Evolution Can't Explain Biotic Diversity (vainity)

self ^ | from a prior thread | Ahban

[gore3000]

Then it wouldn't be called evolution if God created it!

Exactly. The word 'evolution' is an atheist replacement for the word 'creation'. Creation is sudden, it is the result of the Word of God, not of material forces.

[Ahban]

I see Creationism as a major subset of ID. Even Theistic Evolution can be considered ID. Creationism I define as that subset if ID that maintains that the Designer intervened at least once in creation after the initial creation event.

Thank you for your input.

[Ahban]

Thanks for your input. I'm an old earth creationist myself, so I agree with your post. To clarify- I meant new families, not newly discovered families that have been around and leaving fossils for eons. I agree there could be a newly DISCOVERD family, but that is not the same as the families we know of changing enough so that so members of it are reclassed as new families within written history.

[gore3000]

They don't "believe" in it or have "faith" in it, they support it because all the evidence points toward evolution.

Gimme a break! No one has ever seen ANY species transform itself into another more complex species. However, every day we see millions upon millions of individuals have progeny the same as themselves. This has been observed throughout recorded history. It is the best established scientific fact around. So don't come telling me that 'all the evidence' points to evolution. None of the evidence points to evolution.

[Ahban]

Major flaw in the basic premise, is the usage of a linear instead of an exponential growth rate. New families will appear slowly at first and emerge faster over time. 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64, 128, etc

Hardly a flaw in my premise, rather a point in its favor. If the number of families does indeed grow exponentially over time, then new families should be popping up at a HIGHER rate now than they did when there were fewer families on earth. We don't see them.

[Ahban]

You can't have it both ways. Either humans changing the environment opens up new niches so new families will pop up faster, or new niches appearing does not effect the rate of new families.

The fossil record does show bursts of new families appearing- and the advent of man is just such an event that should cause a burst.

Changing the world too fast for animals to evolve? Come now, do we change the world any faster than the asteroid strike that extincted Barney and friends?

Also, the math may be simple, but that does not mean it is wrong. If its wrong, show where, but saying its simple is not proving that it is wrong. Lots of complicated factors go into how many yards a halfback may run for over the course of the season, but one can still find an average yards per carry using simple math, and the number found means something.

[gore3000]

I agree, and I'd like to expand a little bit. There will be exponential growth for a while, until biodiversity reaches an equilibrium, where they won't be any room for new creatures. There's no niches to be occupied, no room for improvement via evolution. Species are already so efficient that any changes are a detriment.

That argument does not wash. According to the theory of evolution (and the Malthusian basis of it) all the niches would have been filled a billion years ago due to the exponential growth of organisms. In addition, according to evolutionary theory all the niches are constantly changing due to environment and the struggle of species with one another - a sort of biological arms race.

So after using these arguments to support evoltuion, it seems to me that evolutionists cannot state that 'evolution stopped' recently. It's just plain double talk and an excuse for not being able to find what the theory says we should be finding - namely intermediate species, species transforming themselves into new more complex species.

[Ahban]

So can evolution if you listen to my friendly opponents. Faith statements both, each choice saying more about the person than the nature of the evidence. What do you choose?

[Ahban]

re your #32. Thanks. That was my take on it as well.

[Ahban]

God creating life with the ability to evolve? He did. But how much? How fast? Not enough to explain the fossil record. So why hold on to evolution as a total answer? It is just part of a bigger picture painted by God.

[gore3000]

My training and most of my work career has been in the fields of chemistry and chemical engineering. The theory of evolution kind of looks okay at the macro level, but at the level of chemistry it sure seems to fall apart.

Not just at the chemical level. At the biological level it falls apart, specifically at the development of a 100 trillion cell organism from a single cell and all that implies. It also breaks down at the logical level. Let's consider this - there are many ways in which organisms reproduce - sexually, asexually, eggs, livebearing, seeds, pollen, fruits, etc. How is it possible for a species to transform the way it reproduces and still be able to continue to exist while this change goes on. Specifically let's consider the change from (as evolutionists claim) egg laying reptiles to live bearing mammals? How did this transformation occur while the species kept reproducing? This is a transformation which required numerous changes in the organism, not just one little change. It is a transformation which would have required millions and millions of years at the least. How could the species have kept reproducing while such a change went on when we know that even fairly small differences in the genetic makeup make it impossible for different species to reproduce with each other? How could such a thing have happened? Not a single evolutionist will say.

Oh, and one more thing:

NO, THERE ARE NO BONES SHOWING THIS HAPPENING

[Ahban]

For slow birth rates with the larger animals, I would expect a new family to emerge in about 100,000 years

A reasonable evolutionary assumption, It HAS to happen at at least that rate to explain the fossil record. Much shorter times with smaller animals, as you point out. But the best VadeRetro can do is to show a small (rat-cat sized) animal POSSIBLY (based mostly on teeth alone) diverging into a new species or maybe genus over the course of 5 million years.

OK, let's say that happend. Throw in 1,000 events like it that he can't find. That still does not come close to explaining what we know, and that is his self declared best card.

[Ahban]

Thank you. It does seem to have some of them terrible upset though.

[Ahban]

I think we really do not even have to do that. If evolution is happening all the time then there should be species 'in the middle' at any given point in time - such as right now. There are no such species between families right now

I see what you mean. Nature is discontinuous. That's why taxonomy works, much to the chagrin of the evolutionary priesthood. I think Denton made that point in the old book "Evolution, A Theory in Crisis".

[general_re]

my family definition: A family is a group of related species, morphologically similiar, who share a set of physical characteristics, which are not posessed in total by any other group.

What sounds easy in theory often turns out to rather difficult to do in practice. As an example, this definition...

For the felines for example, they would be placental carnivore mammals that have retractable claws.

...is broken right off the bat. Your definition of "felines" excludes cheetahs but includes sea otters. Keep trying ;)

[Physicist]

A family is a group of related species,

Very thin ice. How do you establish whether they're related or not? What does "related" mean in the context of special creation?

morphologically similiar, who share a set of physical characteristics, which are not posessed in total by any other group.

That's a highly subjective definition; traits that are crucial to one taxonomist may be totally discounted by another. Biblical taxonomy lumps bats in with the birds, presumably because wings are a more important trait than hair or lactation. The term "pachyderm" used to comprise such disparate animals as elephants, rhinoceri, hippopotami and tapirs.

[Tribune7]

:-)

[Ahban]

Proving, I suppose, that sea otters evolved from cats whilst cheetas did not. I have a sneaking suspecion that the technical details of the sea otters claws are disimilar in structure to that of the cats, and that the cheetah retains the similiar structure, in fact cheetah claws can partially retract.

OK, how many of THESE cat traits does an otter have...

The structure of the felid eye shows various adaptations for increased visual acuity. The pupil and the lens, in the eye of an animal capable of seeing in very dim light, are much enlarged relative to the size of the retina, the layer of light sensitive cells at the back of the eye. The high proportion of extremely light sensative cells in the retina (rods), compared to the cells optimized for vision in high intensity lighting (cones), allows the felids to be well suited for low light conditions. The retina in nocturnal animals, including the cats, are rendered even more effective by the addition of a reflective layer behind the retina, the tapetum lucidum. Light that has passed through the retina without being absorbed, and therefore not sensed by the cells of the retina, is reflected by the tapetum, passes back through the retina, and thus has another chanse of being registered by a detector cell. The light that is not detected by the retina, during both passes through the eye, is reflected out of the eye through the pupil and creates the distinctive yellow-green eyeshine when observing cats at night. The eye structure of the felids greatly improves the light gathering ability of the eyes and results in night vision about six times better than that of humans.


The tongue of the cat is peculiar among the carnivores. Although it is primairly a body cleaning tool, it is also an important part of the feeding apparatus. The upper surface of the tongue is covered with short pointed projections called papillae, giving it the apperance of a wood rasp. Although small and somewhat insignificant in the house cats, the papillae of large cats are fromidable instruments. Scraps of meat and other food items are easily separated from the surface of bone by passing the tongue over the area to be cleaned. Hand feeding captive cubs is often aided by the insertion of a finger into the mouth, initiating the succling instinct, and quickly replacing it with the nipple of the bottle. This sucking on fingers and thumbs is apparently enjoyable for the felids, as it is for the humans, and the process is often observed with adult cats and their handlers. Thumb sucking by adult felids often results in bleeding thumbs and fingers, actually scraped raw by the rasping action of the papillae on the skin.

Dentition is reduced in felids; shortening the jaw results in increased force at the bite point. The dental formula is 3/3, 1/1, 2-3/2, 1/1 = 28-30. The incisors are small and chisel-like. The canines vary from medium-sized to enormous in the extinct sabertooth cats. The upper canine is larger than the lower. The first premolar is absent; the second, when present, is atrophied. The molar is small and simple in structure. Carnassials are very well developed and cheek teeth are exclusively of the shearing type; cats do not crush or grind their food.

[Ahban]

ping

[Ahban]

Special creation does not rule out speciation, especially through loss of information through specialization or isolation. "Related species" can mean just the same thing as it does to an evo.

Word definitions are to some extent subjective. All words are defined by other words, so you could run a person around in circles over 'bout any definition if you are inclined to lawyering over truth seeking. I am not going to argue with you about "what the meaning of is is". The definition I gave for "family" is as objective as any most textbooks give for the word "evolution".