Posted on 11/16/2014 8:04:49 AM PST by SeekAndFind
Charles Darwin worried about a possible hole in his theory of evolution, but some American scientists may just have plugged it. For about a billion years after the dawn of life on Earth, organisms didn't evolve all that much.
Then about 600 million years ago came the "Cambrian explosion." Everything changed relatively quickly, with all kinds of plants and animals emerging—which doesn't quite seem to fit with Darwin's theory of slow change, hence "Darwin's dilemma." Now, within a few days of each other, two new studies have appeared that could explain the shift, ABC News reports.
One, by scientists at Yale and the Georgia Institute of Technology, suggests that oxygen levels may have been far less plentiful in the atmosphere prior to the Cambrian explosion than experts had thought.
The air may only have been .1% oxygen, which couldn't sustain today's complex organisms, indicating a shift had to happen before the "explosion" could take place.
In a separate study, a University of Texas professor explains where that oxygen burst may have come from: a major tectonic shift. Based on geological evidence, Ian Dalziel believes what is now North America remained attached to the supercontinent Gondwanaland until the early Cambrian period, in contrast with current belief, which has the separation occurring earlier.
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
Check out the link in my post #138, it will explain in more detail.
Those growths are still informally called "gills" because they look like gills, and in fish they do grow into gills.
In humans they get absorbed into surrounding tissue and become part of the pharynx -- go ahead, look it up.
And you know this because you read it where, exactly?
OK... here is the logic behind "millions of extinct species":
Scientists estimate that the average species lives about a million years before it either goes extinct or has evolved enough to be classified as a new species.
In the world today there are about 50,000 vertebrate species (fish, amphibians, reptiles, birds & mammals).
If each species survives a million years, then during two million years there would be 100,000 species, in ten million years 500,000 species and in 100 million years five million species.
Calculating all the way back to the Cambrian Explosion (500+ mya) gives us over 25 million species.
How many fossilized species have been found?
A few thousand perhaps, certainly far less than 1% of all species which ever lived.
And that more than anything explains so-called "missing links".
I estimate that, on average, there are probably — if current theories are substantiated, most likely only a relatively few estimates which may or may not contribute to the possibility that this verifiable.
And their fossils all exhibit stasis.
What are the odds that all of the discovered fossils to date exhibit stasis in species?
"Conjecture" so-called, is certainly a part of the scientific process -- it's the root source of first hypotheses and if confirmed, theories.
In other words: without early conjecture, you'll get no eventual hypotheses & theories.
Olog-hai: "It is only anti-science people that try to disguise conjecture as science."
That issue, of course, is not whether "conjecture" is ever legitimate, but whether it has been properly identified as such, and only used as appropriate -- i.e., in a summary of potential implications.
This thread's article is a media news report on scientific results, one written to interest general readers, not duplicate a scientific paper.
It is certainly not scientific, indeed it's anti-science, to make false accusations, which is what you are doing here.
Did I ever go to school? Yes., I went to school. Did they never show me a dictionary? Yes, they showed me a dictionary. The dictionary does't tell. Words are defined in those which I have referred to over the years. …….."Guess" means "faith"…..I would agree with those two words are not synonyms.
A dozen or a bakers dozen…perhaps a little hyperbole, but that is OK. I understand your assertion. But Panspermia….really….panspermia?…..Even Fred Hoyle disavowed the theory as hokum…..but you can give it consideration….we are just talking. You are correct….none of your proposed hypotheses to consider have been confirmed….or even have any scientific evidence to support such nonsense.
As you know, since you brought it up, the Miller-Urey had false assumptions and as you must know the assumptions in primordial atmospheric conditions have been discarded. As I am sure you know borrowed from the Oparin-Haldane model of the atmosphere with methane, ammonia, water and hydrogen Geochemists have ruled out the presumption of such an atmosphere. But as you know these cursory amino acids rapidly degenerated to cyanide and formic acid in the reduced atmosphere which most certainly was present…..hardly a precursor for life….two of the most deadly chemicals to cells. So, Miller-Urey really can only claim to be one of the first attempts, but failed to elucidate any pertinent information on origen of life.
Pal, you did mention panspermia as an option….throwing it out there for the uninitiated. But, Pal, you might as well have been mentioning little green men from Mars, Pal. It was a senseless comment.
You say, "It must have happened in many, many small steps over not just millions, but billions of year." Do you not see that such an assertion is a statement of faith. You do not knows your statement is warranted, true belief. You simply assert this as your belief….you have faith that this is how it happened. Get it, Pal? Your next sentence, regarding enzymes 'evolving' over billions of years, is a statement of faith. If your purported hypothesis of panspermia were to be warranted, then billions of years would not be necessary, would it, PaL?
Good luck" or God's good planning, the process is still the same -- descent with modifications and natural selection result in increasing complexity and sometimes diversity.How do you know this statement is true? You make the assertion, but what is the epistemic explanation for your making such a statement?
The point of the schematic is to show that our sophisticated eyeballs were preceded by many others less highly engineered.
Who was the engineer? Dawkin's mindless, pitiless, pointless universe? Are we anthropomorphizing matter and energy?
In fact, there's more truth in it than you care to admit. Haeckel's drawings were wrong, but the basic idea, not so far off -- many creatures have similar early stages of fetus development.
Current literature in comparative embryology has made crystal clear that Haeckel's drawings were fraudulent. Even atheistic embryologists, who would wish his drawings to be correct, had completely discredited his drawings. His 'science' was presuppositional and he wanted his drawings to be true, but they were deceitful. Wikipedia is not the kind of authority which I reference.
If Haeckel's drawings were true, the statement that "In fact, there's more truth in it than you care to admit. Haeckel's drawings were wrong, but the basic idea, not so far off -- many creatures have similar early stages of fetus development. It sounds like a statement which would be made by Dan Rather….."false, but accurate".
So, Pal, we are just talking. Chatting. Discussing. I am not angry. Relax a little, it's not your style.
Conjecture part of the scientific process? It can be, but only when on solid scientific ground first.
Popperist thinking has really hurt science due to his/its rejection of inductivism. Francis Bacon had the right approach.
Your efforts to redefine the word "science" to suit your own peculiar purposes have been addressed by the US Supreme Court and ruled out of order.
You can't legally do it, at least not in government schools.
That's because the word "science" as is used in these discussions does not mean "knowledge" but rather today's word is short for "natural-science" which means, in short: only natural explanations for natural processes.
That is the opposite of the Greek Gnosis, which meant secret knowledge of spiritual matters.
Those are what concerned the Apostle Paul, not some new method for building ships or mining gold, or indeed some theory about which celestial body revolves around which others.
So I'll say it again: the Bible is not anti-science, but some of those who use it certainly are.
And that obviously includes Olog-hai.
Olog-hai: "You appear to be quite anti-science.
Rubbish!
Heh very good info and a wonderful pun.
Dang,,,,
Are You People in the Real World?
Show Me a Transitional form of Anything?
Something evolves, it’s A Mutant,it dies!
Sure, but the fossil record is full of species which went extinct, replaced by others which competed more effectively.
I was asked: why did some Great Apes survive, when no ancient pre-humans did?
A good example is Neanderthals in Europe -- survived for hundreds of thousands of years, disappeared relatively soon after modern humans appeared there.
What do you call that?
Did humans hunt down Neanderthals and exterminate them?
Probably not, for one reason, DNA suggests there was a small amount of interbreeding that went on, which may also rule out epidemic disease.
That leaves competition for the same food as the prime suspect.
Come on Cowboy didn’t you see the movie 2001? Some aliens from Jupiter dropped a “monolith” on earth and the apes who touched it evolved into humans the ones who didn’t...well we’re doomed to eat bananas forever once bananas evolved from moss.
Then, by all means, be my guest and devise a calculation which you think might possibly be more accurate. ;-)
Just maybe the folks trying to plug the holes in with chance and lots of time are inhaling more than oxygen.
So you say, but one fossil of a species cannot tell you anything about "stasis".
Indeed, a whole herd of Brontosaurs drown in a flood, preserved perfectly, cannot tell you anything about "stasis", since they all died at the same time.
What might demonstrate "stasis" is the same exact species found in strata millions of years apart.
But because we are looking at rock-fossils, there is no possible way to say if the species didn't change genetically in those millions of years.
So I'll cite again the example of zebras -- a dozen breeds and sub-species within three species and two genera.
Their fossil bones themselves might suggest "stasis", but the reality is those three separate species don't normally interbreed, and the two genera can't.
So that's not "stasis", that's just normal evolution, doing it's "thing" over the course of millions of years.
How much of evolutionary theory do you believe is accurate?
Do you dismiss Intelligent Design?
Or are you a Thomist?
Thanks.
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