar that they are reproductively isolated and are no longer capable of exchanging genes: “Island genetics, the tendency of small, isolated genetic pools to produce unusual traits, has been observed in many circumstances, including insular dwarfism and the radical changes among certain famous island chains, for example on Komodo. The Galápagos islands are particularly famous for their influence on Charles Darwin. During his five weeks there he heard that Galápagos tortoises could be identified by island, and noticed that Mockingbirds differed from one island to another, but it was only nine months later that he reflected that such facts could show that species were changeable. When he returned to England, his speculation on evolution deepened after experts informed him that these were separate species, not just varieties, and famously that other differing Galápagos birds were all species of finches. Though the finches were less important for Darwin, more recent research has shown the birds now known as Darwin's finches to be a classic case of adaptive evolutionary radiation.” (Frank J. Sulloway (1982). "The Beagle collections of Darwin's finches (Geospizinae)". Bulletin of the British Museum (Natural History) Zoology Series 43 (2): 49–58.)
Etc.
"I don’t understand the lack of evidence on earth for all the transitions between species. Without this evidence, and IMHO there should be MILLIONS if not BILLIONS of examples, macro evolution does not hold water for me."
Billions of humans live on the earth nowadays. While there have been many generations of humans and pre-human beings in the past, they probably weren’t very numerous.
Also, they didn’t exactly put their skeletons in storage for posterity. I can imagine that after millions of years, on a planet that is subject to important geological changes, not much is preserved in recognizable shape near the surface of the planet and sufficiently abundant to be found and identified.
I sometimes wonder what future civilisations (if any) will think about the way we lived. We tend to completely demolish buildings before we build others. They won’t find the information that hasn’t been stored on a durable form of hard copy. They would find some stuff, but would probably complain that much is missing.
"I don’t see how we can conclude that something gradually turned into something else without tons of solid examples."
Well the above examples from wikipedia are already something. Maybe our scientists can dig up better answers.
I’m sorry to say that I’m not holding my breath for tons of solid evidence from the other camp.
Not hoping to convince you, but couldn't resist trying to answer.
"no animals can communicate using human speech"
I suppose our brain, our speech and our linguistic capabilities evolved over time and in the beginning there wasn’t more than simple grunts.
Animals can also communicate in complex ways, it doesn’t happen to all species, but some end up being better suited to it. Example some birds have complex whistling skillz http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/20 ... 125101.htm
So I can imagine that someday there have been pre-humans who were a bit better at some the necessary characteristics to develop something slighly more complex than simple grunts.
Language and intelligence probably stimulate eachother a lot, so they may have gotten increasingly better at it in later generations.
It seems logical that the more specialised we got in human language, the less other species were compatible with our way of communicating.
But a number of animals have learned to somewhat use human speech anyway. Though generally they have an extremely limited vocabulary.
Most just seem to “parrot” words without understanding them, but others can be taught to understand a very limited subset of human language (dolphins), and some (esp. birds) seem to be capable of using some human language somewhat intelligently.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talking_bird
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talking_animal
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human-animal_communication
I suppose animals in general lack the required vocal abilities, intelligence and human-specific brain circuits to master human language. But if you’d create a breeding program with super-intelligent talking parrots, combined with language training, I bet they’d be able to have pretty good conversations after many hundred thousands of years.
"I will not be surprised if we eventually make a talking horseman if we splice enough DNA:) The hard question for me then will be “Does it have a human soul?”."
I’m rather sceptical to the existance of souls.
"As for breeding, and to reference the article, I have never seen a dog give birth to anything but a dog."
Me neither.
But you’ve only given the dog a number of months to produce a puppy. Maybe if you give it millions of years there will be so many mutations and variations that there will be very little resemblance with what we call a dog and the result won’t be able to breed with dogs anymore.From the Wikipedia page on speciation:
“One example of natural speciation is the diversity of the three-spined stickleback, a marine fish that, after the last ice age, has undergone speciation into new freshwater colonies in isolated lakes and streams. Over an estimated 10,000 generations, the sticklebacks show structural differences that are greater than those seen between different genera of fish including variations in fins, changes in the number or size of their bony plates, variable jaw structure, and color differences.” (Kingsley, D.M. (January 2009) "From Atoms to Traits," Scientific American, p. 57)
There’s also allopatric speciation, during which a population is split geographically , for example because of geographic changes, and becomes so dissimilar that they are reproductively isolated and are no longer capable of exchanging genes: “Island genetics, the tendency of small, isolated genetic pools to produce unusual traits, has been observed in many circumstances, including insular dwarfism and the radical changes among certain famous island chains, for example on Komodo. The Galápagos islands are particularly famous for their influence on Charles Darwin. During his five weeks there he heard that Galápagos tortoises could be identified by island, and noticed that Mockingbirds differed from one island to another, but it was only nine months later that he reflected that such facts could show that species were changeable. When he returned to England, his speculation on evolution deepened after experts informed him that these were separate species, not just varieties, and famously that other differing Galápagos birds were all species of finches. Though the finches were less important for Darwin, more recent research has shown the birds now known as Darwin's finches to be a classic case of adaptive evolutionary radiation.” (Frank J. Sulloway (1982). "The Beagle collections of Darwin's finches (Geospizinae)". Bulletin of the British Museum (Natural History) Zoology Series 43 (2): 49–58.)
Etc.
"I don’t understand the lack of evidence on earth for all the transitions between species. Without this evidence, and IMHO there should be MILLIONS if not BILLIONS of examples, macro evolution does not hold water for me."
Billions of humans live on the earth nowadays. While there have been many generations of humans and pre-human beings in the past, they probably weren’t very numerous.
Also, they didn’t exactly put their skeletons in storage for posterity. I can imagine that after millions of years, on a planet that is subject to important geological changes, not much is preserved in recognizable shape near the surface of the planet and sufficiently abundant to be found and identified.
I sometimes wonder what future civilisations (if any) will think about the way we lived. We tend to completely demolish buildings before we build others. They won’t find the information that hasn’t been stored on a durable form of hard copy. They would find some stuff, but would probably complain that much is missing.
"I don’t see how we can conclude that something gradually turned into something else without tons of solid examples."
Well the above examples from wikipedia are already something. Maybe our scientists can dig up better answers.
I’m sorry to say that I’m not holding my breath for tons of solid evidence from the other camp.
Not hoping to convince you, but couldn't resist trying to answer.
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jacob
- Site Admin
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"I sometimes wonder what future civilisations (if any) will think about the way we lived. We tend to completely demolish buildings before we build others. They won’t find the information that hasn’t been stored on a durable form of hard copy. They would find some stuff, but would probably complain that much is missing."
Enter the toilet bowl theory. One thing our civilization has are sealed landfills. These environments are anaerobic and thus nothing lives there. Researchers have for decades old viable hotdogs in landfills. How's that for preservatives. Now, we build most of our junk out of plastic and wood rather than stone, but we do build some things out of ceramics. The biggest things which are widely build happens to be toilet bowls. They are very hard to break too and will probably survive our civilization.
What conclusions one may draw from a civilization who built so many of these objects I don't know.
Enter the toilet bowl theory. One thing our civilization has are sealed landfills. These environments are anaerobic and thus nothing lives there. Researchers have for decades old viable hotdogs in landfills. How's that for preservatives. Now, we build most of our junk out of plastic and wood rather than stone, but we do build some things out of ceramics. The biggest things which are widely build happens to be toilet bowls. They are very hard to break too and will probably survive our civilization.
What conclusions one may draw from a civilization who built so many of these objects I don't know.
@TheDude
"no animals can communicate using human speech"
From a ny times article:
"Of the 20,000 genes in the human genome, few are more fascinating than FOXP2, a gene that underlies the faculty of human speech.
All animals have an FOXP2 gene, but the human version’s product differs at just 2 of its 740 units from that of chimpanzees, suggesting that this tiny evolutionary fix may hold the key to why people can speak and chimps cannot."
"no animals can communicate using human speech"
From a ny times article:
"Of the 20,000 genes in the human genome, few are more fascinating than FOXP2, a gene that underlies the faculty of human speech.
All animals have an FOXP2 gene, but the human version’s product differs at just 2 of its 740 units from that of chimpanzees, suggesting that this tiny evolutionary fix may hold the key to why people can speak and chimps cannot."
@TheDude
"no animals can communicate using human speech"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R6KvPN_W ... re=related
From Wikipedia
"he could identify 50 different objects and recognize quantities up to six; that he could distinguish seven colors and five shapes, and understand the concepts of "bigger", "smaller", "same", and "different", and that he was learning "over" and "under"."
http://www.nytimes.com/1999/10/09/arts/ ... abstract=1
"no animals can communicate using human speech"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R6KvPN_W ... re=related
From Wikipedia
"he could identify 50 different objects and recognize quantities up to six; that he could distinguish seven colors and five shapes, and understand the concepts of "bigger", "smaller", "same", and "different", and that he was learning "over" and "under"."
http://www.nytimes.com/1999/10/09/arts/ ... abstract=1
@The Dude
Firstly, I think you might have a mistaken impression about just how rare fossilization is. The dinosaurs (as an entire group) roamed the earth for several hundred million years, and how many fossils total have we excavated? Put it this way, according to a quick google search about 30-50 incomplete (where that may mean down to a single bone fragment) T-Rex's have been found. And T-Rex lived for an estimated 2 million years. Fossilization is a very rare event, so finding every permutation, especially of unsuccessful mutations which may not even survive a generation is vanishingly unlikely. Even then with such a small sample size I doubt we can truly say that what we have isn't one of those variations.
"This is why I don’t understand the lack of evidence on earth for all the transitions between species. "
I'm not sure how discrete a piece you're looking for though? Things do die out, and sometimes even because they've changed into new species. I'm not sure I understand the question, to me it's like asking 'why aren't my great-grandparents still around?'. Or saying "well, I see my grandparents, and parents, but I don't see the transitions connecting me to them, just a bunch of discrete generations".
To you, what would a 'transitional' fossil have to look like to convince you? I recall seeing an exhibit of horse skulls lined up and showing a clear progression from a small deer like creature to the modern horse. There were maybe 10 or so spanning several million years. Is that something like what you'd look for just more discrete? Or do you mean more evolutionary dead ends, failed mutations and the like?
To the failed mutation case, I think that is generally addressed by the general rarity of fossils. Furthermore, fossils are very incomplete records of an animal. For starters none of the soft tissue is preserved. Think of how many genetic defects occur in humans that would be invisible to someone just studying our fossilized bones.
As to the dogs: There is at least sub-speciation. Mating a chihuahua and great dane is largely impossible without outside help. There seems no reason to me that two breeds of dogs couldn't keep being selected for so differently that they can no longer interbreed even with artificial help (thus meeting a definition for separate species), heck maybe even start a new genus. I haven't seen it personally, but I hear donkeys can give birth to mules, and have heard of ligers.
Also if your 'big bang' spontaneous isn't abiogenesis, I'm not sure what you mean? (At least your explanation seems to imply you don't equate those two). I don't think anyone is arguing mutations are big and sudden, like you won't grow a carapace overnight, but change can happen given millions of years.
P.S. I enjoy conversing (or typing or whatever) with people through this medium, and don't think that this forum should only be ERE or nothing, and after all there is a specific 'Politics, and other eternal disagreements' category.
@Alex Huh, you're probably correct on the denotation of the word and I should have used representative to be correct. Though I will argue that my sentence is technically correct, though you have to infer that the atheist is a representative.
Firstly, I think you might have a mistaken impression about just how rare fossilization is. The dinosaurs (as an entire group) roamed the earth for several hundred million years, and how many fossils total have we excavated? Put it this way, according to a quick google search about 30-50 incomplete (where that may mean down to a single bone fragment) T-Rex's have been found. And T-Rex lived for an estimated 2 million years. Fossilization is a very rare event, so finding every permutation, especially of unsuccessful mutations which may not even survive a generation is vanishingly unlikely. Even then with such a small sample size I doubt we can truly say that what we have isn't one of those variations.
"This is why I don’t understand the lack of evidence on earth for all the transitions between species. "
I'm not sure how discrete a piece you're looking for though? Things do die out, and sometimes even because they've changed into new species. I'm not sure I understand the question, to me it's like asking 'why aren't my great-grandparents still around?'. Or saying "well, I see my grandparents, and parents, but I don't see the transitions connecting me to them, just a bunch of discrete generations".
To you, what would a 'transitional' fossil have to look like to convince you? I recall seeing an exhibit of horse skulls lined up and showing a clear progression from a small deer like creature to the modern horse. There were maybe 10 or so spanning several million years. Is that something like what you'd look for just more discrete? Or do you mean more evolutionary dead ends, failed mutations and the like?
To the failed mutation case, I think that is generally addressed by the general rarity of fossils. Furthermore, fossils are very incomplete records of an animal. For starters none of the soft tissue is preserved. Think of how many genetic defects occur in humans that would be invisible to someone just studying our fossilized bones.
As to the dogs: There is at least sub-speciation. Mating a chihuahua and great dane is largely impossible without outside help. There seems no reason to me that two breeds of dogs couldn't keep being selected for so differently that they can no longer interbreed even with artificial help (thus meeting a definition for separate species), heck maybe even start a new genus. I haven't seen it personally, but I hear donkeys can give birth to mules, and have heard of ligers.
Also if your 'big bang' spontaneous isn't abiogenesis, I'm not sure what you mean? (At least your explanation seems to imply you don't equate those two). I don't think anyone is arguing mutations are big and sudden, like you won't grow a carapace overnight, but change can happen given millions of years.
P.S. I enjoy conversing (or typing or whatever) with people through this medium, and don't think that this forum should only be ERE or nothing, and after all there is a specific 'Politics, and other eternal disagreements' category.
@Alex Huh, you're probably correct on the denotation of the word and I should have used representative to be correct. Though I will argue that my sentence is technically correct, though you have to infer that the atheist is a representative.
@Thedude
Check out http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/comdesc/ for evidence on macroevolution. They have a lot of information including about transitional forms and speciation.
Check out http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/comdesc/ for evidence on macroevolution. They have a lot of information including about transitional forms and speciation.
@HSpencer
What parts of evolution do you see conflicting with the Bible? The only way I can think that it directly contradicts is if you take the literal interpretation of the Genesis story as the Young Earth Creationists do. Also I'd think you'd have to discard other branches of science (like physics regarding the formation of the Sun and planets) as well?
What parts of evolution do you see conflicting with the Bible? The only way I can think that it directly contradicts is if you take the literal interpretation of the Genesis story as the Young Earth Creationists do. Also I'd think you'd have to discard other branches of science (like physics regarding the formation of the Sun and planets) as well?