so that we can get an answering post from Darwin’s Finch?
I beg your pardon?
I’m not a creationist, but I can play one on TV:
Hey, how come if we evolved from apes, there’s still apes! Answer that smart guy!
Seriously, I bet this was meant to be a response to some pre-existing thread, not a new thread.
Is there even a current creationist thread? I though this OP was more like givin’ “props” to Darwin’s Finch for being a badass.
Funny. I was just thinking about the origin of Man today.
Specifically I was pondering the theory that an alien race chose a species on earth to give intelligence and apposable thumbs to. And that species was apes.
And then my mind wandered and supposed that the same thing happened to that alien race, and to the alien race that did it to them, and so on and so on, until you go back far enough to a race that really did evolve from less intelligent biology, but over billions, rather than millions of years.
It’s a missing link.
You know, I was wondering where all the creationists went. We used to have one pop up every month or so, but I haven’t seen any recently. Maybe they all got scared off.
Well, I consider myself a Creationist, but I also don’t believe that debate and argument will convince someone who isn’t. I’m also fairly new, and I haven’t ventured into the Pit yet, I’m a bit scared.
Anyway, what exactly would you like me to post. I may not be into arguing, but I will gladly post something for you to jump all over. 
Well, if you do decide to post about creationism, you should probably do it in Great Debates rather than the pit, unless you like alot of invective.
But don’t do it if you don’t want to, because you will get jumped on.
I’m a bit bitter and twisted that I’m not considered a creationist, or, even worse, not considered significant enough of a creationist (like the American slang?!) to count as a Board creationist.
What I want to know is why (as is apparently currently fashionable to believe) human beings have given up on evolving. Is this a temporary thing, or is it more terminal? What about those groups living in isolation sans technology in remore rain forests or on some misty mountain top? What the hell excuse have they for giving up?
Come on down, Finchie! It’s you and all your multivarious progenitors against me and all my human ancestors. (Okay, plus my granddad, who was a real animal, I’m told.)
(Mean-spirited response ahead based loosely on a quote from Mission:Impossible)
My dear roger, you asked the question… and you are the answer.
shoots roger and knocks Tom Cruise on the head – I mean, what?
What if… instead of evolving from lower forms of life, we devolved from a higher order of life? Chaos wins, Entropy increases.
Now THAT would be cool.
Not to get serious or anything, but that actually was the view–sort of–of many ancient peoples. The Greeks believed that they were the sad decayed remnnants of a once glorious golden age. You can find evidence of this in both Homer and Hesiod, IIRC.
Right. DF described a personal setback in a thread a couple of months ago and hasn’t posted anything since.
This thread as a matter of fact.
We are evolving. Evolution is simply a change in allele frequencies over time.
I think you’re thinking in teleological terms–that there’s a purpose/direction to evolution, and unless we’re moving towards that we’re not evolving. That’s known as the teleological fallacy and you can find a lot of info by Googling on that.
I think the idea that humans aren’t evolving is fallacious and based on the thought that technology can overcome many natural occurances that would kill individuals without the technology.
However, our society is highly dependent upon that technolgy which is based on an abundant supply of energy, about 20% of which we can convert into material things, such as antibiotics, earth movers, airplanes etc. that we use.
If that source of energy were rapidly to be reduced to, say, one half its current availability Spencer’s Survival of the Fittest would be there waiting, ready to pounce.
Evolution, possibly among other things, is adaptation to an environment. Our environment is a highly technological and interdependent society. If that environment changes, humans will either adapt or fall by the wayside.
Not bothered about purpose - just wanna know whether we’re evolving into a new form, kind, species (you can even choose your mot du jour). Especially them what’s living in the Amazon rain forest, New Guinea - wherever - and are still pretty much unaffected by technology and needful of some useful adaptations/alleles whatever to help 'em along their way. Non-purposively, naturally.
There isn’t any survival pressure to evolve into a new species right now. And that includes those in the rain forest. When the technological world intrudes on them the change will be rapid and will result either in their disappearance or their collection into caretaking reservations. In order for such primitives to survive a new species isn’t really needed. After all, the human species survives quite well in a technological society.
And, of course, if the environment changes there is no guarantee that a new species will result. Extinction is always a possibility.
Well, we’re not getting culled nearly as vigorously as we used to be. Antibiotics and modern medical techniques save many, many people who would have died a century ago. Diabetes, for instance, used to be a fairly short death sentence, yet now diabetics are able to live and reproduce with only a little bit of intervention. Same thing applies to a great many diseases. We inoculate for a variety of diseases, and many children live to grow up and reproduce who would otherwise have succumbed to whooping cough, for instance. We’ve eliminated smallpox, except for a few samples which are kept for research purposes. It used to kill and scar many people.
So you see, the forces of evolution upon human beings have changed drastically. Not sure if this is good or bad, in the long run. It’s much too soon to tell.