This is exactly right. This is why the fossil record cannot stand alone as evidence (or lack thereof) of evolutionary processes. Were this the only evidence at hand, evolution would not be presented as ‘fact’ and the mechanisms would be virtually impossible to decipher. Fortunately, however, it is not. The majority of evolutionary studies (indeed, most ‘tests’ of various hypotheses) are done with living organisms.
You also sez:
This would be difficult to explain, because, by and large, pain is a mechanism to enhance survivability; that is, if something is painful, it is typically harmful. Not doing things which result in pain usually increase one’s chances of survival. If this safety mechanism is removed, the creature is more likely to meet an untimely death (a broken leg, for example, could get very much worse if you keep walking on it because it doesn’t hurt).
You seem to be referring to desensitizing to pain. I am referring to simply eliminating it. As in, suppose there was something which might cause some non-fatal skin rash or something, and a creature had a physical characteristic which helped avoid it. Or something of that sort.
CollegeStudent, thank you very much for giving attribution to your source. As a former academician and college instructor, intellectual honesty is very important to me. And as a writer, I sure don’t want my ideas to be dissemminated without my permission. I’m glad you understand, and I meant no offense. Please make sure to credit your sources in the future.
As an aside, CS, again with no offense meant, why do you accept Jack Chick’s work as fact? Would you ever be willing to be shown where he is wrong? What do you think of the p[osts above, especially by Dr. Fidelius?
Certainly a lack of pain could be seen as beneficial in certain circumstances (e.g., the skin rash). In the long run, however, the inability to feel pain is certainly a detriment. If you mean that the inability to feel pain is limited to non-life-threatening situations, then perhaps it would, in fact, be an advantageous mutation. However, even if the creature does not feel the rash, it would still have it, which could still lead to complications (if the rash were due to an external parasite, for example, the creature would do nothing to remove it, and the situation may get worse).
Am I making any sense here? My thinking is a bit muddled today…
Are you talking about something like poison ivy? According to my dog’s vet, dogs are not affected by poison ivy. (Even if it’s not true, it may still serve as an example.)
I think that it’s fairly easy to see why this is a desirable trait, especially for an animal which spends much of its time poking its nose at everything it can. The evolutionary advantage of not reacting to poison ivy is that the dog won’t waste resources scratching and licking the sores that result.
I think that it would be hard to find a trait that does not affect how a creature will survive. Dealing with non-fatal conditions (e.g. poison ivy), we start dealing with effectively using resources. If we talk about appearances, it gets into sexual selection. Etc. etc…
Okay, I was wrong regarding the fossils… Show me to the church.
However, regarding your sources and your specific quote, hominids were “disputably” walking the earth already 10 million years ago. Surprise surprise, that is when the rat split from the mouse.
But the whole cause is predicated on a lie: the lie that Genesis is literally (rather than metaphorically) true, and can be used as a science textbook. The fact is that you can’t support that position without using falsehood.
It seems to me that of all the beliefs you hold, the mechanism by which God creates is the least important. If God created you, if he loves you, if he died on the cross for you, who cares whether he created you “as is” in a puff of smoke, or created you “as is” through a process of evolution?
I am not sure what you are saying, but I have a comment.
Science is not looking for compromises. Science is not a way of trying to make people happy and friendly. Science seeks the best possible interpretation and explanation of the universe. Improvements in people’s lives may be (and often are) byproducts of that process, but they’re not the primary goal.
Usually “simplicity” is a criterion that is included as one of the tests of “best”. All other things being equal, when two competing theories are exactly equivalent in explanatory and predictive power, we choose the simplest as the “best”, at least for the time being. This principle is often referred to as “Occam’s Razor”.
The proposal that maybe Adam and Eve were deposited by some supernatural or unknown agency could be incorporated into the theory of evolution. It appears to me that it would not increase the predictive or explanatory power of that theory. It would allow incorporating a non-literal interpretation of Genesis into evolutionary theory; but I fail to see why incorporation of Genesis is desirable from a scientific point of view. Maybe it would please some people; but scientific theories are not validated based on how pleasing they are.
So, although the theory you posted is possible, it’s just a complication that adds nothing to the science. Accepting it would indeed undermine the scientific method; it would be choosing the “best” theory for unscientific reasons.
Even worse, London, it would be adding complexity without evidence. Theories become more complex when they are required to by additional evidence. Einstein’s special relativity has not been disproven, but it has been added to as new experimental and observational data come to light. Science demands the simplest explanation that fits all the facts. Adding aliens to the mix, while not contradicting any known evidence, is violating Occam’s admonition to avoid the needless multiplication of entities.
The assertion that some DNA is junk is not an assumption; it’s the best available interpretation of a large body of tests and evidence. Yes, the field is relatively recent, but that’s not a good indication of how much evidence has been gathered.
Of course, the idea is subject to question (as is all of science). The idea that you fall when you jump off a building is also subject to question. Our best evidence indicates that it’s not a good idea to jump off a tall building, and that a significant portion of DNA is junk. The body of evidence supporting each of those two ideas is very large.
Sounds to me like a “false dichotomy” fallacy, but maybe it’s some other fallacy. There may be a correlation between people’s opinion of the Bible and their willingness to believe in the possibility of evolution being contradicted, but there’s no established direct link.
Now there’s the basis for a long and interesting discussion! Evolution has been tested, observed, and verified to an incredible degree. Note that “prediction”, in the scientific sense, includes much more than “saying what will happen in the future”. It also encludes exploring all the consequences of a theory. In that sense, the obvious relationships and heirarchy of life are a prediction of evolution, although that heirarchy was first chronicled by Linnaeus (a creationist) long before Darwin.
The subtle measurements of quantum mechanics are farther removed from direct observation with our senses than the predictions of evolution. Yet seems that no significant number of people have the difficulty in accepting QM that we see with evolution.
Lib – I don’t have the Journal Star article any more, but you have to remember that what I wrote was a summary of what was said (except, obviously, for the quoted parts). They obtained the information directly from Hovind in an interview with him. He lied to them about Gould. It’s just that simple. There aren’t any media conspiracies there.
Well, sure. The basics of evolution are easy enough to understand and distort. But the folks who are so eager to distort evolution simply don’t understand QM well enough to mislead and decieve their sheeple.
Hell, even those who understand quantum mechanics don’t understand it.
Did you know that the ICR offers a video which asserts that General Relativity is wrong?
Actually, relativity has been a big target of religious kooks, in its own way, because many people feel that it’s deterministic. Usually they try to shoot GR down by trying to prove Euclid’s Fifth Postulate. Maybe that’s too kooky even for the ICR.
And speaking of the ICR, Joel, I should point out that the question here isn’t whether all creationists are dishonest. The problem is that the top creationists are all dishonest. Duane Gish, the head of the ICR, is a prime mover in the creationist movement, and he’s a notorious liar. Behe has been criticised for making statements that he, as a biochemist, clearly should know are false. And as for Kent Hovind…
-Ben
I’m jumping into this debate a little late, so I only read the first and last page. I’d just like to point out that on the first page, everyone assumed that genetic mutation is the driving force of evolution. Don’t forget that recombination of genes is probably more significant. Mutation is fairly rare, and a beneficial one that much rarer. Recombination, however, happens every time a zygote is formed.
Sorry if this was previously covered. Call me lazy for not wanting to read 5 long pages.
Recombination can rearrange genes, but can’t really create new genetic data. I suppose you could plead that some recombination is an error-prone process, and therefore mutation is implicit. Recombinination alone is like shuffling the deck, not adding cards to it. All new data must come from point mutations, duplications, inversions, maybe deletions, etc.
In the short term, however, recombination does increase genetic variability in a population. With recombination and no mutation or environmental change, over a few generations you just fall into Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium.
While discussing the incomplete fossil evidence, you stated:
So what? Unless you mistakenly thought we had already uncovered every possible fossil, you must have realized that some evidence would be missing. However, we make far more important decisions on much less evidence all the time. Do you need a 30 frame/second reel depicting the crimes of the latest prisoner executed by Dubya before carrying out his sentence?
Decrying the existing gaps in the fossil record is a diversionary tactic that misses the point. Try examining the actual evidence, such as this really cool interactive presentation that maps the relationship of hominid skulls, a multi-page document (with pictures) about human evolution, and this page detailing prominent hominid fossils. Instead of focusing on what’s not available, first look at what is available.
This is NOT circular reasoning, any more than if you tie my shoelaces together and I call it a practical joke because I think you shouldn’t have done it. If a supposed creator deliberately sets out to deceive me, I am well within the common usage of the term to declare it a practical joke (or worse). Besides, you have once again intentionally or foolishly missed the point. Try it this way – All the evidence supports evolution. It didn’t have to.
JonF covered this quite well in his response. Perhaps you will believe it coming from him. You could try reading the article I referenced to you earlier about this very issue, but I suspect your conclusion has already been made. Why do you accept the validity of paternity testing or DNA fingerprinting, yet doubt these same scientists on topics concerning evolution?
Huh?! My understanding of evolution is in no way based on the Bible. Nor do I use it to determine if the earth is flat, or if geocentrism is correct. I try to base my ideas on evolution like I do with all scientific theories – on the preponderance of the evidence. Any thoughts about religion should be considered separate from science. To do otherwise is a disservice to both.
You might believe there to be some type of hocus-pocus involved, but you would be wrong. Just because you do not understand the evidence does not make it any less convincing, except to you. However, it is interesting that you chose a chemical reaction as your standard of “truth”. Practically every aspect of evolution can be described in terms of chemical reactions. It only differs in the vast number of reactions and their degree of complexity.
Again let me reply – Huh?? How could anything I’ve said be construed as restricting one’s religious freedom? Nothing could be further from my intentions. I’ll assume it was a simple misunderstanding and leave it at that.
In the course of this discussion, you have repeatedly stated this mantra:
To which I then asked:
You replied:
This is no idle matter. If you are unable to answer this question, perhaps some homework is in order before you can decide whether the existing evidence is overwhelming. How can I set about to persuade you without knowledge of the type of evidence it would take? Would a statement by every Nobel Prize winner living in the United States in 1986 that “The evolutionary history of organisms has been as extensively tested and as thoroughly corroborated as any biological concept” hold any weight? How about the Pope, does his opinion mean anything to you?
All kidding aside, if you will take the necessary steps to determine what would constitute sufficient evidence for evolution, you will have come a long way toward understanding why evolution is singularly subjected to this type of debate. In a forum such as this, what more could be expected?
You’re right, it’s not the same folks, but there are plenty out there who want to disort QM and mislead others. Usually, these folks are found in the New Age crowd, claiming that QM means we can send telepathic signals and the whole universe of man is linked through QM thought fields and other nonsense.
As I already stated (I think the tiny post might have got lost in the shuffle), JonF made a compelling argument that convinced me to change my mind. I see now that Hovind is a liar.
