Posted on 11/10/2009 10:54:53 AM PST by decimon
As I said, if "creation scientists" have been saying what you say they are saying for years, i.e. that the rate is wrong, and there is sound data for accepting a different "standard" rate of genetic mutation then there is no argument between "creation scientists" and the normal scientific community at all.
However, you are being disingenuous. I.e. you are a liar and a fraud because that is not what "creationists" believe it all. They don't believe that the those biologists who use the theory of evolution as a working hypothesis got some details wrong. They toss out the entire hypothesis altogether.
I think you mean by analogy but if a measuring device were just ten percent off the more measures made the greater the cumulative error.
So a survey of my property with a ten percent at each measure would be wrong, the boundaries with my neighbors would be wrong, my tax bill would be wrong, a measure of my net worth be wrong. And I wouldn't know by how much.
But if it were a simple matter of correcting the error it could be done. However it must be known that was error and how much and how to rescale it.
In selling some property I discovered I owned five acres of land that does not exist. Why? No one knows and no one knows how to go back and correct it.
If an “out of Africa 200'000 years ago” story is based upon genetic dating and the genetic dating method is unreliable what happens to the story?
Consider what the conclusions about the electron would be if the measurement of its charge were 200 or 400 percent in error. Or if the means of measuring charge were incapable of really measuring charge at all.
Define unreliable. Suppose it was 400,000 years ago, or 150,000 years ago, does that change the story?
First, there are other methods of dating things a lot of the time, so the scale is not entirely arbitrary, but does have bounds. Second, does the inaccuracy affect your understanding of the relative sequencing of populating various parts of the world?
More to the point, however, refining these temporal scales does nothing to refute the underlying premise of evolutionary theory, namely random genetic variation and selection by fitness for the environment. I think almost any biologist is open to dispensing with almost anything else if compelling data that leads to a contradictory conclusion is presented AND it is shown that other contradictory data is invalid. [mere clashes of data are simply an invitation for further research to settle the issue]
I picked the story of the electron because it is real, and it took a significant amount of experimental work by a significant number of researchers to refine techniques to the point where measurements were reasonably repeatable and reasonably in agreement. At no point did a discovery of measurements errors (which started off being fairly substantial) "disprove" the hypothesis of a universal quantized charge for the electron.
Now I know evolutionists have gotten delusional, when they take their own strawmen and figments of their imagination and hold on to them more tightly then the evidence right in front of their face.
I am a Life member of the Creation Research Society and the Lutheran Science Institute. I wrote chapter 1 of Persuaded by the Evidence, a book documenting conversions to biblical creationism based on the scientific evidence. I am a life member of the Creation Museum run by AiG. I read six different peer-reviewed scientific publications produced by biblical creationists, participate on CRSnet, have published a number of book reviews, letters, and articles in creationist publications. Back before the web was widespread I ran a creationist BBS. I've attended three International Conferences on Creationism, a Baraminology Study Group conference and several other conferences, including lecturing at one and helping stage others. I have a personal library of well over three hundred books from a biblical creationist perspective, not counting evolutionist and other non-YEC books on origins.
In short, I think I have a handle on what my fellow biblical creationists believe.
I have no problem with saying I'm in a minority position on this or that point within the creationist camp if that's the case, but when I emphasize that creationists believe in a dynamic living world that we expect, in many ways, to be more dynamic than evolutionists expect, this is a point that is presented without controversy or opposition within the creationist literature. Just browse the articles at any major creationist website and you will see my point.
Un reliable means useless in this case. As this link leads to the “unreliable” Our of Africa theory:
http://www.detectingdesign.com/dnamutationrates.html
“The original 1987 study involved mtDNA from 136 women from many parts of the world having various racial backgrounds. The analysis seemed to support the idea of a single ancestral mtDNA molecule from a woman living in sub-Saharan Africa about 200,000 years ago. Later, more detailed studies seemed to confirm this conclusion. Unfortunately though, there was a undetected bias in the computer program as well as with the researchers themselves. The researchers used a computer program designed to reveal a “maximum parsimony” phylogeny or the family tree with the least number of mutational changes. This was based on the assumption that evolution would have taken the most direct and efficient path (which is not necessarily true, or even likely). Also, the computer program was biased by the order of data entry to favor the information entered first. This problem was recognized when the computer gave different results depending on the order that the data was entered. Now, after thousands of computer runs with the data entered randomly, it appears that the “African origin” for modern humans does not hold a statistical significance over other possibilities.26
The problems with these studies were so bad that Henry Gee, a member of the editorial staff for the journal, Nature, harshly described the studies as “garbage.” After considering the number of sequences involved (136 mtDNA sequences), Gee calculated that the total number of potentially correct parsimonious trees is somewhere in excess of one billion.25 Geneticist Alan Templeton (Washington University) suggests that low-level mixing among early human populations may have scrambled the DNA sequences sufficiently so that the question of the origin of modern humans and a date for “Eve” can never be settled by mtDNA.22 In a letter to Science, Mark Stoneking (one of the original researchers) acknowledged that the theory of an “African Eve” has been invalidated.23”
As the rest of the link makes clear; GI-GO.
Again, my comment was made before I ever saw the name of the person invoking the YEC screed. I simply stated that I knew "a half-wit" would post that worn out hyperbole. I posted my comment without knowing who would make that particular post.
Perhaps it was uncharitable to hitchit since I had no idea who the first would be.
However you, my dear little hypocrite, called GGG "clueless." You are the typical "Progressive" lib pointing at others while falsely claiming the moral high-ground. Meanwhile, you commit the very act you accuse others of doing. Nancy Pelosi would surely applaud your efforts.
Incidentally, your posting volume for today is mighty impressive for someone who is supposed to be at work pulling in $100 an hour in "Holiday Pay."
I don't make that much money; but I know a few people who do. One thing I've noticed about them is they stay busy and don't screw around posting about their income on anonymous websites in a futile effort to impress others.
You are a poser and a pretender. I recommend you find successful people who are willing to tolerate you and attempt to learn their habits. If you follow this advice you just might make something of yourself.
Uh, you lie. You made a direct reference to his #10 post AFTER he posted. When you made that pointer to #10 you knew full well who you were calling a 'mouth-breathing half-wit'.
I didn't say I would be working today. It's a paid holiday. Ten hours of holiday pay.
Whatever makes you feel better. BTW, I have used the day off to work on my stock portfolio a little. I really don't have that many days off when the market is open. I think you should get your mind and house in order before you give advice to others.
Uh...Uh...
Are you supposed to be Obama, now?
Hey "clueless," I posted to #8 before reading any further. If you bothered to read my first post you would know that. After I posted I read down further and saw hitchit's post.
Why don't you go take a course on reading comprehension and better yourself? You'll be able to spend time out of your Mommy's basement. She'll appreciate that.
Keep posting your fantasies; I have no interest in joining your little "psycho-drama."
You might want to have to mods investigate how your handle got tied to #45 which pointed directly to hitits #10.
2. Is this a position agreed upon by other self-proclaimed "creationists?"
3. When you state creationists believe in a dynamic living world that we expect... to be more dynamic than evolutionists expect what are you trying to say? Are you saying:
a. That rapid changes in the morphology of living beings cannot be explained by genetic mutations, even though we can compare the genes of the rapidly evolving morpheme and demonstrate quite conclusively that the morphological changes can be related to genetic changes.
b. Or that environment is irrelevant to the determination of which forms are more likely to survive and which are less likely to survive?
c. That "evolutionists" deny that morphological changes happen at the rate that they are observed to happen by "more careful" scientists, i.e. that sloppy and biased "evolutionists" deny the existence of altered morphologies that are observed, recorded and documented by "more careful" "creationist" scientists.
4. Do you hold with many of your fellow creationists that radiometric dating is flawed and unscientific? In other words, do you disbelieve that the decay rate / half-life, etc. of C14, etc. is a random variable not subject to repeatable observation by different scientists ind different places using different methods of detection?
Actually, in certain cases, improved reading and writing skills only succeeds in making an already evil person even worse than before. Marx and Hitler are just a couple of the more obvious examples.
So sayeth you.
There are two problems that those who criticize this theory have in saying the mutation rates are faster than folks believe. First, proposing faster mutation rates cannot explain the fact that all human beings seem to have derived from the same original haplogroup.
Second, you cannot criticize the theory of evolution with any argument about genetic mutations unless you are arguing that they don't exist or are irrelevant to explaining the origin of species.
The underlying problem is a hard problem in computational biology. With the state of computing in 1987 it would have been absurdly hard. With the million fold increase in the speed and power of computers from then until now, what was absurdly hard has become routine, and sifting through a billion trees is just about trivial.
Try looking up "parsimony dna mutation computation" or some such on google and write me a summary of the top 4 mathematical papers (published in the last 5 years) that you find on the subject.
So here's what you must do. Write an 87 page paper (APA style) on (1) How mutation rates are determined, (2) How a billion trees means twisting the knobs a little bit will get any result desired.
And no garbage from Talkorigins or atheist sites or quotes from bloggers.
Thanks for posting. Interesting stuff.
It is only rubbery around the edges. I know a blond from a brunette from a redhead, but the division between dishwater blond and auburn at some point is hard to distinguish. That does not mean haircolor is not a useful categorization 95% of the time.
To throw out categories is to throw out science and to throw out human knowledge altogether.. You can do it if you like but it leaves you nothing important to talk about.
I may not know if a Ding Dong is a cup cake or a brownie, but in general I know what a cup cake is and I know what a brownie is, even if you find such categories "rubbery."
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