Common Creationist Arguments - Pseudoscience

http://www.stardestroyer.net/Creationism/Arguments/Pseudoscience.shtml ^

[Aquinasfan]

Now as for the so-called "irreducible systems like the eye and the flagella," if evolution had an explanation for those, would you then abandon ID?

I've probably heard it before. But feel free to post a link.

[Heartlander]

“The degree of complexity tells us one is designed and one is not. Similarly, we know a rock bridge can form by natural processes alone, but the Golden Gate Bridge was designed.

Some will say that this analogy is true for art and engineering, but not for biological systems. Even though a fine painting or the Golden Gate Bridge obviously didn't just happen by chance, biological systems have ongoing processes that don't occur with paints or bridge components. I agree that this contention has some truth. However, as noted above, even in biological systems, undirected evolution of functional complexity still has theoretical problems (ie the math situation mentioned above). Therefore, I still contend that complexity, whether in biological or nonbiological systems, can give evidence for design.

One more comment. Some scientists simply say that an intelligent design hypothesis has no place in science. However, this assumption is generally made without scientific support as to why it is true. In fact, the search for intelligent design is used all the time in certain aspects of science. For instance, forensic science tries to discern if a possible crime was an accident or "designed." Similarly, archeological science looks for evidence of design and seeks the identity of the designers.

Some people counter this argument by saying that for archeology or crime cases, we know there could be an intelligent person behind the observation (ie we know that people commit crimes or make artifacts). On the other hand, in the case of living systems, we haven't ever seen one originated by a personal designer.

One flaw with this response is that the same criticism can apply to saying evolution produced very diverse creatures. We have never seen a new creature arise simply by random, natural processes. In making this statement, I am excluding small developments created by artificial breeding. This would include fruit fly "species" that cannot mate with each other, as well as some plant breeding phenomena. These developments involve very small effects compared to what must happen to start with slime molds and evolve biochemists and race car drivers.

There is another flaw with the "we never saw this" statement. Just because one has never seen a divine designer, doesn't automatically mean one does not exist. Unless there is reason to rule out the possibility of a designer for living species, then one is possible. “

Robert DiSilvestro, Ph.D. Biochemistry

[Aquinasfan]

Why? If the situation is stable, so should be the critters adapted to take advantage of that situation.

Because by definition every creature descended from some other creature by small variation. These transitional forms should fill the fossil record. Instead, all we see is morphological stasis.

One especially abrupt appearance of new forms occurred in the Cambrian explosion.

[Doctor Stochastic]

So you are claiming that rock bridges are not designed, but natural? Formed by natural processes? No designer at all?

[PatrickHenry]

Me: "Now as for the so-called irreducible systems like the eye and the flagella, if evolution had an explanation for those, would you then abandon ID?"

You: I've probably heard it before. But feel free to post a link.

Junior has all those links at his fingertips. Perhaps he'll take the time to give them to you. However, you really didn't answer the question, which I now repeat: "... if evolution had an explanation for those, would you then abandon ID?"

[Aquinasfan]

The entire population of the daughter species is reproductively isolated from the parent species. It doesn't work with one individual -- you need a breeding population.

OK. I don't get it.

As far as I can tell, the "daughter species" gets isolated geographically from the "parent species." Over time, members of the daughter species mutate. Eventually the cumulative effect of the variations makes it impossible for members of the daughter species to mate with members of the parent species.

So far so good?

My problem is, somewhere along the line one member of the daughter species mutated enough to become reproductively isolated from the parent species. But at the same time that creature must necessarily be reproductively isolated from the other members of the daughter species, unless an opposite sex member of the daughter species mutated comparably simultaneously.

[Aquinasfan]

"... if evolution had an explanation for those, would you then abandon ID?"

It would certainly affect my opinion. I don't know whether it would be decisive. Like everyone else, my judgement is based on my assessment of all of the evidence that I have seen. As in the case of the woodpecker, I usually find the ID or Creationist explanation to better conform to the evidence.

[Heartlander]

”…we know a rock bridge can form by natural processes alone…

I am quoting my initial quote.
To answer your question, yes, a rock bridge can form by natural process.

[Doctor Stochastic]

What features show the rock bridge to not be designed?

[medved]

My problem is, somewhere along the line one member of the daughter species mutated enough to become reproductively isolated from the parent species. But at the same time that creature must necessarily be reproductively isolated from the other members of the daughter species, unless an opposite sex member of the daughter species mutated comparably simultaneously.

Not only does that sort of thing not happen in nature, but they sat there for years trying to cause that to happen with fruit flies which produce new generations every few days and could not figue a way to. Kind of like saying that a time machine or a faster than light volkswagon is too complicated for man to build but, if you wait long enough, it'll just sort of come together naturally...

[Junior]

No, no, no. At one point a member of the isolated daughter species mutates just enough not to interbreed with the parent species, but not enough to not interbreed with the rest of the daughter species. The daughter species has been moving genetically away from the mother species all that time.

Don't picture a breeding population as a point along a spectrum, picture them as a cloud of dots, denser in the center and sparser on the fringes. When a daughter population is split from the group, picture that dense center splitting and gradually moving apart. For awhile the fringes are quite capable of intermixing, but as the dense centers move farther and farther apart the fringes become less and less interactive until there is nothing linking the two clouds any more.

[Heartlander]

The same features as a sand dune.

We are about to embark into a circular argument that can go both ways. The question is Intelligent Design and I understand the natural design argument that you are about to pose…

But your argument is that everything occurred naturally – Life, the Universe, and everything. That being the case, I will stick with Douglas Adams’ answer of 42 – it makes as much sense. It is meaningless.

[Virginia-American]

So first of all, I am very suspicious of that statement.

If I understand the following reference correctly, the base pairs under discussion are in fact identical.

good discussion of this stuff

Secondly, that would be an example of devolution - making a species less fit. Mutations seem to do that.

True, most mutations are harmful. However, this particualr one did not decrease the fitness of the organism, as it preusmably ate fruit, like modern people and chimps do. It did decrease the fitness of 'limeys' many millenia later (that's how ascorbic acid was discovered)

one mutation made it unworkable in both man and chimp is not to be wondered at. It is a slim chance, but not an impossible coincidence.

Read the article I linked to, this isn't the only such 'coincidence'.

Lastly, the genes of different species are never the same even if they code for the same function

Not true. The genes I'm talking about are a counterexample.

Thanks for a civil reply.

[VadeRetro]

A proof of the Behe school runs, "I don't understand how this could evolve, therefore it was designed."

A reply of the Dawkins school says, "Evolution is smarter than you are."

[VadeRetro]

VadeRetro: What is the barrier that prevents "microevolutionary" changes from accumulating indefinitely to "macroevolutionary" in reproductively isolated populations?

[picture of actual fossilized series follows]

Aquinasfan: The minor problem of the lack of fossil evidence, your example of the shell notwithstanding.

No! No! No weasely escapes. The state of the evidence, no matter how you lawyer it, cannot be a real-world barrier.

Darwin was puzzled by the fossil record, but he was only the first evolutionist. Real-deal scientists of today are not particularly baffled by the fossil record we see. For the most part, you just have to know where to dig.

The state of the evidence is not a barrier. What is the barrier?

Just an aside: what if the lurkers aren't as dumb as you're clearly hoping?

[Doctor Stochastic]

If ID cannot be distinguished from natural causes, why add the complexity of a designer?

[VadeRetro]

Darwin was puzzled by the fossil record, but he was only the first evolutionist.

Strictly speaking, Darwin was only the first Darwinist.

It is a feature of creationist arguments that every puzzlement and every dispute that has ever taken place among evolutionists since 1859 lives on--in creationist arguments.

[Heartlander]

On the contrary, ID can be distinguished from natural design. Example = computer vs. rock. The argument as posed above is quite simply; the obvious distinction between intelligent design vs. natural occurrence is not being applied to biology.

[f.Christian]

Not only does that sort of thing not happen in nature, but they sat there for years trying to cause that to happen with fruit flies which produce new generations every few days and could not figue a way to. Kind of like saying that a time machine or a faster than light volkswagon is too complicated for man to build but, if you wait long enough, it'll just sort of come together naturally...

710 posted on 3/19/02 9:44 AM Hawaii-Aleutian by medved

Too funny---

"a time machine or a faster than light volkswagon is too complicated for man to build but, if you wait long enough, it'll just sort of come together naturally..."

Evolution is the millenium 3000 Brooklyn Bridge--hale bopp!

[VadeRetro]

I posted you number 680.

In 706, you told Junior:

My problem is, somewhere along the line one member of the daughter species mutated enough to become reproductively isolated from the parent species. But at the same time that creature must necessarily be reproductively isolated from the other members of the daughter species, unless an opposite sex member of the daughter species mutated comparably simultaneously.

This shouldn't be happening. You don't refute. You just repeat, having ignored every correction of your absurdly bad strawman model of what punk-eek doesn't say.

You don't want to be like gore3000, do you? He's the poster boy for Holy Warriors who brazen too long and can't acknowledge error or even slink away. So now, like the flying Dutchman, he's condemned to twist in the breeze, pretending he can't see requests to explain his false claims.

Don't go there. Learn to read the other side, answer their questions, incorporate new information, correct errors, and be an intelligent participant in an intelligent dialogue.