Posted on 11/13/2009 8:11:34 AM PST by GodGunsGuts
Evolutionary philosophy is a bottom-up storytelling project: particles, planets, people. Naturalists (those who say nature is all there is) believe they can invent explanations that are free of miracles, but in practice, miracles pop up everywhere in their stories. This was satirized by Sidney Harris years ago in a cartoon that showed a grad student filling a blackboard with equations. His adviser called attention to one step that needed some elaboration: It said, "Then a miracle happens." Examples of miracles in evolutionary philosophy include the sudden appearance of the universe without cause or explanation, the origin of life, the origin of sex, the origin of animal and plant body plans, and the origin of human consciousness.
An egregious example of appeal to miracle appeared recently in Nature ...
(Excerpt) Read more at icr.org ...
Hail Darwin full of grace,
Help my horse to win the race?
(1) If Fred wanted to get me sacked then he’d go and have a word with the boss.
(2) There goes Fred to have a word with the boss. Therefore:
(3) Fred wants to get me sacked.
This argument is clearly fallacious; there are any number of reasons why Fred might be going to have a word with the boss that do not involve him wanting to get me sacked: e.g. to ask for a raise, to tell the boss what a good job I’m doing, etc. Fred’s going to see the boss therefore doesn’t show that he’s trying to get me fired.
(1) If Fred wanted to get me sacked then he’d go and have a word with the boss.
(2) There goes Fred to have a word with the boss. Therefore:
(3) Fred wants to get me sacked.
This argument is clearly fallacious; there are any number of reasons why Fred might be going to have a word with the boss that do not involve him wanting to get me sacked: e.g. to ask for a raise, to tell the boss what a good job I’m doing, etc. Fred’s going to see the boss therefore doesn’t show that he’s trying to get me fired.
Oh, snap!
You seem conversant with the theory of evolution, perhaps you can point to just what level of already existing life evolution began operating on.
How far back in the history of life must we go before we can say, “at this point evolution began”?
"This argument is clearly fallacious; there are any number of reasons why Fred might be going to have a word with the boss that do not involve him wanting to get me sacked: e.g. to ask for a raise, to tell the boss what a good job I’m doing, etc. Fred’s going to see the boss therefore doesn’t show that he’s trying to get me fired."
Exactly. Evolution follows the same fallacious pattern.
Evolution predicts 'change' (your quote), 'Change' is observed; therefore evolution is 'supported'. This is and always will be a logical fallacy.
Life could have been created with the adaptive attributes that we observe. Evolution is not the only option. It is the fallacy of affirming the consequent to claim that it is.
Amazing that you still don't see that?
GGG, You don’t get to redefine the parameters of a theory for the pure intent of discrediting it. Try sticking to the scope of the theory as it exist and try not to add more than what’s really there.
Immediately after origin.
nor does it even attempt to give a comprehensive theory of origins.
Nor SHOULD it even attempt to give one iota of a theory of origins. The ToE HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH THE ORIGINS.....kick the dead strawman around a little.
A true naturalistic theory of evolution would explain the origin of the universe and everything in it
No, it wouldn't, Admin-man. Claiming as such to creat a strawman to kick around gets you nowhere.
Calling something a religion does not make it so.
Origin of species does not state equate to origin of genus or phylum. Darwin discussed variation that give rise to new species and the mechanism for change over time. He hypothesized that enough change over time would cause a transition to a new genus and theorized that transitional forms should exist (note that these are conjecture upon which research and study are required and are NOT statements to fact). I think your imperfect denial of an imperfect theory is strangely equivocal yet hardly have the air of authority.
You just underscore how silly and weak Darwin’s “ToE” really is. Not only is Darwin’s “theory” completely devoid of evidence for macro-evolution, his “theory” is also completely silent with respect to how life got started (other than to speculate that we may all be related to a warm little pond that got together with some lightening).
Right at the point where the flying spaghetti monster dropped the first meatball....that’s when evolution began.
I really just don’t get how people demand that a theory does something it was never intended to do.
I demand that string theory provide the mechanism behind which gravity occurs!!!
To quote Ronald Reagan; "There you go again". Confabulation won't win any arguments or converts. You don't get to redefine words and scientific principles or to infer content not included in them to support your fallacious unfounded assumptions. Its far better to cut and paste the truth than to make stuff up as you go along. To rehabilitate your credibility you are going to have to operate in the realm of truth for a while.
His theory has NOTHING TO DO WITH HOW LIFE GOT STARTED. Didn't they teach you that in Admin classes?
Why were there no Tyrannosaurus rex "kinds" on the Ark?
It’s a quite reasonable question: If evolution only pertains to life once begun, at what point in the history of life does evolution start operating?
You make statements about evolution so either you know what the theory stipulates or not and making silly comments like this, “Right at the point where the flying spaghetti monster dropped the first meatball....that’s when evolution began”, are not a substitute for knowing what you’re talking about.
Would you like to try again?
Although I agree with most of the content above, I'd like you to direct readers to the source of what you call "your quote."
In addition, I'd like to see a logical layout of what you call fallacy in the above.
of what?
If you consider the ability to replicate to be a defining qualification of life then process began immediately with the first replication.
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