"I always seem to forget. Was it a Horse + donkey = Mule? or Horse + Mule = donkey?
It matters not. They interbreed. "
Male donkey + female horse = mule. Male horse + female donkey = hinny. However, most hinnies are called mules, and are usually as sterile as mules are. It’s safer, when breeding, to have the smaller species father the hybrid. Only nitpickers like me are likely to know or care about the difference.
As for interbreeding, humans will mate with ANYTHING, animal, vegetable, or mineral. Or rubber.
Well, I’ve actually heard of a theory on how this all started.
First some basic definitions
Enzyme: protein which usually catalyzes some reaction–some can catalyze their own replication.
RNA: Ribonucleic acid; counterpart to DNA. It is basicaly a copy of DNA. It then procedes to a ribosome to synthesize proteins. Some RNA act like enzymes.
Ribosome: site of Protein synthesis.
Experiments containing the conditions found in archaic earth have yeilded small fragments of RNA and many, many other organic compounds nessescary for life.
The theory is based on the “ribozyme” An enzyme-life RNA which is capable of self-replication. This Ribozyme then proceded to replicate. Eventually one invaded a membranous sac (basically a cell membrane with it’s own enviroment and nothing else…this HAS been created spontaneously) A little later on the time-line a random mixing of atoms and molecules yeilded a early form of reverse transcriptase(A enzyme which creates DNA from RNA). Now you have a DNA molecule which can reproduce and have genetic variation via reverse transcriptase and mutation of RNA. Not yet quite a living organism, but eventually it WILL evolve into one.
Actually, it is, if you use the word as it is commonly used. And it makes things rather difficult when people start to use new definitions for words. Creationist, in common terms, means somebody who believes the universe was created by God, without evolution taking place. There are young-earth creationists who believe in a literal 6-day creation, and old-earth creationists who accept geological and astronomical evidence about the age of the earth and universe, but still refuse to accept biological evidence about evolution and thus say it didn’t occur.
Which evolution doesn’t say anything about. Again, you’re apparently redefining terms. Evolution is a scientific theory and fact that says absolutely nothing about whether or not a deity exists.
Bully for you! So you are a theistic evolutionist. Many of the folks around here are. So you will be helping us fight against the ignorance of creationism, right?
I think this thread should be titled, “Evolutionists: Strut Your Stuff.”
The way I see it, it is you who has to prove yourselves, not us (Creationists). So far, you’ve done a very poor job of convincing me (and many others) that evolution exists. Until you can prove (not hypothesize, not theorize) beyond ALL doubt that every tiny little facet of evolution is fact, from Big Bang to primordial ooze, to the present day, I will stick with Creation 100 times out of 100.
Wait a minute… There actually there is significant proof that evolution does exist and happen. It’s just the way it is. There is actually no proof of ‘creationism’, per se. It’s a faith thing.
But let’s think of it from this angle, if you will. The Bible claims that the earth was created in six days. We all know phooey, it cooled and formed over billions of years. That’s pretty much solid there, right? Unless you claim that God ‘faked’ the age for some reason (because he was bored on day 4). In that case, you will just have to settle with believing that. Fine with me, I guess.
But why couldn’t evolution be God’s way? I mean, why not? The six-day story could have been written, way back when, as a story to help the peoples understand better. They had little concept of time… What better way to explain how they got here than with a simplified story of creation. It’s fun, it gets the point across, and it’s not confusing. The thing is, this does not have to go against a God-created universe! Why on earth do you insist that it must be exactly as it was written in the Bible. Granted, we know several stories that were true and can be backed up historically… But we also know many that were parables and comparisons for a point.
Evolution does not always mean anti-God. But I just don’t see that we just popped up one day and said, “Oo, lookie! Here we are! Us humans.”
The big bang, the earth cooling, the evolution of life… It can be true without meaning you have to throw God out of the picture. It’s fairly magnificent in and of itself and defies explanation on how it all got together. But God can still be in the picture.
I really think it’s time for a new way of thinking on this point. Again, none of us knows for sure. But your base beliefs don’t have to be in jeopardy.
ARG220, awhile back I decided to be nice to you because you are apparently sincere in your beliefs, and you try not to personally attack anyone.
But that last posting of yours is the most weaselly statement a “creationist” can make.
You are demanding absolute evidence from us for evolution, which you damn well know is impossible to produce on any subject, but when it comes to creationism, all you can provide is unscientific statements, ignorance about evolution, and a demand that we take your side on faith!
I am dissapointed.
Eagles may soar free and proud, but weasels never get sucked into jet engines.
What is so hard to understand about the concept of a religious belief? What exactly is the comprehension barrier you have that doesn’t allow you to understand that some people take things on faith?
Why on earth do you get your jollies from trying to mock people with religious beliefs? And why do you insist on asserting that your evolutionist beliefs are so much more valid than the alternative, you pompous son of a bitch?
Listen, because I’m only going to explain this once. Sometimes I look around at the splendor of life on this planet, and to me, divine creation makes a hell of a lot more sense than the random coagulation of some amino acids. I look at everything that humans have created here, and creationism seems a little more sensible than some kind of random biological happenstance. I think about the human brain, with its voltage-gated ion channels and sodium-potassium pumps, and trial-by-error evolution doesn’t make a lick of sense. And I think about the difference between humans and other animals, and it leads me to the belief in some kind of higher purpose for my existence. I try to avoid these debates, because I know that you don’t understand the concept of faith, and that you’re just going to try and pick on me, and your friggin yes-men will sit and laugh. But now you’re out hunting for people who believe as I do, trying to goad them into some kind of trap so you can use them to get off on how smart you think you are. You prick.
“History will be kind to me, for I intend to write it.” -Winston Churchill
Rousseau, that was entirely uncalled for. Why don’t you take the hate to the Pit where it belongs?
IMHO, it boils down to what you do when you confront an unknown. A scientist will try to find out what is going on, trying not to make any assumptions with evidence. A religionist ascribes the unknown to “God” until the evidence is presented on a silver platter, and sometimes not even that will change her/his mind, because it is seen as a threat to religion.
Not entirely accurate, since a single Hox mutation can add extra ribs, and I believe that a single mutation is responsible for extra fingers. But that only makes it easier for the Cambrian explosion to happen (and I saw a paper once on the development of Hox genes as regards the evolution of body plans in the CE, FWIW.)
This reminds me of Feynman’s “cheese makes it go” story. He was reviewing science textbooks and found one with a picture of a motorcycle, and the caption “energy makes it go!” A picture of a car, with “energy makes it go!” A picture of a horse, again with “energy makes it go!” But what is “energy”? They didn’t talk about the law of conservation of energy, or the relationship between matter and energy, force and acceleration and energy, etc. In short, they said nothing meaningful about energy, and just used it as a word that one could shout enthusiastically at things that “go.” They might as well have said, “cheese makes it go!”
CalifBoomer, you ask “how did it all begin?” and answer “God” as if that means anything. It’s as if someone asked Kepler, sure, the planets move around the sun, but why? What makes them do that? It must be God pushing them around!
The question is, if you want to say that the universe was caused by something which you refer to with the word “God,” as opposed to, say, the word “cheese” or “energy,” then what is that “God” and what characteristics does it have? What testable predictions are made by your hypothesis? How does it help us understand the data in a constructive way? Even a chimp can type letters after someone else types a question- the real test is whether those combinations of letters have any meaning.
Yes, but they do not produce viable offspring. However, several new plant species have arisen from hybridization of different plant species in the wild. They are fertile because accidental duplication of their chromosomes makes meiosis possible.
Well, that’s a little surprising to me, since the scientific community considers evolution to be as well demonstrated as the atomic theory. What books have you read on the subject?
Why should I have to prove the Big Bang? That’s not part of evolution. One might as well demand that someone prove that the Holocaust really happened before one accepts the atomic theory. It’s no wonder we’ll need good luck- you don’t give us any credit unless we jump through every single flaming hoop you have arbitrarily chosen for us.
Anyway, here’s a bit of proof of evolution for you: protein homology. Of all the creationists I’ve spoken to, including a molecular biologist and the authors of a number of creationist textbooks, only a single one (not the molecular biologist, incidentally) even knew the basic facts of what protein homology is, and that person admitted that the molecular evidence was overwhelmingly in favor of evolution, but they don’t believe it anyway.
Perhaps you will be the creationist who finally provides a creationist explanation of protein homology?
-Ben
I think that this is an entirely appropriate response. Rousseau, I’m a structural biologist, and the fact of evolution is as blatantly obvious to me as the fact of a round earth is to an astronaut. I don’t oppose creationism because I can’t understand faith or want to ridicule people who believe differently than me. It’s that evolution is true, and I’d like to see someone find a cure for cancer someday, and it’s not going to happen if we teach falsehoods like creationism in schools.
The fact of the matter is that evolution is a scientific theory and creationism is not. Evolution can explain the facts, and the creationists I have met almost always don’t even know what the facts are. I frankly think that if creationists are going around in different threads talking about how dumb evolution is, it’s a good idea to consolidate those threads so that their objections can be dealt with all at once. David isn’t trolling for hapless creationist fools so that he can enjoy roasting them- he (and I) just think it’s time that all these creationists finally put up or shut up.
If the best you can do is to gripe about David’s motivations and rehash the argument from personal incredulity, then I think you’ve done a rather poor job of putting up.
I like your points, but you handled it rather harshly. There are several people around here that simply cannot grasp the concept of a religious faith/belief system. They’ve got their minds in that lock. But you have to find a middle ground… Creationism just does not fit. Even the lightest of modern science principles backs that. I have yet to hear a valid reason for why the earth is so damn old if it was puffed into existance mere millenia ago. It’s much more reasonable to assume that, through devine pattern and guidance, that the earth was wrought out over billions of years and that even the evolutionary process was under devine guidance. It seems like you would embrace this theory.
A better question for you to ask would be… What about the real beginning? The big bang, or whatever. What exactly caused that? Where did the matter/energy/blink of existance innitially come from? Was it just ‘here’ in form or did a God create it? It had to be created first, in a sense. Right?
Still, you can marvel at the wonder of creation and still believe in faith and God. It’s a growing belief… Simply for the fact that typical Creationist thought just flat don’t work. I like the former better, anyhow. In faith and in science, it just adds up.
‘Mr. Johnson argues his case in two books, Darwin
on Trial and Reason in the Balance. The flair and
sophistication of his presentation has won a
hearing for the design paradigm in high-level
academic circles. Of course, some establishment
scientists dismiss Mr. Johnson as a lawyer who
has overstepped his bounds–who just “doesn’t
understand how science works.”’
The problem is that Johnson doesn’t know how science works. if you read Darwin on Trial, Johnson specifically states that you don’t have to actually study evolution in any depth in order to debunk it, and that’s why his “research” for the book consisted solely of reading popular works. The end result is that the book is riddled with ridiculous scientific errors.
For example, one of Johnson’s favorite techniques is to bring up a possible problem with evolution (for example, he claims that the genome has a limited ability to adapt before all the genetic loci get filled up,) admits that scientists have an answer to that objection, (the genome can evolve to become more able to adapt by duplicating genetic loci,) and then dismisses the rebuttal as being “ad hoc.” In fact, Johnson stresses that this is the main point of his book: scientists don’t have any evidence for evolution, they just come up with ad hoc reasons why it must be so. The problem is that every time he calls a statement “ad hoc,” it’s really a proven, experimental fact. Fruit flies have been shown, in the lab, to evolve new genetic loci so that their ability to adapt to the environmet never gets saturated- but according to Johnson, the fact that scientists suggest that such a thing could be is proof of how desperate scientists are to suggest any idea, no matter how crazy, so long as it will answer his objections.
It’s also interesting that the article criticizes evolutionists for “selective use of evidence” and then, in the very same sentence (!), claims that the only evidence for evolution is minor changes in moth wings and bird beaks. Of course, there’s plenty of evidence for evolution, but much of it has been cleverly hidden in textbooks, where Philip Johnson will never find it.
-Ben
I’m not even going to bother truly dignifying your post since in my opinion it shows mere ignorance.
[quote]
“Life is hard…but God is good”
[/quote}
To who? Those who worship him blindly? And then to how many precent of those people?
I attended church for many many years, but in all that time I still did not ever see one single shred of proof of the existance of a omnipotent being.
~Infamus
Doesn’t that mean that GOD lied to us? The omnipotent, omnipresent and righteous God LIED to us?
Oh wait, that example wouldn’t be the only time…
Oh, and judging from the rest of your post you’re a diest, not a creationist.
~mealworm
I’ve always liked this argument. It at the vert least takes an open mind to accept it, but there is one major flaw. If the GOD could **JUST[/b} exist, then why not the inital point-mass?
Would you please explain the need to begin yet a new thread on this subject? There was
already a comprehensive discussion going in Ben’s excellent thread “Creationism
questions” started on 2-10-00, wherein batgirl, a Creationist (with a PhD, no less), had
been explaining, in great detail, how she came to her conclusion. She and cmkeller
articulately and patiently answered every question with a thoughtful response. Ben on the
other hand,had questions relative to the more scientific, biological components of the
discussion, and approached the issue with an open mind. Spiritus mundi, DrFidelius, and
Fillet weighed in with their thoughts, always presented in a coherent and non-antagonistic
manner, from the perspective of their respective disciplines.
Then there were others, (you know who you are), who brought nothing but their prejudices
to the table. These are the truly closed minded ones. They are unwilling or unable to
formulate a conclusion of their own, place it for discussion and field questions. Instead,
they emerge from the woodwork like big spiders solely for the purpose of ridicule. These
include an individual who names himself after an entity he obviously does not even believe
exists! and a secular humanist who is fond of quoting biblical verses What
hypocrites! After posing their snidely pompous questions, they scurry back into the
cracks. These nattering nabobs of negativism contribute nothing; their purpose is only self
aggrandizement. Having nothing with which to counter an opinion or conclusion
presented, they revert to an attack on the credentials or even the identity of a poster.
So, David, back to the original question. Why start a new thread when the creationism
question was in the process of comprehensive analysis elsewhere? And why have you not
contributed your hypotheses to the discussion? Or are you content simply to
sanctimoniously render criticism on those who do?
Alright, here’s my major problem summed up in a little more calm manner. Too often around here I see people who subscribe to the evolution theory ask people who subscribe to the creation theory to provide some kind of evidence to back up their beliefs. When the creationists say that they hold their beliefs on faith alone, they get mocked. That pisses me off. If I were to ask an evolutionist to back up his belief, I would expect scientific evidence, since it is a theory based in science. However, since creationism is based in religion, it is pretty ignorant to be asking for scientific evidence to back it up.
When I read the OP, it seemed to me that David was just looking for creationists to come in here and get stoned by David and his troop, who seem to understand little that is not accessible in physics textbooks and search engines. I get pissed when that guy tries to prove how smart he is by attacking people with convictions. However, I know that this is GD, so I’m sorry if I was inflammatory or anything.
“History will be kind to me, for I intend to write it.” -Winston Churchill