Fact, Fable, and Darwin

One America ^ | 09-2004 | Rodney Stark

[razzle]

"read Ann Coulters new book"

There are many other good books that point out the serious flaws in the evolution tale. Of course all are being ruthlessly suppressed by people like the ones flooding this discussion. Like the democrats, all questions about their religion are immediately attacked often in a personally insulting manner. Darwinism is going down, they just don't know it yet.

[Coyoteman]

Mr. coyote, can you even read the writings of your heroes like Gould who said there is no evidence in the fossil record (for macroevolution), and other darwinists who admit that they cannot disprove irreducible complexity or show a plausible explanation of the origin of a cell. How can you as a rational human (descended from an ape of course) believe all this conjecture is a fact and continue to disparage anyone who questions the darwin "science"; and make up stories to fool school children that you know are false.

Six years in grad school studying the subject.

And that's Dr. Coyote to you, son.

[VadeRetro]

Mr. coyote, can you even read the writings of your heroes like Gould who said there is no evidence in the fossil record (for macroevolution)...

Gould expounded on people like you in this 1994 article. Relevant highlights:

Faced with these facts of evolution and the philosophical bankruptcy of their own position, creationists rely upon distortion and innuendo to buttress their rhetorical claim. If I sound sharp or bitter, indeed I am—for I have become a major target of these practices.

Can you tell he's talking to you yet? Reading on...

I count myself among the evolutionists who argue for a jerky, or episodic, rather than a smoothly gradual, pace of change. In 1972 my colleague Niles Eldredge and I developed the theory of punctuated equilibrium. We argued that two outstanding facts of the fossil record—geologically "sudden" origin of new species and failure to change thereafter (stasis)—reflect the predictions of evolutionary theory, not the imperfections of the fossil record...

Clue for the clue-impaired: "geologically sudden" is not "suddenly one day." PE is a Darwinian theory of gradual (but non-uniform) change.

In most theories, small isolated populations are the source of new species, and the process of speciation takes thousands or tens of thousands of years. This amount of time, so long when measured against our lives, is a geological microsecond. It represents much less than 1 per cent of the average life-span for a fossil invertebrate species—more than ten million years. Large, widespread, and well established species, on the other hand, are not expected to change very much. We believe that the inertia of large populations explains the stasis of most fossil species over millions of years.

Told you.

Since we proposed punctuated equilibria to explain trends, it is infuriating to be quoted again and again by creationists—whether through design or stupidity, I do not know—as admitting that the fossil record includes no transitional forms. Transitional forms are generally lacking at the species level, but they are abundant between larger groups.

Read that one over until you've absorbed it. He's talking to you there. He's definitely talking to you.

BTW, "generally" does not mean "perfectly." Many instances of species-level transtion are known.

Smooth Change in the Fossil Record.

That, in turn, comes from a discussion of what PE really is: Speciation by Punctuated Equilibrium.

For examples of transitions at many taxononmic levels (and a general refutation of creationist claims, see Taxonomy, Transitional Forms, and the Fossil Record. I like it because it talks about what evolution predicts/explains and pig-ignorantism creation/ID ignores: if you trace a modern form back through the fossil record it becomes more and more similar to "unrelated" (in modern times) forms until all differences disappear and the best you can find could be a generalized common ancestor of a lot of different modern forms. That is, you see a branching tree of divergence in reverse as you go back. Don't believe me? Read it for yourself.

... other darwinists who admit that they cannot disprove irreducible complexity or show a plausible explanation of the origin of a cell.

Perhaps you mean "Darwinists" like Behe himself, who purports to accept common descent but not particularly mutation and selection? Any biologist worth his salt is familiar with what is wrong with Behe's IC. Behe says there's no way an IC thing can evolve. Every real biologist has known better since 1939.

For one, Behe thought he had invented Irreducibly Complexity. On pages 203-204, he wonders if some unknown mechanism could generate I.C.-ness. He dismisses the possibility. On page 233 he compares his great discovery to those of Newton, Einstein, Pasteur and Darwin. He should instead have compared himself to Nobel Prize winner H. J. Muller [3], who invented irreducible complexity in 1939. Muller argued in some detail that evolution would routinely cause such systems. That conclusion is today a common wisdom of evolutionary biology. Behe didn't rebut Muller's argument because he didn't even know it existed. He says on page 187 that evolution always progresses by addition, but any evolutionist knows that it often happens by subtraction.

Note that the quoted text occurs in a subsection called "Ignorance of His Own Subject Area." It's a review of Behe's Darwin's Black Box. Don't forget to click the link to How Can Evolution Cause Irreducibly Complex Systems?

As for abiogenesis, "Darwinists" know that Darwin for one never even wrote about it. Evolution is about how the diversity of life we have now arose from some early and primitive universal common ancestor. The origin of that first thing is another problem for another theory. You don't "refute" a theory by lying about what it's even about.

How can you as a rational human (descended from an ape of course) believe all this conjecture is a fact and continue to disparage anyone who questions the darwin "science"; and make up stories to fool school children that you know are false.

How can you post one misstatement after another--AS YOU HAVE DONE IN YOUR POST--and expect to be taken seriously on a subject of which everything you have said is false?

[muawiyah]

Let me put an end to "irreducible complexity" ~ Science News, August 26, 2006, Vol 170, page 133, "Lacy Molecular Order".

"

Lacy molecular order

Peter Weiss

This surprising honeycomb pattern emerged after an organic-chemical vapor settled onto a cold copper surface, which was then heated and cooled. On copper (black), each anthraquinone molecule appears in this scanning tunneling microscope image as a mound that's orange or yellow on top, green in the middle, and blue at the base.

 

Bartels Research Group

 

Scientists had never seen spontaneous molecular patterns include voids that were so much bigger than the molecules themselves, says Ludwig Bartels of the University of California, Riverside. The pattern results from a balance of attractive and repulsive forces, his team proposes in the Aug. 18 Science. Typically, making such open patterns requires elaborately crafted templates. Bartels suggests that by merely tweaking properties of molecules or surfaces, researchers might generate various patterns and pore sizes. "

[razzle]

"punctuated equilibrium" - ha ha - the cracks in your religion are appearing.

Referring to the fossil record, Gould stated the "embarrassment of a record that seems to show so little of evolution directly" and also this "The extreme rarity of transitional forms in the fossil record persists...the evolutionary trees that adorn our textbooks (brainwashing our kids again) have data only at the tips" (and we haven't even gotten into lack of darwinism at the molecular level or the frauds of your embryology "evidence")

Gotta give you credit for trying to keep that faith alive.

(I didn't address this to coyote or the other darwinists, I know they will read this since you all page each other immediately when someone questions the faith)

[Junior]

Your actual quote (in context):

Darwin's argument still persists as the favored escape of most paleontologists from the embarrassment of a record that seems to show so little of evolution. In exposing its cultural and methodological roots, I wish in no way to impugn the potential validity of gradualism (for all general views have similar roots). I only wish to point out that it is never "seen" in the rocks.

Paleontologists have paid an exorbitant price for Darwin's argument. We fancy ourselves as the only true students of life's history, yet to preserve our favored account of evolution by natural selection we view our data as so bad that we never see the very process we profess to study.

For several years, Niles Eldredge of the American Museum of Natural History and I have been advocating a resolution to this uncomfortable paradox. We believe that Huxley was right in his warning [1]. The modern theory of evolution does not require gradual change. In fact, the operation of Darwinian processes should yield exactly what we see in the fossil record.

Not that you'll even read this, but the word "directly" only appears in the Panda's Thumb essay dealing with this quote [1].

Now, since this is the first time I've ever caught you taking a quote out of context to make it say something it does not say, I'll cut you some slack and say you were simply ignorant. There are those who post on these threads, though, that continue to do it after they've been caught -- those folks are basically liars.

Now, what does it say about a movement that has to lie to support its position? Doesn't that sound like what Democrats do on a regular basis?

[Coyoteman]

(I didn't address this to coyote or the other darwinists, I know they will read this since you all page each other immediately when someone questions the faith)

Found it on my own thank you.

But I see Junior has handled it nicely.

Here is some evidence for your consideration:

---

Fossil: KNM-WT 15000

Site: Nariokotome, West Turkana, Kenya (1)

Discovered By: K. Kimeu, 1984 (1)

Estimated Age of Fossil: 1.6 mya * determined by Stratigraphic, faunal & radiometric data (1, 4)

Species Name: Homo ergaster (1, 7, 8), Homo erectus (3, 4, 7, 10), Homo erectus ergaster (25)

Gender: Male (based on pelvis, browridge) (1, 8, 9)

Cranial Capacity: 880 (909 as adult) cc (1)

Information: Most complete early hominid skeleton (80 bones and skull) (1, 8)

Interpretation: Hairless and dark pigmented body (based on environment, limb proportions) (7, 8, 9). Juvenile (9-12 based on 2nd molar eruption and unfused growth plates) (1, 3, 4, 7, 8). Juvenile (8 years old based on recent studies on tooth development) (27). Incapable of speech (based on narrowing of spinal canal in thoracic region) (1)

Nickname: Turkana Boy (1), Nariokotome Boy

See original source for notes:
Source: http://www.mos.org/evolution/fossils/fossilview.php?fid=38

[taxesareforever]

Don't you believe that only God could predict earthquakes in the world, which He does in the Bible, before there were scientists who sought out the answers on this? And how could God know this? Because he was the author of the earth and put the plates together.

To compare scientific discoveries by man to what God can and has done is just plain assinic. There is only one God who created this earth and everything in it. I believe in the God who can and does all things.

[Jaguarbhzrd]

Crush any dissent?

No, to try and help you realize that science is science, not what you wish science would be.

As far as Gould etc, he was wrong, is wrong, and continues to be wrong.

Irreducible complexity has been disproven in so many ways, and so many times, that continued use of such nonsense just shows that ignoring the evidence is easier then dealing with it.

Dissent is fine, as long as it is scientific dissent, so far I have yet to see any.

I see religious dissent, which has nothing to do with science, or the scientific method.

[taxesareforever]

Anyone who doesn't think translation doesn't change the Scriptures hasn't done enough translating.

And anyone who believes that the Scriptures are translating is in danger of spending eternity in hell.

[Jaguarbhzrd]

Sorry, that should have been the Gould quotes are wrong, and continue to be wrong. That isn't actually what he meant, but creationists are infamous for taking quotes out of context to fit their needs.

[Jaguarbhzrd]

You are quotemining, and taking them out of context, again.

You need to stop this, it makes you look dishonest and desperate.

And evolution has been in in it's death knell since 1859, so I think that saying such a thing is wishful thinking, to say the least.

The evidence for evolution is overwhelming, so to continue to ignore that evidence, shows major desperation on the creationists part.

[shield]

bttt

[Jaguarbhzrd]

So, could not God have created us through evolution?

[muawiyah]

Wasn't Gould's thesis that the "uniformitarian" and "gradualist" points of view were invalid when it came to "evolution"?

That, in fact, sometimes things happened too rapidly to produce good fosil records anyway.

No doubt all of his details in support of his general thesis have been supplanted by more advanced findings by now of course, but that general thesis would still be true.

[Jaguarbhzrd]

See post 231, I corrected myself.

[muawiyah]

Very good ~ missed that. Thought you were off your meds there a second.

[Stultis]

It was well-known that selective breeding can create variations within species. But the boundaries between species are distinct and firm--one species does not simply trail off into another by degrees.

This sociologist's screed his full of such delicious irony. For instance, as in the present example, although he's puffing himself up as a righteous denouncer of (supposed) narrowness, dogmatism and gratuitous fact mongering on the part of "Darwinists," he himself makes many bald assertions of simple (supposed) fact that are wildly wrong.

Yes, it's true that in many cases "the boundaries between species are distinct and firm," but it's just as true that in many other cases they are not.

If we take reproductive isolation to mark the species boundary, as is most commonly done, then there is almost every imaginable degree of such in nature, depending on which allied species we consider. There are some species which never hybridize with their closest living relatives; and among them some which physically cannot, but also some that could, but simply don't (e.g. because of behavioral barriers or because of geographic isolation). Then there are species which do hybridize, but again with every variation in degree of rarity. Some hybrids are relatively common, while others are extremely rare. Still others can only be produced under very unusual circumstance or with human intervention. Hybrids themselves show every degree of fertility; some completely infertile, and others whose fertility is merely reduced wrt to pure breds, again to a great variety of degrees.

And of course, even if admittedly few in number, there ARE cases, such as "ring species," where "one species ... simply trail[ing] off into another by degrees" is EXACTLY what we find in nature.

Now let's ignore the fact that such wide variation in the distinctness and firmness of species barriers is exactly what we should expect to find if evolution is true. Let's even ignore the fact that the author, while pretending to denounce dogmatism, is ludicrously full of his own. Let's just consider that the overwhelmingly prevalent pattern wrt to biological phenomena (again, even leaving evolution completely aside) is DIVERSITY and VARIATION. There is hardly a generalization that can be made in the field that does not have degrees, and most probably outright exceptions.

This is true of even the most basic generalizations. For example there is probably no more general principle in biology than the "cell theory," which claims that all living organisms are composed of cells. And yet there are at least partial exceptions even to this: e.g. organisms or tissues that don't have cell walls, so that multiple nucleases exist in the same field of cytoplasm.

So here we have an idiot who is not only ignorant of the fact that boundaries between species are NOT (in any remotely uniform sense) "distinct and firm". That's bad enough. We also have one who, in his ignorance, is also clueless enough about biology in general to even expect it to be true. And yet such a one feels free to pontificate knowingly on the largest problems in biology, and to globally correct it's leading lights. Amazing.

[VadeRetro]

Gotta give you credit for trying to keep that faith alive.

Gotta give you credit for a non-substantive, non-responsive, brazen repetition of utterly demolished points. Are you hoping no one will notice? What kind of idiot sucker are you trolling for here?

[Coyoteman]

So here we have an idiot who is not only ignorant of the fact that boundaries between species are NOT (in any remotely uniform sense) "distinct and firm". That's bad enough. We also have one who, in his ignorance, is also clueless enough about biology in general to even expect it to be true. And yet such a one feels free to pontificate knowingly on the largest problems in biology, and to globally correct it's leading lights. Amazing.

He's not doing science. He's doing apologetics. The author's approach falls within what has become the standard method for that field.