Posted on 05/03/2010 6:22:25 AM PDT by Need4Truth
A major storm of protest against the myth of evolution has been building for many years, as proved by almost a thousand major scientists, all with doctorates who have signed on to the following statement as of 2010: “We are skeptical of claims for the ability of random mutation and natural selection to account for the complexity of life. Careful examination of the evidence for Darwinian theory should be encouraged.”
Those scientists threw down the gauntlet to evolutionists by publishing a two-page ad in a national magazine with the heading, “A Scientific Dissent From Darwinism.” Fevered, fanatical, and foolish evolutionists will charge that those dissenting scientists were backwoods yokels (maybe even a few snake handlers and flat earthers mixed in) dug up by pushy creationists to promote their cause. Not so, I have gone over the list and if certification and accreditation are so important, impressive, and indispensable, then those people will give evolutionists a perpetual heartburn.
(Excerpt) Read more at canadafreepress.com ...
More like he dropped out of medical school because he found it rather dull. But please don't let the truth get in the way of your argument... whatever it was.
Accepting the validity of a scientific theory based on evidence is not what's usually called "faith."
It's often called "science."
“Accepting the validity of a scientific theory based on evidence is not what’s usually called ‘faith.’”
It’s often called ‘science.’”
Yes, a lot of things are called “science” that are not science. But it’s not what a thing is called that matters ultimately. Alchemy was once called science.
I have no objection to people accepting evolution if they choose to. They can even call it science if they like. Who knows, maybe some day some form of evolution will finally be explicated and proven. In the meantime, evolution is only a hypothesis, a guess based on some very sketchy evidence and a lot of imagination. Until it is proven, it is not a theory, and won’t be until the mechanism for evolution can be experimentally repeated.
I’m not trying to convince you, because you “accept”the evolutionary hyposthesis as fact. In my book, that’s faith, but I’m not asking you to take that view.
Not everyone buys the evolutionary hypothesis, as the 1000 scientists mentioned in the article this thread is about, do not. I wonder what it is about evolution that makes those who believe in it have this missionary zeal to convert everyone to their view. I have no interest in making you abandon your views. I’m just expressing mine.
Hank
I said that accepting a theory because of the evidence was called "science." I did not claim that meant everything ever called "science" was based on evidence. There's a difference.
In the meantime, evolution is only a hypothesis, a guess based on some very sketchy evidence and a lot of imagination. Until it is proven, it is not a theory,
A hypothesis does not become a theory by being "proven," but by accumulating a great deal of evidence. Which, IMO, the theory of evolution has.
I wonder what it is about evolution that makes those who believe in it have this missionary zeal to convert everyone to their view.
I don't care whether you believe in evolution or not. I started by addressing your question about "whether one specie can become a new and more complex one by means of mutations." I offered an example that I thought met that criterion (the lizards). Your only answer, as far as I can see,was to challenge whether it was really mutations that caused the change. Maybe, maybe not.
But see, for me, the fact that scientists left 5 pairs of lizards on an island and came back 30 years later to find that the descendants of those lizards had new body structure is evidence that evolution occurred. Until you or somebody else comes up with a better explanation of what did happen to those lizards, I'll continue to regard their story as just one more piece of evidence on the mountain of evidence that has turned evolution from a hypotheisis into an extremely strong theory. If you want to pretend the mountain isn't there, that's really up to you.
“But see, for me, the fact that scientists left 5 pairs of lizards on an island and came back 30 years later to find that the descendants of those lizards had new body structure is evidence that evolution occurred.”
Look, if that is all you mean by evolution, who doubts it? The question is not about changes within a specie, and you know it. The entire question is whether it is possible for a more complex specie to evolve from a less complex one.
It may be possible, but at present there is no evidence of it. You are willing to accept that story without evidence, and I am not. That’s it.
Hank
As I asked you when I first brought them up: these lizards have changed in morphology, diet, and behavior. They've developed an entirely new structure in their gut that wasn't there before. Why does that not qualify as the development of a more complex species?
You are willing to accept that story without evidence, and I am not.
No, you're determined to say "that's not evidence" no matter what anyone presents you with. Which is fine with me, but don't expect me to join you.
“As I asked you when I first brought them up: these lizards have changed in morphology, diet, and behavior. They’ve developed an entirely new structure in their gut that wasn’t there before. Why does that not qualify as the development of a more complex species?”
For me, development of a more complex species would have to be a transition from a cold blooded animal to a warm blooded one for example, or from an insect to a mammal or from a creature with a compound eye to one with single lens vision, for another example. All of the “examples” of so-called evolution which have been observed are not changes in species but changes within species. I’m not making an arguments against evolution, by the way, only explaining why I do not find it convincing.
By the way. If it ever turns out that evolution is how the various species came to be, I very much doubt it will be by means of mutations, but another biological function altogether which it will never be possible to discover so long as mutation is the accepted method. Science does not find, except by mistake, what it is not looking for.
Hank
Ah,okay, you’re asking for changes way, way above the level of species. How long are you willing to wait?
Just three:
1).Can we be sure to teach Islamic Creationism alongside the "Christian" version? The Hindu version, too. Oh, plus the Scientology version is nice, too, what with the aliens and volcanoes and all that. Creationists definitely owe it to each other (and to us) to share the love.
2). Since when do we determine truth based on the placement of newspaper ads?
Is a Major Scientist anything like the Major Award won by the old man in A Christmas Story? Are they all fra-gee-lay?
No. The jesuits recognized human nature saying “give me a boy until he is seven, and he will belong to the Church for life.”
“And yet Evolution so far is the best answer we have so my statement that “Until a better theory is stated Evolution will be the champ.””
Try reading my post next time. Yours did not address anything.
Dream on, dream on. . . .
“Adopting that as the absolute you wish is going to render swaths of theory in the fields of sub-atomic and astro physics inoperable. Acceptable collateral damage?”
All of the discussions on FR have the evos stating that the tests have been done, the theory has been verified, the science is settled, etc.
The fields of sub-atomic and astro-physics have no zealots stating the same type of thing, simply because there is no way to test many of those theories. It’s like a number of theories that Einstein stated; there was no way to verify them until many years later.
Who, exactly are "the evos"? Sometimes it's anyone who doesn't dismiss evolution as impossible. Sometimes it's limited to a handful of extremists academics. Sometimes it's one and then suddenly the other, starting with the zealots, and then extending that to encompass anyone who isn't a creationist. Who is it this time?
I just finished reading Richard Dawkin’s “Selfish Gene”.
I find the argument compelling for what I and others term “micro” evolution.
There are still great gaps in evidence (so-called missing links that SHOULD rival or outnumber “links” in the fossil record) for the idea of Evolution as a displacement of a Creator.
Atheism is not a necessary prerequisite for a belief in evolution. However. Evolution IS a necessary prerequisite for a belief in Atheism. The greatest result of a theory of Evolution is to transform the relationship of the world culture to God as a lateral instead of vertical relationship. Agnosticism doesn’t carry as much weight when evolution shows how God can be ignored, altogether.
Except. No honest account of evolution can accomplish that goal. Only those that require that evolution must give them cover to deceive themselves can actually accomplish the link that evolution dismisses a Creator.
Dawkins on page 86 of “The Selfish Gene”: “The gene pool is the long-term environment of the gene. ‘Good’ genes are blindly selected as those that survive in the gene pool. This is not a Theory; it is not even an observed fact: it is a tautology.”
The above is an amazing admission of faith.
The bottom line is that however compelling evolution might be, there is a God-shaped hole in its presentation. In order to ignore that gap requires a faith of a different type, but nevertheless: faith.
“Dawkins on page 86 of “The Selfish Gene”: “The gene pool is the long-term environment of the gene. ‘Good’ genes are blindly selected as those that survive in the gene pool. This is not a Theory; it is not even an observed fact: it is a tautology.”
The above is an amazing admission of faith.”
—I’m curious why you see that as an ‘amazing’ admission of faith.
If something is true by definition (a tautology), than it hardly requires faith to believe.
In fact, it’s often Creationists themselves that point out the tautology, thinking that it’s a problem for the theory of evolution. Of course it’s not a weakness since evolution is not a theory of ‘who’ survives, but a theory of what occurs as a result of the differential survival rates among members of a population as a result of differing characteristics. Those that are better at surviving can be called ‘good’ or ‘fit’ or whatever, but that individuals exist that are more likely to survive than others is hardly a point of contention.
“I merely point out that, at its base, evolution is a circular argument.”
—As I said, evolution not a theory of ‘who’ survives. That ‘the fit survive’ is not the theory of evolution. It’s a theory of what occurs as a RESULT that some individuals have a better chance of surviving than others.
The statement that “some individuals have a better chance of surviving than others” – is not a tautology. The statement that “over time the characteristics of a population will gradually change depending on who survives” – is also not a tautology. These are the base of evolution.
Defining those that survive as “fit”, and saying “the fit survive” - is a tautology. But that’s not an argument of evolution. It’s merely semantics. And all semantics – being that it deals with definitions – are tautological.
“DISPROVE the existence of God, dude.”
Well, as a believer it’s kind of incumbent on your good self to prove that he does, not for someone else to disprove it.
As Romans points out, dudette, all of creation points to His Creating. If you choose to snuff out even that mighty source given to build faith, then you are on your own, sweetums.
Two things:
a/ Less of the “dudette”, if you please ;-)
b/ Huh?
“If you choose to snuff out even that mighty source given to build faith, then you are on your own, sweetums.
I am most certainly not alone in my (lack of) beliefs.
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