Creationist questions evolution

[James R]

On the information question, by the way, Jan, let's consider one more example. Start with that hypothetical snippet of DNA from above:

ATAGTACCT

Suppose that a random mutation changes one "letter" of the code, with the result:

ATAGTATCT

Does this, in your opinion, constitute a loss of information? Let's suppose that the first snippet codes for some useful trait, while the second leads to something that harms the carrier of the gene. Is the mutation then a loss of information?

Now consider an organism that starts with the second sequence. A random mutation, same as before, changes one letter of the code, producing (at random) the first sequence. Note that this process is exactly as likely to occur as the first change, above.

In this second case, if we are to assume that information was lost in the first example mutation, then it seems to me that we are forced to conclude by the same reasoning that information was gained in the second mutation. This would constitute an example of increase in the information content of the genome, according to this picture of what "information" is (which I am not saying I agree with, by the way).

 

[billvon]

Some ancient cell, which just happened to be put together by random processes.

How do you know that?

 

[Dinosaur]

First put one issue beyond the evolution discussion. Evolution does not concern itself with the origin of life.

The facts of evolution are illustrated by the following (as well as by other sets of fossils).

A set of related fossils starting with Eohippus & ending with the modern horse.

A set of related fossils starting with an early primate & ending with modern Homo Sapiens.
​

Darwinian-like evolution provides an excellent explanation for those two sets of fossils.

To refute Darwinian evolution, one must provide a better explanation for the above facts.

Such an explanation could be called Creationist Theory of Evolution Facts.​

 

[DaveC426913]

There should be a couple of givens here that have been touched on, but maybe bear repeating.

1] Evolution - the change of species over time, and its heritability - is fact. It is irrefutable, most notably because it is easily demonstrated, today, in real time, with nothing but basic pet-keeping equipment - by anyone who wishes to do so. Any dog breeder or fish breeder can demonstrate that, if individuals with certain traits are given the opportunity to breed, their offspring will tend to have those traits to some degree - and will pass those traits to their offspring. This process can be repeated until you have a new strain of individuals that are unlike the original.

2] What can be disputed is the mechanism for that selection. Darwinian evolution is an explanation for natural selection as the mechanism for evolution - specifically, the environmental and competitive drivers in the wild that result in some individuals having better success at breeding than others. Evolution by natural selection is the theory.

If Jan et al has a problem with that so far, then we have a much more fundamental discussion on our hands, and there is no point in moving forward without settling it.

Can we agree then that the core of this discussion is natural selection?

 

[Jan Ardena]

First, I have to ask: do you make a distinction between what you call "Darwinian evolution" and just plain vanilla "evolution"?

Come on James, you know what is meant by Darwinian evolution, means.

I’m not going back over that.

Which parts of Darwin's ideas do you leave out of the picture?

The idea that one kind of animals turns into a completely different kind of animal (a dog to a whale).

Take natural selection, for example. Do you accept that as a mechanism for evolution.

I accept natutural selection occurs.

My main point of contention is massive changes like dog types into whales.

Jan.

 

[DaveC426913]

... you know what is meant by Darwinian evolution...

Your own post, on the other hand, indicates that you do not.

The idea that one kind of animals turns into a completely different kind of animal (a dog to a whale).

My main point of contention is massive changes like dog types into whales.

This is an alarming misconception. There is no such idea, except in the minds of those ignorant about evolution.

Dogs and whales evolved from a common (terrestrial, mammalian) ancestor that was neither dog nor whale (nor did dogs or whales exist at the time).

Similar like Scotties and Greyhounds both evolved from a common wolf ancestor that was neither Scottie nor Greyhound (nor did either exist at the time).

When you scale that up by a factor of a thousand (from tens of thousands of years to tens of millions of years) you get divergence so great that they cannot breed together.

In fact, if you kept the lineage of dogs and greyhounds apart long enough, their DNA will be altered so much that they could no longer breed, and they will be defined as distinct species.



I submit that Jan's entire stance on evolution is invalid, as he does not actually know what this 'evolution' thing is, and is merely addressing straw men, born of his own misconceptions.
That's a hard stop.

 

[Jan Ardena]

Your own post, on the other hand, indicates that you do not.

I don’t believe you.

Dogs and whales evolved from a common (terrestrial, mammalian) ancestor that was neither dog nor whale (nor did dogs or whales exist at the time).

Pakicetus, dog...
Same difference in terms of claim.

When you scale that up by a factor of a thousand (from tens of thousands of years to tens of millions of years) you get divergence so great that they cannot breed together.

In fact, if you kept the lineage of dogs and greyhounds apart long enough, their DNA will be altered so much that they could no longer breed, and they will be defined as distinct species.

Has a dog ever produced a non- dog?

I submit that Jan's entire stance on evolution is invalid, as he does not actually know what this 'evolution' thing is, and is merely addressing straw men, born of his own misconceptions.
That's a hard stop.

I submit that you are entitled to your own opinions, as am I.

Jan.

 

[Dinosaur]

Faith is for those who have no evidence to support their views.

It is not a path to knowledge

 

[Xelasnave.1947]

I submit that you are entitled to your own opinions, as am I

Of course you are Jan.
And if evolution worked the way you seem to believe it works I expect most of us would agree with the opinion you present.
But it is clear you attack a straw man, one constructed by those who feel evolution threatens their religious beliefs.
What would help you is firstly not to get your information about evolution from folk who do not understand it and present it as an idea substantialy diffferent to what the theory says.
Secondly to do a little homework so you are working with reality and the limits of the theory.

I agree that a dog cant give birth to a whale or the other way around but that nonsence comes from folk who have no idea as to what the theory presents.

But you see no one has ever claimed such or anything like that.
Name just one proponent of evolution who has said such a thing...no one has and to keep on with saying that makes you look foolish ...I dont want you to appear foolish because some one has lied to you.

We are all giving you the truth.

Look into the idea of common ansestor or really take on board what Dave has tried to explain.

Like we did not come from apes..but we and apes can trace back to a being that we each came from..once you get the crazy notion that the expectation is a whale can give birth to a dog you may see what we are trying to share with you.

Also the thing to remember is that evolutions validity has no bearing on there being a god or not.

Say evolution was proved totally false ... that does not mean..therefore its all in Gods hands.

The problem of proof of God does not turn on evolution being right or wrong.

If you at least distributed your "faith" between the science of today and the scriptures of yesterday you may find a better understanding.

Attacking the believers strawman does you no favours.

Have a great weekend and may your prayers be considered and assigned appropriate priority.
Alex

 

[DaveC426913]

I don’t believe you.

Your example of evolution was a dog evolving into a whale.
That is an egregiously ignorant concept of evolution.

You literally don't know what you are talking about.

For the good of the planet, I forbid you from talking about it further.

 

[iceaura]

Has a dog ever produced a non- dog?

Not yet.
The ancestors of dogs apparently produced seals, after a while (long chain of intermediate beings).

I submit that you are entitled to your own opinions, as am I.

But you are not entitled to your own facts - all your assertions about Darwinian evolutionary theory are false.
You do not know what that theory says, or how it works, or what it is used for. You do not even know how "new information" emerges accordingly, after multiple explanations over years.
You instead embrace misconceptions of a very basic, elementary nature.
Then you use your misconceptions to attack the very process of reasoning from evidence that underlies science, and the people who employ it.
So we see they are not mistaken knowledge, but pretext - which is why you refuse to set them aside for knowledge.

 

[kx000]

Eternalist questions creationist questioning evolution.

 

[Write4U]

Jan Ardena said:
Has a dog ever produced a non- dog?

Has a dog ever produced an identical clone of itself?

There are a few species that do produce clones. The Silvery Salamander is one. All Silvery
Salamanders are female and clones of their mother. That is because the females reject male sperm and only use their own chromosomes in mitosis.
This is why this species does not evolve and is at an evolutionary dead end. We protect them.

Evolution is an incremental process. The problem with creationists is that they believe the earth to be 6000 - 10000 years old which would have demanded that evolution would have to occur in giant, noticeable leaps . But in reality that's not necessary at all.

Life began some 3.5 billion years ago, and that is enough time for the gradual evolution from a self-replicating bio-chemical polymer into a million different expressions of living biological patterns.

Hybrid speciation is a form of speciation where hybridization between two different species leads to a new species, ........

Species name designations for unisexual Ambystoma are no longer in use". Instead, unisexual Ambystoma should be considered distinct biotypes rather than species

http://www.wikiwand.com/en/Hybrid_speciation

There is your silvery salamander (dog) that changed into a different biotype.

Look at how many evolutionary paths resulted in dead-ends? Those were nature's trials that resulted in non-viability and extinction. And of course, there were many natural disasters which killed millions of organisms indiscriminately.

Humans have become God to the Silvery Salamander. There are a few dozen specimen left in a few well identified ponds and protected from possible mass extinction because all clones have identical
vulnerabilities to say, a single bacteria.

There is an extremely limited population of the salamanders in Vermilion County, Illinois with only one remaining natural population known

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silvery_salamander

 

[billvon]

The idea that one kind of animals turns into a completely different kind of animal (a dog to a whale).

1) They are not completely different kinds of animals. They are both mammals. They both have a very similar skeletal structure; the differences are in size, not construction. Their DNA is quite close.

2) It was not "a dog to a whale." It is that dogs and whales shared an ancestor.

3) We have "force evolved" (bred) wolves into chihuauas; created water dogs almost as happy in the water as they are on land. And that's in only 15,000 years. Can you really not get your mind around the fact that a time period 3000x as long could make even bigger changes?

I accept natutural selection occurs.

If you accept that natural selection occurs, and that random mutations cause heritable changes in an organism, then you have accepted Darwininan evolution.

My main point of contention is massive changes like dog types into whales.

Small time periods lead to small changes. Large time periods lead to large changes. Pretty simple.

Believing one but not the other is like believing microerosion (i.e. a road washes out in a storm) but not macroerosion (i.e. the Grand Canyon.)

 

[billvon]

Has a dog ever produced a non- dog?

Look at any Chihuahua. It is well on its way to being a non-dog. Another 15,000 years and you'd have something that could not interbreed with other dogs i.e. a new species.

Or look at these organisms which have all evolved into new species as we have watched:

Evening Primrose (Oenothera gigas)
Kew Primrose (Primula kewensis)
Raphanobrassica
Hemp Nettle (Galeopsis tetrahit)
Madia citrigracilis
Brassica
Maidenhair Fern (Adiantum pedatum)
Woodsia Fern (Woodsia abbeae)
Stephanomeira malheurensis
Yellow Monkey Flower (Mimulus guttatus)
Fruit fly (Drosophila paulistorum)

 

[DaveC426913]

(5:1 odds Jan simply ignores all these examples and tries to change the subject.)

Jan, I'd like to hear where you heard that dogs supposedly change into whales. No evolutionary scientist has ever suggested such a notion.

 

[DaveC426913]

It might be interesting to hear Jan's interpretation of the fact that whales

- though having no hind legs at all - still have the same bones of their ancestors - femur, tibia and knee joint of a quadroped mammal.

- though only having jointless and fingerless pectoral fins - retain all the tarsal, digital and knuckle bones and muscles of a four-fingered mammal.

(But Jan doesn't know about that. Because Jan hasn't done his homework.)

 

[DaveC426913]

Likewise, it would be interesting to hear Jan explain why snakes have leg bones, despite not having legs.

 

[Write4U]

Likewise, it would be interesting to hear Jan explain why snakes have leg bones, despite not having legs.

Genetic remnants.

 

[Xelasnave.1947]

I dont think it is useful to force Jan into a defensive position but rather give him the opportunity to first realise that he needs to get rid of the stawman.

It will be hard for him to accept our help if we keep attacking...ones normal response will have Jan defending stuff he may well not if given time free of attack to think it through.

Lets face it the way it seems believers are told how evolution works would have us raising the same objections raised by Jan.

Jan is a very intelligent person and given breathing space should realise the straw man does have problems but the strawman is not evolution.

Ad as I said before evolution ( not the strawman) being true or not has no bearing on the existence of god.
Maybe God has inspired scientists to understand evolution so as to reveal how he has "created" all the species.

And if there is a God wouldnt he show us more than the bronze age folk now that we can use evidence to support his plan to get things done via evolution☺.

If Jan must fit evolution into a 6000 year time frame he wont be able to come to grips...time and lots of it is the key.

If he is prepared to go with our modern dating and available time for evolution it should be easy for him to accept and embrace the concept.

If he is stuck with only 6000 years evolution can never seem correct for him.

All I am trying to say is that for any of it to sink in perhaps we determine if Jan can embrace the time frame given by science as if he cant accept that time frame he will be stuck with his straw man and the snakes hidden legs etc he will have to reject ignore sidestep etc. But at least we will understand why he must reject evolution and go with the strawman.

What is so interesting is how each critter has a general lay out in common with most other critters..body arms legs fingers..all the same just different sizes ... the snake even has its legs...its as though there was a general design that could be altered to produce different but similar critters simply by adjusting the basic design...hope that helps☺
Alex