# Creation vs. Evolution **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [June 27, 2003, 9:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/creation-vs-evolution/184854 "2003-06-27T21:22:08Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![MrVisible](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/46a35a/32.png) [@MrVisible](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrVisible)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2003, 7:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/creation-vs-evolution/184854/41 "2003-06-28T19:58:16Z")
I think one of my favorite events on the SDMB is the moment that **Ben** posts to a creation versus evolution argument. It’s like seeing Superman appear in the sky. It’s the only reason I read any of these threads anymore. ---
**Author:** ![Joe\_Random](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e8c25b/32.png) [@Joe\_Random](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Joe_Random)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2003, 7:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/creation-vs-evolution/184854/42 "2003-06-28T19:58:49Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Nomadic\_One \* > \*\*I look at the evolution side just as often as I look at the Creationism side, if not more. \*\* I find that very difficult to believe, seeing as you don’t even see to know what evolution _is_. If you have actually looked at the evolution side, then why did you bother to mention the Big Bang, which, as you would hve to know, has _nothing_ to do with evolution? ---
**Author:** ![Meatros](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b4bc9f/32.png) [@Meatros](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Meatros)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2003, 8:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/creation-vs-evolution/184854/43 "2003-06-28T20:46:15Z")
[QUOTE] \*Originally posted by Tinker Grey \* \*\*In the interest of “stamping out ignorance”, from the link provided by Meatros, the first page of the [preface](http://www.literature.org/authors/darwin-charles/the-origin-of-species/preface.html) show the complete title as > [@](#): > > \*\* :smack: Whups, I was a bit tired, last night, and not thinking altogether clearly. ---
**Author:** ![Meatros](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b4bc9f/32.png) [@Meatros](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Meatros)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2003, 8:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/creation-vs-evolution/184854/44 "2003-06-28T20:54:37Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Nomadic\_One \* > \*\*🙂 Well thank you all for showing your opinions on my post. 🙂 I will try to get to answer the questions but i need to go to work and I need a little more time. First of all I want to say I am a little shocked that no one agreed with me. Usually when I post a topic of this nature on other message boards (there are quite a few) I usually get some pro responses. I find that intriguing. Well please know that I do get both sides of these topics. There are quite a few different creation/evolution messageboards out there, I know that I have at least 15 (or so) bookmarked. > [@](#): > > I have googled this so many times I must be their number one user. 🙂 And this isnt just the conservative side of the issue I look at the evolution side just as often as I look at the Creationism side, if not more. At this time you will be thinking …man that kid is really ignorant or blind. I try not to be. I may have come off a bit…harsh, but I don’t really think you are generally ignorant, I just think you are misinformed. I’ve heard (and I’m sure many others have also heard) the gist of your post before. Now, I haven’t heard the connection between Darwin and Hitler for a long time now and it took me off guard (as you can see by _my_ misinformation). ---
**Author:** ![Ben](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/df788c/32.png) [@Ben](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ben)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2003, 9:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/creation-vs-evolution/184854/45 "2003-06-28T21:12:34Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by MrVisible \* > \*\*I think one of my favorite events on the SDMB is the moment that **Ben** posts to a creation versus evolution argument. It’s like seeing Superman appear in the sky. > > It’s the only reason I read any of these threads anymore. \*\* Ok, now I’m blushing. Masonite, I have the FAQ which explains the questions in detail. I’d very, very much appreciate it if you or anyone else would read it and tell me what parts you did or did not understand, so I can try to make it better suited to the layman. [http://psyche11.home.mindspring.com/ben/WritingIndex.htm](http://psyche11.home.mindspring.com/ben/WritingIndex.htm) I’ve been planning on making more detailed essays on specific issues, like retrogenes, but I’ve been too busy with other things. (Specifically, a page with pictures of human and primate chromosomes side-by-side, so you can see for yourself where different cut, paste, and flip operations took place in human evolution.) For now, let’s focus on retrogenes: When one of your cells takes the information in DNA and makes it into a protein, it first makes a “working copy” in the form of messenger RNA, or mRNA. (This lets the cell keep an “archival copy” in the DNA.) The mRNA is then edited in a number of ways. A string is pasted onto the end which reads “AAAAAAAA”. Genes also normally have intervening sequences called “introns,” which don’t code for any part of the protein. These introns are spliced out of the mRNA. After the editing, the mRNA is sent off to be read by the protein-synthesising machinery. The odd thing is that sometimes you see genes, called _retrogenes,_ that have an “AAAAAAA” on the end, and have no introns. These genes started out as mRNA, but the mRNA was accidentally pasted back into the genome. The evidence for this (other than the obvious similarities between retrogenes and mRNA) is as follows: - retrogenes are flanked by repeat sequences that occur when you splice RNA back into DNA. - retrogenes can be found far from the parent gene. By contrast, the other main mechanism of production of new genes makes two identical genes side-by-side. - retrogenes can be cut short, as if the machinery that was writing them back into the DNA pooped out before it got finished. So what’s the creationist explanation? Why did God create a class of genes which look _exactly like they came from mRNA that was pasted back into the genome?_ ---
**Author:** ![Phoenix\_Dragon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/65b543/32.png) [@Phoenix\_Dragon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Phoenix_Dragon)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2003, 11:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/creation-vs-evolution/184854/46 "2003-06-28T23:53:22Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Apos \* > **Actually, even your account contains bits of the creationist distortion of the truth. No one extrapolated a whole species from a tooth in the way that it is often described. What happened was that the Illustrated London News (a popular newspaper, not a scientific journal) had an artist draw a rendition of early man’s ancestors. But though the story was about the tooth, it WASN’T based on the tooth: it was based on the Java man. And the article even contained the disclaimer that the "reconstruction is merely the expression of an artist’s brilliant imaginative genius.” Even then scientists still criticized it as being misleading, and it was never reprinted until creationists discovered it as a usual PR tool to spin lies about (in their account, they make it sound like “scientists” all conspired to publish a reconstructed picture based solely on the tooth, when in reality, even the tooth wasn’t ever taken all that seriously in the first place.)** Sorry, should have been more clear in my post. The quote I gave about it being impossible to extrapolate a whole species from a tooth was a reply written to the Illustrated London News. I would have put more detail into my post, but it was getting mind-numbingly long enough, already 🙂 The Talk Origins pages have a lot more detail, obviously. ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2003, 12:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/creation-vs-evolution/184854/47 "2003-06-29T00:09:23Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Nomadic\_One \* > \*\*Evolution carries with it an elitist attitude. To an evolutionist, the idea that an almighty God created everything is pure foolishness. False dichotomy combined with straw man - Evolution is not atheism, neither are all people who accept evolution athesits > [@](#): > > -The public school system, -Rather then encouraging students to have an open mind to the world, they teach only one possible solution for our existence. Projection. I think this criticism would be more true of the kind of extreme fundamentalism that is so often associated with creationism. Anyway, keeping an open mind to things that have already been substantially proven false can be quite counterproductive; should we teach our kids that 'some people think 2 plus 2 is 4, but hey, keep an open mind about it!"? > [@](#): > > -The college and university system –The elitist attitude of educrates only gets stronger as one moves to the secular university system. Evolution is more or less universally accepted as their doctrine of choice. reversal of cause and effect; evolution is quite fundamental to biology and genetics, creationism on the other hand, contributes nothing but confusion to the topics (along with geology, astronomy etc…) > [@](#): > > The false concepts and ideas from evolution are used constantly as a marketing tool to target kids, FlavoRite Fruit Snack Boxes, Quaker oatmeal with dinosaur eggs, and many more products in which they are in contact with. Nonsense - kids just like monsters and dinosaurs are great monsters - I can’t see what your point is here, unless you’re trying to claim that dinosaurs never really existed. I’m not even going to try to address the rest of your post (although all of it is of the same cloth) because what you’re doing here is the favourite tactic of spraying multiple, diverse arguments all at once in the hope that the resulting melee leaves the casual observer with the impression that you know what you’re talking about. ---
**Author:** ![Trinopus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/2bfe46/32.png) [@Trinopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trinopus)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2003, 2:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/creation-vs-evolution/184854/48 "2003-06-29T02:04:52Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Mangetout \* > \*\*Projection. I think this criticism would be more true of the kind of extreme fundamentalism that is so often associated with creationism. Anyway, keeping an open mind to things that have already been substantially proven false can be quite counterproductive; should we teach our kids that 'some people think 2 plus 2 is 4, but hey, keep an open mind about it!"? > \*\* In fact, yes… I remember exactly that discussion in fourth grade, as an introduction to “clock arithmetic.” “If someone told you that nine plus four was equal to one, would you say they were right, or wrong?” In other words, the public schools _do_ teach us to keep an open mind regarding other interpretations of the facts. What they _don’t_ do, and should not ever do, is ask us to be so open to every lurid claim made by extremists, as to give up on the primary avenues toward knowlege. (e.g., yes, we _should_ keep an open mind about the possibility of other gunmen in the JFK assassination… But no, we don’t need to pay any attention to the idiots who say that Richard Nixon orchestrated the whole affair!) (I mean, obviously, it was GHW Bush, right?) Trinopus ---
**Author:** ![Nomadic\_One](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/858c86/32.png) [@Nomadic\_One](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nomadic_One)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2003, 3:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/creation-vs-evolution/184854/49 "2003-06-29T03:19:59Z")
Ben its going to take me a while but I am working on answering your questions. ---
**Author:** ![Ben](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/df788c/32.png) [@Ben](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ben)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2003, 3:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/creation-vs-evolution/184854/50 "2003-06-29T03:47:09Z")
Why don’t you just focus on retrogenes for now? ---
**Author:** ![JRDelirious](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jrdelirious/32/9531_2.png) [@JRDelirious](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JRDelirious)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2003, 3:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/creation-vs-evolution/184854/51 "2003-06-29T03:52:46Z")
**Nomadic\_One** , if you’re feeling sort of lonely in your attack on Darwin, may I point you to [this thread](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=194026) (Warning! The OPer on that one believes in posts of thousands of words quoted verbatim from obscure sources! And when using his own words is rude in a kinda half-arsed way) He’s not even a _Christian_ Creationist! 😉 HOWEVER, more seriously, the SDMB **does** contain believers in Creationism, or at the very least in “Intelligent Design”. **But…** , they usually know better than to come up with things so lame as to call upon the 2d Law of Thermodynamics argument (Earth is NOT a closed system) or demanding “the missing link”. They know our followers of the various schools of Evolutionary theory are just too well-prepared. I must respectfully join the earlier comment that your friend Andrew did you no favor at all by equipping you with such an inferior set of tools. If you’re going to stand fast for Creationism because _your_ Faith demands it, **that** is fine with most of us. (BTW that is the attitude of the OP in the quoted thread: “because The Master says so and he has Perfect Knowledge”) And you could then preach it at us until you’re blue in the face, the cows come home, and there is a Constitutional Amendment requiring a President be able to correctly pronounce “nuclear”; complete with any necessary theological/scriptural arguments about requiring a literal reading of the Bible (or Vedas, or Qur’an). But that is **witnessing** , not “debate”. Don’t be fooled into thinking it’s “that simple” to win the _science_ argument. Have fun , JRD ---
**Author:** ![JerseyDiamond](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/8491ac/32.png) [@JerseyDiamond](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JerseyDiamond)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2003, 4:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/creation-vs-evolution/184854/52 "2003-06-29T04:42:17Z")
Ben, I think you would like In the Beginning, by Dr. Walt Brown, Ph.D. Have you read it? I just started, and it’s wonderful. **Nomadic one** , pick that book up, you will like it 🙂 A person at the bookstore I go to just told me about another book to pick up. I can’t think of it right now, but it’s by a MIT professor. I’ll let you know. ---
**Author:** ![JerseyDiamond](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/8491ac/32.png) [@JerseyDiamond](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JerseyDiamond)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2003, 4:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/creation-vs-evolution/184854/53 "2003-06-29T04:44:32Z")
[http://www.creationscience.com/](http://www.creationscience.com/) ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2003, 5:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/creation-vs-evolution/184854/54 "2003-06-29T05:39:30Z")
**JerseyDiamond** , why don’t you actually contribute to the debate instead of linking to religious websites. Pick out a point from that book you like so much and throw it at us. You sound very confident so let us have it. What impresses you so much about Walter brown, Ph.D? (Ph.D. in what, btw?) ---
**Author:** ![JerseyDiamond](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/8491ac/32.png) [@JerseyDiamond](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JerseyDiamond)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2003, 5:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/creation-vs-evolution/184854/55 "2003-06-29T05:55:08Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Diogenes the Cynic \* > \*\ ***JerseyDiamond** , why don’t you actually contribute to the debate instead of linking to religious websites. Pick out a point from that book you like so much and throw it at us. You sound very confident so let us have it. What impresses you so much about Walter brown, Ph.D? (Ph.D. in what, btw?) \*\* Like I said, diogenes, I just started the book, and I am not finished reading. If you want more info about Dr Brown, read the link I posted, ok?! Anyway, if you don’t like what I post, you don’t have to read it. It’s that easy. ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2003, 6:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/creation-vs-evolution/184854/56 "2003-06-29T06:05:24Z")
How do you know it’s “wonderful” if you just started reading it? What have you read _already_ that merits the adjective “wonderful?” Your link contains an advertisement for the book but does not outline any of the author’s arguments so it’s hard to respond to if we don’t know what he’s saying. If we can’t see his argument to analyze it, wnd you don’t know enough about to to articulate it yourself, what was the point of posting it in this debate? I notice, btw, that Dr. Brown has a Ph. D. in mechanical engineering which means he has no discernible credentials as a biologist. So why would an engineer know anything about evolutionary theory? ---
**Author:** ![Urban\_Ranger](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/e9c0ed/32.png) [@Urban\_Ranger](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Urban_Ranger)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2003, 6:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/creation-vs-evolution/184854/57 "2003-06-29T06:34:44Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by JerseyDiamond \* > Ben, I think you would like In the Beginning, by > Dr. Walt Brown, Ph.D. Have you read it? I just started, and it’s wonderful. Oh yeah, Walter Brown. How about this nice little tidbit to begin with? > [@](#): > > Another example involving numerous creationists is the claim that Donald Johanson discovered “Lucy’s” knee joint 2 km away from the rest of the skeleton. This claim was first made in the Bible-Science Newsletter by Tom Willis in 1987, and has since been repeated by \Walter Brown\, John Morris, Paul Taylor, Russell Arndts, and Michael Girouard. But it’s false, apparently based on a misunderstanding at a Q&A session at the University of Missouri attended by Willis. Johanson did find a knee joint 2 km away from “Lucy,” but he never claimed that this knee joint was “Lucy”'s. [link](http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/icr-whoppers.html) Oh, and his doctoral degree is in Mechancial Engineering. ---
**Author:** ![buttonjockey308](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/bcef8e/32.png) [@buttonjockey308](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/buttonjockey308)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2003, 7:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/creation-vs-evolution/184854/58 "2003-06-29T07:31:36Z")
Ok. Admittedly, I’m no great research scientist, hell, I can’t even get to the second page of the bloody thread because the site won’t respond, but isn’t there just waaaay to much information to deal with for something so simple as life? I mean I get the gist of Bens’ posts, and I understand Nomads’ as well, but here’s a question for both of you. What if your’re both right? I mean yeah, it’s a bit simplistic (it’s also 0230) and perhaps I’m just an idiot, but what about the idea that first there was creation, and from that sprang evolution? Really, why the big effin debate over something so (at least to me) obvious? Yeah you can pour over text, both religious and scientific, until your head explodes, but it is a mystery that no man, no human is meant to solve, which, IMO, is the reason that we’ve been perpetually on the cusp of discovery. Personally, I applaud and encourage folks on both sides of the aisle, because it just makes for damn fine reading, (not to mention VERY informative thanks again Ben) but when it comes to something that needs debated, I think I’ll stick with politics. It’s less delicate, and there’s a clear way to determine who’s right, and who’s republican 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2003, 7:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/creation-vs-evolution/184854/59 "2003-06-29T07:58:38Z")
Evolutionary science does not make any claim as to how the universe started or as to the origin of life. **Nomad** has conflated those issues. The rest of us have not. In fact, if you scroll around in the thread i think you’ll see a few posters who try to make the point that evolution does not have to be an atheistic theory. It’s creationists who seem to think that evolutionary science seeks to disprove God. Scientists have never, ever tried to assert any such thing. ---
**Author:** ![Zoe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/a4c791/32.png) [@Zoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zoe)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2003, 7:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/creation-vs-evolution/184854/60 "2003-06-29T07:59:29Z")
A rebuttal of Walt Brown’s flood geology: [http://www.geocities.com/pgspears/pflood.htm](http://www.geocities.com/pgspears/pflood.htm) Jersey Diamond: > [@](#): > > but it’s by a MIT professor You are mistaken. He is not a professor at MIT. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/creation-vs-evolution/184854.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/creation-vs-evolution/184854.md?page=4)