Richard Dawkins vs Wendy Wright

John99 said:
Can you prove that wrong?
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I see that:

"I assume you question the validity of evolution."

Was correct.

Then there is no sense in pretending.

You will not accept the time line of mammalian evolution, so what is the point in discussing it any further.

I can not present the physical evidence to you. You will need to educate yourself and determine if it is acceptable to you or not.

But for what it's worth here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evolution_of_mammals

"These changes forced the Mesozoic mammaliforms ("nearly mammals") into nocturnal niches, and may have contributed greatly to the development of mammalian traits such as endothermy, hair and a large brain"


"The first clear evidence of hair or fur is in fossils of Castorocauda, from 164M years ago in the mid Jurassic."
 
pappl, let me ask you a question:

Why is it that technology has advanced so quickly in the past 100 years or so? Whereas technological ability was displayed over 1000 years ago but under 10K years ago not much seemed to have happened. What happened in those millions of years?

IF we were to accept your timeline of human existence.

Edit: I say...way under 10K years.
 
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spidergoat said:
Look at the evidence. We know apes use stones as tools. In early homonid settlements we find the first chipped stone tools. Later on we find representative symbols and pictures, later on we find more advanced artifacts. It shows a progression in intelligence. This is mirrored in brain structure, size and complexity.
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So you are saying that human brains were different?...or could this be due to technological breakthroughs?

Meanwhile we looked identical to what we look like now. Although i agree size of brain is not an indication of intellectual ability. I see small fish with brains the size of the tip of a match stick that have intellect on par with MUCH larger brained animals. I think a small fish is equivalent to a monkey in terms of learning ability but look at the difference in the size of their brains.

Disadvantages:

Fish live in water which makes human interaction very difficult and they dnt have hands.
 
The question is:

You take a fish in an aquarium, there is a layer of glass separating you from them can you communicate with thie fish telepathically through the glass or does the glass block the communication?
 
Well done John99. I have found your posts here at SF to be meaningless drivel on several occasions, and now, reading this, my mind is made up. You're going on my ignore list, because your posts are an infuriating waste of time.

Jpappl has asked you a simple question, and you've been dishonest in your response.
 
phlogistician said:
Jpappl has asked you a simple question, and you've been dishonest in your response.
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He is wrong about the "canine teeth". No one uses those to break through harder surfaces or tear through raw meat. If you look at someone biting another person they use the front teeth. I answered this repeatedly and i dont see any reason to change my response. TBH, those teeth are almost useless.


Also, animals dont even use those teeth for breaking raw meat (which is what he said) they use the fornt teeth. I see no relation although an animal like a wolf can use them to hook an arm or leg and not let go but what does this have to di in relation to humans is what i am asking.

Now the question is: are you saying that humans had jaws that were elongated like those we see in canines and they use those teeth to capture and immobilize prey? Do you have evidence for this?
 
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John99 said:
So you are saying that human brains were different?...or could this be due to technological breakthroughs?

Meanwhile we looked identical to what we look like now. Although i agree size of brain is not an indication of intellectual ability. I see small fish with brains the size of the tip of a match stick that have intellect on par with MUCH larger brained animals. I think a small fish is equivalent to a monkey in terms of learning ability but look at the difference in the size of their brains.

Disadvantages:

Fish live in water which makes human interaction very difficult and they dnt have hands.
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Yes, hominid brains were different than modern human brains. Also, there were certain key differences in their hands, which gradually became altered to where we can now grasp a stick and throw things. Apes cannot do this with the same effectiveness due to a particular bone in the wrist.
 
John99,

“ Originally Posted by phlogistician
Jpappl has asked you a simple question, and you've been dishonest in your response. ”

He is wrong about the "canine teeth". No one uses those to break through harder surfaces or tear through raw meat. If you look at someone biting another person they use the front teeth. I answered this repeatedly and i dont see any reason to change my response. TBH, those teeth are almost useless.
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You have completely mis-understood everything that I said. But now that I see that you are completely confused all is not lost.

I will explain again below.

Also, animals dont even use those teeth for breaking raw meat (which is what he said) they use the fornt teeth. I see no relation although an animal like a wolf can use them to hook an arm or leg and not let go but what does this have to di in relation to humans is what i am asking.
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That is not what I said and also has nothing to do with my question.

However, animals do use canine teeth for gripping, holding and tearing into another animals flesh. Large canines in these animals are a dangerous weapon obviously.

Now the question is: are you saying that humans had jaws that were elongated like those we see in canines and they use those teeth to capture and immobilize prey? Do you have evidence for this?
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No not at all, way off. See below. Please read and comprehend.

The point that I was making and the question raised is.

There is evidence of humans cooking their food for at least around 150,000 years and could be much older. Time will tell.

At this point we absolutely are in a trend to no longer need large canines for holding and tearing at raw flesh. We may still use them for other purposes like dominance and mating.

Over time, the need for these specific teeth has gone away in humans and that need has steadily gone down over the last 150,000 years at least.

So the question is why do we have them ?

The only logical answer is that they are left over from a time of real need, there is no evolutionary reason to get rid of them but there is no evolutionary reason for them to be large either.

So you may not believe that humans evolved from a lower species but what is the alternative to this explanation. IE that we evolved and that is why we still have our canines, we are part of the mammalian family who have canines.

Reverse this and my point is made.

If you believe that god created us within the last 10,000 years or if you believe aliens planted us here or that we are aliens from another planet.

WHY THE F DO WE HAVE CANINES ?

The answer: WE WOULDN'T

Do you get it now ?

Do you have a logical alternative answer ?

TBH, those teeth are almost useless.
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Is about as close to answering my question so far. By accident.
 
John99 said:
pappl, let me ask you a question:

Why is it that technology has advanced so quickly in the past 100 years or so? Whereas technological ability was displayed over 1000 years ago but under 10K years ago not much seemed to have happened. What happened in those millions of years?

IF we were to accept your timeline of human existence.

Edit: I say...way under 10K years.
Click to expand...

This question is almost unanswerable because it is so convoluted.

It appears you are asking why tech has evolved so much more in the past 100 then in the previous 1000 and more than 10,000 years before that and 1 million before that.

If that is the statement then I would agree. It's taken a long time to get to where we are and now the ability to advance even farther, faster is in place because all of the building blocks are there for it to happen.

It didn't happen by accident. People have systematically advanced knowledge in a variety of fields and as the knowledge base grows the opportunities for advancement are there.

If that doesn't answer the question then re-phrase it.
 
John, on technology, why not take into consideration that if it was left to religion there would be no Science, their would be no Scholars as everything would be accepted as being put here by a higher being.

The only way the world would therefore be would be how religion had dictated it and to be perfectly honest people would outgrow this eventually anyway since it's so naive.
 
I've come to the conclusion that any discussion with John99 comes under the heading of Einstein's dictum that 'insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result".

There is no rationality there.
 
Stryder said:
John, on technology, why not take into consideration that if it was left to religion there would be no Science, their would be no Scholars as everything would be accepted as being put here by a higher being.

The only way the world would therefore be would be how religion had dictated it and to be perfectly honest people would outgrow this eventually anyway since it's so naive.
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Stryder, my resposes are not based on religion. I admit that if you look at fish, as an example, you see a closer resemblance amongst species and yet they are different. could be color, a stripe or bump etc. It does seem logical that these changes would occur over time and then consider the number of these changes is very high but consistent amongst the various species.
 
jpappl said:
This question is almost unanswerable because it is so convoluted.

It appears you are asking why tech has evolved so much more in the past 100 then in the previous 1000 and more than 10,000 years before that and 1 million before that.

If that is the statement then I would agree. It's taken a long time to get to where we are and now the ability to advance even farther, faster is in place because all of the building blocks are there for it to happen.

It didn't happen by accident. People have systematically advanced knowledge in a variety of fields and as the knowledge base grows the opportunities for advancement are there.

If that doesn't answer the question then re-phrase it.
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Its not convuloted. When did humans first appear on the planet?
 
spidergoat said:
Yes, hominid brains were different than modern human brains. Also, there were certain key differences in their hands, which gradually became altered to where we can now grasp a stick and throw things. Apes cannot do this with the same effectiveness due to a particular bone in the wrist.
Click to expand...

Fascinating. So Apes are actually obsolete.
 
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