Well, I wasn't the one who called it that, but I don't see any conflict, because your previous comment was different from a statement about the ancestry of birds. You wrote:
I will be waiting for the day the evolutionists produce a bird from an alligator.This *does* appear to be a straw man fallacy, because it uses one thing (producing a bird in the lab) as a stand-in for another (the course of evolutionary history). You're disingenuously implying that if the former can't be done on command, then you've demolished the latter. That's a classic straw man argument.
Furthermore, crocodiles are not dinosaurs, so your comment wasn't even the same as the point of mine you're trying to use as justification. Finally, if evolutionary biology is correct, it *shouldn't* be possible to exactly "replay" a prior sequence of evolutionary change, in the lab or elsewhere, for exactly the same reason you can't recreate Hurricane Katrina on demand and set it loose through New Orleans again. But just as the inability to recreate Hurricane Katrina doesn't mean that meteorlogy is flawed, the inability to "re-evolve" an extant bird from any reptile doesn't mean that evolutionary biology is flawed.
To your second comment, I thought you had suggested that the author of the piece offered was just not keeping up with the current state of science, hence my reply about the theory being in a fast moving state of flux.
I'll agree that it's in flux -- it's getting more and more accurate as new research helps refine the details -- but that's not all you said. You went farther than that, you said that "general theory of organic evolution is in such a state of flux that we just can't keep up with it". This is wrong on two counts. First, it's not the "general theory" that's in "such a state of flux", it's the reconstructions of the myriad details which all together describe the history of life on this planet. Think of theory as the "how" (i.e., how does genetic change occur under various combinations of conditions), and the evolutionary history as the "what" (i.e., the details of how each of the millions of species which have lived on Earth have changed and migrated and interacted across all of the history of the planet). Some pieces of the latter change often, and holes get filled in, as we learn more and find more evidence of what occurred when and where and is connected to what. The former (the theory) doesn't change nearly as often or as dramatically, although it is refined in spots as new kinds of interactions are understood.
I am beginning to get the drift. Both of us have our prejudices founded on our understanding of origins.
My only "prejudice" is that the evidence should be followed wherever it leads, regardless of whatever preconceptions I might have.
I subscribe to teological priciples and that causes me to search for a designer.
It's a mistake to presume one's conclusion.
One can always "find" support for any conclusion when one goes looking for it. What's harder is to let the findings direct the conclusion, and to validate a candidate conclusion by fairly comparing all its predictions against reality.
I find the most acceptable authority revealing that designer to be the Bible.
I find the most "acceptable authority" to be Creation itself -- reality, the Universe. It should be studied to determine what its properties say about its nature and its origins. Reality doesn't lie, doesn't make mistakes. The same can not be said of any human "authority", any "authoritative" book.
In it I read the account of creation, the alienation of mankind from his Creator, and the plan of reconciliation with the Creator.
So do the Muslims in *their* book. The plethora of "holy books" should give one pause.
It is a book of books recorded by over fortytwo writers spanning a period of over sixteen hundred years and develops a consistent theme. It has stood the test of time remaining unchanged for the past two thousnd years while so called science has tried unsuccessfully to impune it.
There are quite a few things in your book which are contradicted by the evidence, but if you're happy with it, I have no interest in dissuading you from your conclusions.
On the other hand you subscribe to the theory of abiogenesis for origins
I do?
and from that beginning you construct a complete developmental theory ex any first cause.
Incorrect.
There is no authority for your beliefs except what you can produce inductively.
Actually, the "authority for my beliefs" is Creation itself, which I'll put up against any book or any priest who attempts to contradict it.
Since it is a naturalistic explanation of organic development, then in this political environment, you own the government schools.
I do?? Why am I not being paid rent?
(As I remember the Prussian government schools in the thirties turned out little Nazis. Our government schools turn out ignorant little robots that think government is good. Then I have to hire them and teach them how read, write, and add and subtract.)
Okay. What does that have to do with anything I've written?
In my world view you have the opportunity to lay hold on eternal life if you have the courage to do so. What commends your world view?
The study of reality, and the desire to understand it as fully as possible, while not falling prey to comfortable fictions.
It offers nothing except to appeal to personal pride and six feet of dirt.
Ah, the old "appeal to consequences" fallacy, eh? I never fell for that one. Truth is not determined by what we'd *prefer* to happen.
So, instead of your continual boasting and back slapping, why don't you and your fellow travelers give the Bible a fair chance
I have.
instead of looking at it with a view to pick it apart and critize?
I don't.
If you choose to do so, don't pay any attention to the guys with their collar on backward.
I do when they make sense, I don't when they don't.
I am only interested in your well being.
Well thank you, that's very kind.