Consider the Probabilities (Creation vs Evolution)

Websites ^ | 9/6/2013 | Dennis Richter

[DennisR]

ConsiderTheProbabilities.com is an attempt to objectively, honestly, and logically discuss the much-debated subject of creation versus evolution.

[DennisR]

“By the way, did nobody ever explain to you — on Free Republic, when you wish to debate some topic, you present the topic, your facts and your arguments, and then defend them as best you can?”

Who do you think created the website considertheprobabilities.com, FRiend?

So again, what sare your detailed, logical, believable answers to the questions presented at considertheprobabilities.com?

[DennisR]

“Of course, most species’ fossils have never been found.”

Hm...could this be because they do not exist?

[DennisR]

Scientific proof, please. And see considertheprobabilities.com for the common-understood definition of the scientific method. Otherwise, your statement is purely conjecture, right?

[muir_redwoods]

Research endogenous retrovirus. ERV’s prove a common ancestor for humans and chimps.

[Ha Ha Thats Very Logical]

The “false premise” being what?

See #36. Perhaps you shouldn't go away for a week, if it means you lose track of the conversation.

[DennisR]

Really? No challenge? I guess you did not read section 3. There are plenty of challenges there.

And why would you dismiss it as “polemic”? Of course it is polemic - see definition following.

Definition of polemic:

1.passionate argument: a passionate, strongly worded, and often controversial argument against or, less often, in favor of somebody or something
2.passionate critic: somebody who engages in a passionate dispute about or argues passionately against somebody or something
3.containing passionate argument: containing or expressing passionate and strongly worded argument against or in favor of somebody or something

To dismiss it as “polemic” only exposes an inability or unwillingness to answer the questions, does it not?

[John Valentine]

It expresses only an unwillingness to participate in your rigged game.

Give me ONE honest question - I mean HONEST - and I’ll answer it.

[DennisR]

“They’re stupid questions because they’re based on a false premise: that all our systems were developed in humans”

That is only your opinion (”They’re stupid questions”)...to which you are entitled, of course. However, you have no scientific proof that our systems were not developed in humans, and no scientific proof that there was something else in which our systems developed. Right?

Again, if you do not wish to answer the questions, that is understandable. I have not yet found an evolutionist (assuming you are one) who can or will. So...the beat goes on.

[DennisR]

Well, there is just one problem here. You will not answer any question you do not deem to be “honest.” So it is purely subjective on your parrt, right? That said, my honest question (in my opinion) to you would be, “A man and a woman are required for human sexual reproduction. What was the evolutionary stop just before sexual reproduction evolved?”

I assume you cannot or will not answer this “dishonest” question, so what exactly is “dishonest” about it?

[Ha Ha Thats Very Logical]

However, you have no scientific proof that our systems were not developed in humans, and no scientific proof that there was something else in which our systems developed.

Nothing that you'd accept as "proof," I'm sure. There's tons of evidence, but you'd have to be willing to accept, for example, that the kinds of animals whose fossils are found in very old rocks were around before animals whose fossils are only found in younger rocks. Then you might accept that fish hearts developed before amphibian hearts, which developed before mammal hearts. If you can accept that, you'll find that the "heart" goes way back to wormlike creatures.

[John Valentine]

You have given me an excellent chance to make my point by posing a wonderfully dishonest question.

You start out by saying “A man and a woman are required for human sexual reproduction.”

Fine, so far, but then you commit the logical fallacy of “the old switcheroo”: “What was the evolutionary stop just before sexual reproduction evolved?”

WHOA!

What happened to the human part? So I’ll fix it for you: “What was the evolutionary stop just before human sexual reproduction evolved?”

This HONEST question can be easily answered: “There is none. The human species have always reproduced sexually.”

Or, the question could be honestly posed in an alternative way, like this: “A male and a female are required for sexual reproduction. What was the evolutionary stop just before sexual reproduction evolved?”

In this case, the answer would be “asexual reproduction”. However, let it be said, that there are species that can reproduce either way. It isn’t necessarily a one or the other situation.

[BroJoeK]

DennisR: "Who do you think created the website considertheprobabilities.com, FRiend?
So again, what sare your detailed, logical, believable answers to the questions presented at considertheprobabilities.com?"

Please read my response in #51 above.
I assert that every issue raised by your web site is answered in my recommended introductory book:

And if you dispute my claim, then you must read the book, and post here any of "your detailed, logical, believable" responses.

Until you do, I will rightly assume that you now totally agree with Scott, and utterly reject the issues raised in your own pathetic web site -- isn't that fair?

Well, OK, if you don't like that, then explain to us in what way, exactly, is my demand different from yours?

[BroJoeK]

DennisR: "Hm...could this be because they do not exist?"

Well, if you think about it logically, today there are roughly 64,000 vertebrate animal species, including fish, amphibians, reptiles, birds and mammals.
And that is only "species", not counting sub-species, breeds and races -- of which the example of dogs shows there are many.
Now, every year, here and there, in some out-of-the-way corner a new species of this or that is found, so scientists extrapolate how many new species are still left to be found.
Well, barring some Big-Foot, Yetti or Nessie, the answer is zero for large animals, but considerable numbers for smaller ones -- deep sea fish, for example.

The same is true for fossilized species -- every year a few more are discovered, and we might reasonably suppose that in most eons past, the total numbers of species were similar to those of today.
But the total numbers found so far are in the dozens and hundreds per category, per time period -- not thousands or tens of thousands like today.

We also know that certain mass extinction events (i.e., 65 million years ago) reduced various categories of species by 50% or more.
In that particular example it was 100% of ancient dinosaurs.
Afterwards, the number or surviving species slowly but steadily grew, until the next great extinction event.

But with fossilized species, two key facts:

1. By the nature of fossilization, only unusual circumstances allow it, and therefore very few individuals are ever fossilized.
   Indeed, whole categories of species can live in areas where none are ever fossilized.

2. Of those few fossils left, most are today buried in geological strata deep underground, and so cannot be recovered except by tunneling through, or removing from them, vast quantities of overlying rock.

But enough fossils have been found -- even in the deepest strata -- and more new ones every year, to suggest that many more "missing links" remain yet to be discovered.

Bottom line: if only 10% of species ever left fossils, and only 10% of those have so-far been found, that would explain why the numbers of fossil species for any given time period is circa 1% of the numbers we see alive today.

Do you disagree?

[DennisR]

“In this case, the answer would be “asexual reproduction.””

So was there some point in the evolutionary process that asexual reproduction converted to sexual reproduction? Based on the basic hypothesis of evolution (minute changes over billions of years), there must have been. If so, exactly how did the conversion from asexual to sexual reproduction take place?

[DennisR]

“In this case, the answer would be “asexual reproduction.””

So was there some point in the evolutionary process that asexual reproduction converted to sexual reproduction? Based on the basic hypothesis of evolution (minute changes over billions of years), there must have been. If so, exactly how did the conversion from asexual to sexual reproduction take place?

[John Valentine]

So was there some point in the evolutionary process that asexual reproduction converted to sexual reproduction?

If this question did not reveal such a profound lack understanding of evolution and the mechanisms of life in general, it might be a cause for amusement.

But somehow I cannot find mirth in another's abject poverty of thought. It's merely pitiable.

[BroJoeK]

DennisR: "So was there some point in the evolutionary process that asexual reproduction converted to sexual reproduction?
Based on the basic hypothesis of evolution (minute changes over billions of years), there must have been.
If so, exactly how did the conversion from asexual to sexual reproduction take place?"

Here is a somewhat abstruse discussion of the evolution of sexual reproduction.
It includes these paragraphs on the origin of sexual reproduction.

Please note in the article: the word "theory" appears 19 times and the word "hypothesis" 31 times.
I would suggest that most of those 19 "theories" are not strongly confirmed and so could as well be described as "hypotheses".

Another more common term for "hypothesis" is S.W.A.G. = "Scientific Wild-*ssed Guess".
Of course, they are highly educated scientific guesses, but still... guesses.

Among the article's more clearly written sentences are these:

"In the eukaryotic fossil record, sexual reproduction first appeared by [1.2 billion] years ago in the Proterozoic Eon.[49]
All sexually reproducing eukaryotic organisms derive from a common ancestor which was a single celled species.[1][41][50][51]
Many protists reproduce sexually, as do the multicellular plants, animals, and fungi.
There are a few species which have secondarily lost this feature, such as Bdelloidea and some parthenocarpic plants.

Organisms need to replicate their genetic material in an efficient and reliable manner.
The necessity to repair genetic damage is one of the leading theories explaining the origin of sexual reproduction."

My point here is: all this is part of "origin of life", about which much is speculated but little is known for certain.
So there are many hypotheses, few facts and even fewer strongly confirmed theories.

But basic evolution theory says that whatever complex forms we see today evolved from simpler versions, and this would logically apply to the origins of life itself.
"Complex chemistry" obviously does develop on its own, in nature.
And over billions of years, as "chemistry" becomes more and more complex, it can take on characteristics we today call "life".
And that is just what the fossil record shows, though exactly how it happened is still well beyond the ken of our best scientists.

But it's important to remember that even today there are still some single-celled critters that have "intermediate" characteristics between "chemistry" and "life" or between "asexual" and "sexual" reproduction.
These could provide clues as to how such forms evolved in the first place.

Finally, here is a very recent book on the subject, which doubtless refers to all the latest research and discoveries:

[MrB]

Another more common term for "hypothesis" is S.W.A.G. = "Scientific Wild-*ssed Guess".

More apropos is this definition: I've already assumed the consequent (a logical fallacy), and trying to come up with an "hypothesis" to fit the evidence to it.

[tacticalogic]

So, we should have theories without a hypothesis, or should we just not have theories at all?

[MrB]

You should seek the truth,
not justify an agenda.