Posted on 11/29/2004 6:52:41 AM PST by PatrickHenry
HAhaahaa! I just said that. You can anything you want to be except a Paladin.
Or a Druid -- not that anybody in their right mind would actually want to be one.
So, if two groups could produce viable offspring, but refuse to mate (for various reasons), would you consider them separate species.
There are hundreds of books on astrology, does that make astrology a scientific alternative to astronomy of such pursuasive scope that we should teach it in science class?
Or a Monk, but that's too much work anyway.
I had this Dwarf (Mental note: He was pretend), who had enough strength to wield two battle axes at once. I forget what I named him, but he became know as the "Blender".
Have a room with a bunch of baddies, send in the Blender and back him up with some potent magic user, and you will be trapesing through the dungeon. I stopped taking him in because the DM's would have rooms labeled "Blender" killer.
It also don't make it science.
I cannot figure out from what you've written if a creationist became an evolutionist or vice versa, nor who "this guy" is or who or what "this guy" is for or agin'. But please don't feel obligated to straighten this all out. Your offering has a certain piquant charm as it stands.
Evolution does not equal science. Evolution is a pitifully-conceived theory. Period. Evolution within a species - no problem there. Monkeys becoming people? Big problem there. Absolute no credible scientific evidence for that.
Well, since you're going to run away, you might stop by your reference library and refamiliarize yourself with the term "circular logic," since your prior post in which you accused me of it demonstrates that you don't quite understand what it is.
And did you notice the way you went from stating that the microevolutionary and macroevolutionary processes are exactly the same to pointing out the differences between them without missing a beat? Nice footwork.
Incidentally, I'm curious about your statement that you're a Christian minister. Generally speaking, that might indicate that you believe in a number of supernatural events relating to various Biblical events. If that's the case, I'm puzzled about why the Genesis account so offends you. Maybe you think God just isn't capable of pulling it off.
From donh: There are hundreds of books on astrology ...
I was thinking of responding along similar lines when I saw your post. So I'll just elaborate a bit.
If you go into a "New Age" bookstore, Red6, or any really large general bookstore, you'll see shelves groaning with books on all kinds of pseudo-science: Ancient astronauts, UFOs, crop circles, pyramid power, psychic channeling .. the list is a long one, and a very sad one. The point I'm making here is that anyone can write a book, about anything, and say anything he likes.
The issue you raise, the issue that everyone faces, is this: knowing that all kinds of foolish tales, claims, and books exist, what shall we believe? How do we know something? How do we decide between two or more competing claims about the same thing? One guy says the earth is 6,000 years old. Another guy says it's billions of years old. Now what?
You seem like a thoughtful fellow, Red6. So tell us, how do you decide these things?
If this were true, introducing antibiotics to a bacteria culture would have no effect as everyone of the bacteria have the same genetic code.
However, in reality, most of the bacteria will be killed off and a few with a favorable mutation not found in their kin will survive.
That would be Behe, I expect. And his painful detail happens to omit the fact that several of his predictions about insurmountably complex problems had already been solved and published before his book went to press.
Behe, and Johnson, and Dembski and all the rest of the psuedo-scientific support for ID are just putting out fancy-dress versions of a basic theory I can easily summarize, shorn of their technical-sounding window dressing: "If I can't figure out how it was done, it must be a miracle, by gum!"
Where unobserved history is concerned, sure. Science hasn't even got time, light, and energy down pat. I hardly expect it to offer serious history. The problem with adherents of evolution theories is they demand "facts" from their counterparts but squeal like stuck pigs when their counterparts demand the same.
Fact: There is a fossil record.
Conjecture: It took millions of years for the fossil record to be laid down.
As far as I am concerned, I will not treat any scientific proposition as "fact" unless it can be demonstrated by observation and recorded history. Those who propose "millions of years" as an acceptable tool for the laboratory have an easy out. They sure as hell don't have the eyeballs and experience to verify their story.
But hey. All evolutionists have their story, and I'll let them tell it any way they want to. When they start telling the rest of us we have to accept their stories as "fact" I would just as soon show them the more certain reality of the black hole that resides on my posterior and kindly request they pucker up for a big kiss.
I don't challenge the validity of stellar astronomy, any more than I challenge any other scientific discipline that recognizes the limitations of its ability to extrapolate. At least with astronomy, you are actually able to observe something. Without being able to get close and sample the materials/phenomenon, there is, of course, a chance that one's conclusion is not entirely accurate. I don't think it's safe to say, for instance, that our existing periodical table of elements represents every type of matter the universe holds; therefore, I think it's entirely possible that when a phenomenon is observed at such a distance, the makeup of that phenomenon may be considerably different than what we think it is, though it may appear to be something we're familiar with in terms of how it's measured and interpreted by our existing instruments.
In a scientific sense, there is no other theory. ID doesn't even approach testable hypothesis, let alone theory, and creationism is patently false.
In a scientific sense, there is no other theory. ID doesn't even approach testable hypothesis, let alone theory, and creationism is patently false.
#####According to the theory of gravity, an object launched from a particular position at a particular velocity would be able to orbit around the planet Mercury. Is it the job of proponents of the theory of gravity to launch such a probe to verify that the theory works in this particular instance, or are they permitted to generalize from the mountains of evidence which suggests that gravity works the way they think it does?#####
Sure, but there are in fact MOUNTAINS of evidence about how gravity works. It's not an unobserved phenomenon.
If we observed, let's say, rabbits evolving into cattle, it wouldn't be that unreasonable to suggest that maybe cattle could evolve into elephants. But we've never observed such a thing and there's no indication that such a thing ever occurred. There's no reason to believe any creature on earth ever evolved from any other creature. That's why evolutionists continue to be astonished when polls show strong support for creationism. It isn't that people are stupid or stubborn, or brainwashed by faith, as the secularists would have us believe. It's just that people don't swallow a theory that stretches logic and credulity. If you or I were able to trace our ancestry back to the very beginning, would we find a single celled organism? Perhaps you think so, but I don't.
I simply don't think it's possible that accumulated random mutations led to the millions of species on earth. Particularly given the known facts of extinction. How much faster would evolution have to occur than extinction to arrive at the millions and millions of species that now exist?
I don't object to evolution being offered up as a theory. I question the degree of certainty with which it's put forward and the tendency to disqualify competing theories.
Ultimately, the only solution for conservatives may be to simply homeschool or send our kids to private schools, because the socialist left will never let evolution become disestablished from the government school curriculum. And let's face it, evolution **IS** the socialist left's pet theory of how we as humans got to where we are. It didn't start out that way. But the left fell in love with the theory and it was they who enshrined it. Not natural selection, but evolution.
That's odd. Stalin, the biggest leftist of them all, murdered his Darwinian evolutionists. Trofim Denisovich Lysenko. Stalin's biologist, definitely an anti-Darwinian.
And if you're correct, then how can you explain this article from the Institute for Creation Research? Darwin's Influence on Ruthless Laissez Faire Capitalism. ICR links Darwin to good ol' capitalism.
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