Evolution has almost 0 predictability and the same amount of explanatory power. Do you know, given a specific population in a specific environment what will happen to the population? Does evolution predict how the population's DNA will change? No. Evolution only predicts that at some point, the DNA will change and whatever changes will be selected from based on an undetermined fitness ratio.
Nice summation. Here are some past gems I was able to glean from these boards several years ago. See if any of them look familiar. :)
"Evolution is an observed fact."
Depends on how one defines "evolution." I give you another "best-hits" compilation of evolution's "morphing definitions." See if you can follow the "changing" chameleon!
Here we see one definition of evolution.
"Evolution in the extended sense can be defined as a directional and essentially irreversible process occurring in time, which in its course gives rise to an increase of variety and an increasingly high level of organization in its products. Our present knowledge indeed forces us to tile view that the whole of reality is evolution—a single process of self-transformation."2
2. Julian Huxley: "Evolution and Genetics" in What is Man? (Ed. by J. R. Newman, New York, Simon and Schuster, 1955), p.278.
And here we see another:
"Evolution does NOT proceed towards greater complexity. If anything, it meanders towards fitness within the species' environment. (And of course there's a big question of just how well it does that!)"
130 Posted on 10/30/1999 15:14:23 PDT by jennyp
"Maybe Darwin thought it was neat & linear. But it turns out it's actually quite a chaotic (unpredictable in advance) process. Wild & bushy, more like. Kinda like the dynamic free-market economy vs. the intelligently designed Soviet economy."
98 Posted on 10/03/1999 22:23:54 PDT by jennyp
"evolution is usually defined as any shift of allele frequencies in a population. Scientists don't usually make value judgments on whether or not a particular shift in frequency is "upward" or "downward". In fact in a book by Gould that I read, he gives an example of a plankton species that got smaller over time. While it's a common misstatement among even many of those who accept evolution as fact that evolution is "progress" it's not really a part of evolutionary theory."
49 Posted on 10/21/1999 07:40:16 PDT by garbanzo (garbanzo@worldnet.att.net)
Although 90 percent of Americans believe in God, "no divine intervention" is what their kids have been learning in public schools. As late as 1995, before yielding to anti-Darwinian pressure, the National Association of Biology Teachers made this clear when it described evolution as "impersonal, unsupervised, unpredictable."
Published: 08.22.99 Author: JACK CASHILL
If, as you imply, evolution is ongoing, where, exactly is it headed?
"We'll never know until we get there. Evolution doesn't have a predetermined goal, in the sense that we could predict beforehand. I guess you could say that it's headed in the direction of optimal fitness of each species to its local ecology. Of course, ecologies change all the time."
71 Posted on 10/03/1999 00:12:01 PDT by jennyp
The sheer dishonesty with which evolutionists approach the whole subject is quite clear.
When they want to prove evolution, they simply call it "change." When they want to attack creationists for distorting evolution, they trot out "improvement." And yet, "improvement" must have been part of the "change," or we wouldn't be discussing this right now.
And note the following:
"Evolution does NOT proceed towards greater complexity. If anything, it meanders towards fitness within the species' environment. (And of course there's a big question of just how well it does that!)"
130 Posted on 10/30/1999 15:14:23 PDT by jennyp
Now I ask you all to consider the quote, above, in the light of this oft-repeated evidence on these threads:
"...RNA strands of as little as six units is enough to provide a template for the creation of new copies of itself. Six units!"
166 Posted on 01/15/2000 21:42:28 PST by jennyp
I wonder how one gets from "RNA strands of as little as six units" to HUMANS, CELLS, DNA, a protein with a process that "does NOT proceed towards greater complexity."
"Six units!"
All life from RNA strands as little as "Six units!" by a process that "does NOT proceed towards greater complexity."
Is any of this getting through?
And a few more quotes that illustrate the illogic by which evols push their world view.
garbanzo: we can tell that horses have changed over time - that part seems quite clear - but what isn't known is exactly who ancestors of horses were. The fact that we don't know exactly what the ancestry was doesn't change the fact that horses developed from somewhat horselike progenitors.
watchin:
1) We know horses have changed.
2) We don't know what they looked like before
3) It is a fact that horses developed from somewhat horselike progenitors.Okay. How can #1 and #2 be true at the same time? That's like meeting someone for the first time and telling him he looks like he's lost weight. And the basis for #3 is that you know horses evolved because evolution is true?
160 Posted on 11/03/1999 13:14:15 PST by watchin"It's clear humans evolved from something, just what is isn't yet clear." "The law of biogenesis probably breaks down at the molecular level. Exactly how it breaks down isn't yet known though."
94 Posted on 08/22/1999 20:59:27 PDT by garbanzo
Ah, good times, good times. O.o
illustrate the illogic by which evols push their world view.
Surprise, individuals - even adherents to the same position - hold different views; sometimes slightly like these two, sometimes more grave (have a look at the Religious Forum) ...
But, amusingly, there isn't so much of a contradiction in the quotes you gave...
prime?
Variety is nothing more than natural selection, it has nothing to do with a supposed macro evolution process, genetics in is genetics out variety is just a reshuffling of already existing genetics. Peace!