Posted on 12/09/2004 9:21:27 AM PST by Michael_Michaelangelo
Is Darwin winning the battle, but losing the war?
As soon as one challenge to the teaching of evolution is beaten in the courts, another emerges to take its place.
The current contender is “intelligent design,” a theory that according to advocates at the Discovery Institute “makes no religious claims, but says that the best natural evidence for life’s origins points to design rather than a process of random mutation and natural selection.”
(Excerpt) Read more at firstamendmentcenter.org ...
LOL!!!
Actually, I am pretty sure that nowhere in the theory of evolution itself is there any mention of randomness or purposelessness. Those ideas are not scientific. What test would lead you to the belief that the random or purposeless nature of evolution is false? Now individual scientists, on the other hand, often argue precisely that evolution is random or purposeless. If anything, randomness or purposelessness may be assumed on the basis of Occam's Razor. That is, the idea that life evolved as a result of undesigned processes and the idea that life evolved as a result of designed processes are deemed to be equally good at explaining the observations. Occam's Razor tells us not to multiply entities needlessly, so undesigned processes are assumed, since there is then no need for a designer. Science will never accept a designed process since there is no test for it.
Nothing to do with evolution, though, just with the origin of life.
How can you tell when bacteria speciate? Define "species" as it applies to bacteria. Hint: the biological definition of species generally is accepted to be a group of organisms that can interbreed and produce fertile offspring. Bacteria reproduce asexually.
I've never seen you, so it's hard to say.
Our DNA is very very close, but we look very very different.
CLOSE, but no cigar.
But then, I'm sure you smell different than me.
If you look like that gorilla, I won't be following you into the mens room.
We both have one head, two arms, two legs, and some dangelies between our legs.
Say,,,,you didn't come here to talk about evolution did ya?
Nobody said scientists get to define truth. Scientists get to define science, though. Unless you believe that truth and science are equivalent. I personally do not, even though I am a scientist.
Evolution is defined as the changing over time of allele frequencies in the gene pool of organisms. Indivdual organisms do not evolve. Populations of organisms do. When a subgroup of the population becomes isolated from the rest of the population and evolves to the point where its members can no longer interbreed with the members of the main population, speciation has occurred. After many such speciation events occurring from within both the subpopulation and the remainder of the population, it is reasonable that the descendants of these two groups will eventually become very different.
Thank you. I was beginning to think I was the only person that thought that way. Many people (on both sides of the argument) seem to ignore either the supporting evidence of the other side or the gaps in their own theory. I believe that God guides evolution. They actually fit together quite nicely.
No problem there. Honest scientists do not begin with a priori assumptions of materialism, naturalism, and atheism and then put extreme effort into feeding their cocooned discipline to the rest of the world through distortion, propaganda, and intimidation. Fortunately they appear to be increasing in number, but they do not annoint themselves as sole arbiters of their discipline.
LOL
Some bacteria do it sexually (or with plasmids) and some (even the same ones) may do it asexually.
The theory of evolution is just a theory
The word theory means something different in science than it does in common usage. Theories are the result of a hypothesis, or educated suggestion, being tested and found to be consistent with observation. A theory coherently explains a large range of observations. It is in contrast to a law which simply expresses a regularity seen in observations without attempting to explain that regularity. Theories do not become laws. Laws are not somehow more certain than theories. Both are on equal footing in science.
There's no way life could have arisen from non-living chemicals/There's no way to get from the big bang to humans
Neither the origin of life nor the big bang is covered in the theory of evolution. Evolution only applies once life has begun. It makes no difference how life began.
The second law of thermodynamics makes evolution impossible
The second law of thermodynamics states that IN A CLOSED SYSTEM, entropy always increases. The earth is not a closed system. The earth receives energy from the sun. This release of energy from the surface of the sun at a temperature of 6000K to space at a temperature of ~3K represents an enormous increase in entropy. Therefore, even taking evolution into account, the entropy of the earth/sun system does indeed increase over time.
Creationism is just as valid a theory as evolution/Evolution is not really science
To qualify as a theory in science, an idea must explain observations in such a way as to be falsifiable. This means that it must predict something and finding that this prediction is not true would require abandonment or serious modification of the theory. Evolution meets this requirement. For example, evolution predicts that in billion year old rock layers, no fossils of modern humans will be found. It predicts that all organisms on earth will have nucleic acids as their genetic material. It predicts that it will be possible to observe changes in the genepool of organisms. All of these predictions have been borne out by observations. If any of them are not, then evolution would have to be seriously modified or abandoned. I am sure that someone with more knowledge of biology could provide many more such examples. Creationism, on the other hand, by its very nature can offer no such predictions. The most basic premise of creationism is that there is an omnipotent God who created the universe. By virtue of God's omnipotence, there is no possible observation that could falsify this premise. God could have made the universe appear any way He wanted it to appear.
Evolution has never been proven
Neither has quantum theory, or relativity, or any other scientific theory or law. Science never offers proof, merely strong evidence for an idea. Evolution is backed by a large amount of observational evidence.
Evolution isn't compatible with the Bible (or belief in God)
Evolution says absolutely nothing about whether or not God exists. Science in general makes no reference to God. Theories of gravity, electromagnetism, nuclear forces, quantum mechanics, and many other theories in science are make correct predictions (so far) without reference to God in any way. As covered above, God is simply not a proper subject of science. The idea that God exists (or the idea that He doesn't) is simply not falsifiable, and is therefore not scientific. There is no test or physical evidence that would be able to prove that those who believe in God are wrong. Similarly there is no test or physical evidence to show that those who don't believe in God are wrong. Both ideas are unfalsifiable and are thus outside the realm of science. I have heard arguments that "evolutionists are trying to eliminate God." This may be true, but it is beyond the scope of the theory of evolution to try to disprove the existence of God. This is the result of some subset of scientists (or non-scientific evolution supporters) trying to push their own opinions. I have also heard people who are entirely convinced that the Bible contradicts evolution entirely since evolution is not mentioned in the Bible. Such people need to remember that, while the Bible has not changed over all these millennia, our necessarily flawed human understanding of it has. We used to believe, as recently as 140 years ago, that the Bible said that the owning of another human being in a condition of slavery was acceptable, and some even went so far as to say that the Bible said that this was a desirable condition for both the master and the slave. We no longer believe this. Therefore the way we understand the Biblical word has changed. If you believe that your interpretation of the Bible is the only one that is possibly correct, then you are ignoring the fact that good people have struggled to understand the Bible for thousands of years. It is not a sign that someone is evil if he/she disagrees with your beliefs about what the Bible means.
The point of "The Wedge," as Philip Johnson has stated, was "Darwin on Trial." The ID movement can't be stopped now. It's too big. But it's fun to watch the Darwinists hang on and speculate as to when ID becomes common wisdom.
Practically and colloquially, kind of. Logically, no, since philosophy (and theology) determine the scope of all sciences.
Antibiotics kill off antibiotic-vulnerable bacteria, leaving the originally relatively small number of antibiotic-resitant bacteria to multiply.
Who claimed it was absolutely true?
These two books pretty much convinced me and satisfies me as you seem to indicate regarding Intelligent Design.
“Nature’s Destiny” and “Life’s Solution”
"OK. If Darwin is a crackpot, and living things do not evolve, then please explain why we now have anti-biotic resistent bacteria."
There has always been anti-biotic resistant bacteria. There's just more of it now that we've killed off the non-resistant bacteria.
Creationism is not against gene shifts in populations, but in the creation of new and complex mechanisms through randomness.
Which "evolving concept" should we teach as fact? I am willing to have evolution taught as an "evolving concept" as long as the evolving concepts of ID are presented as well. That's all we ask. We want a free and open debate.
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