Posted on 10/10/2009 9:32:40 AM PDT by GodGunsGuts
Discovery of 4.4 Million-Year-Old Fossil Does Not Shake Creationists' Faith
By RUSSELL GOLDMAN
Oct. 7, 2009
Sometimes an ape is a 4.4 million-year-old fossil that sheds light on the evolutionary origins of human beings, and sometimes… an ape is just an ape.
In the case of "Ardi," the ape-like fossil recently discovered in Ethiopia and already being celebrated as the oldest found relative of modern human beings, the final determination depends on who is doing the talking.
In one camp are evolutionary scientists who last week published and hailed the discovery of an upright walking ape named Ardipithecus ramidus, or "Ardi" for short, who made Ethiopia her home nearly 5 million years ago.
But despite the excitement from the paleontology community, another group of researchers, many of them with advanced degrees in science, are unimpressed by Ardi, who they believe is just another ape...
(Excerpt) Read more at abcnews.go.com ...
Let's back off from the gaps for a moment and return to your claim that every bit of evidence found to date shows Darwin to be wrong. While I will be the first to agree with scientists that the evolutionary record is not complete, I would also agree with them that there is a great deal of evidence supporting the concept of transition between some species over millions of years. Why would you call them wrong? How does everything listed on that site refute Darwin?
Gaps can be explained by the sheer improbability of a given species being fossilized. Take a walk through the woods some time and list the remains of animals you find. How many deer skeletons do you see? How many bear or beaver or squirrel or bird skeletons do you find? Not many would be my guess. Is it because the the number of animals who die in the woods is remarkably small? Or would a more reasonable explanation for the lack of whole skeletons be the fact that scavengers tend to scatter the remains all over the place? Why should it have been any different millions of years ago? Fossils are rare because the process needed to fossilize them was specific and virtually all that died back then did so under conditions that did not lend themselves to fossilization. Add to that the fact that we're talking of a period of millions of years and gaps are not surprising. But science continues to look and find the answers. Unlike creationists they haven't stopped their search.
You are not alone.
I have faith that an intelligent conservatism that recognizes that reason, logic and the honest pursuit of knowledge is mankind's highest calling, will prevail and we will not return to the dark ages.
If not, Conservatism is destined for the dustbin of history.
Why?
"Why would you call them wrong? How does everything listed on that site refute Darwin?"
I didn't say everything on that site refuted darwin. However, I am curious how they explain the "species could have appeared suddenly".
"Gaps can be explained by the sheer improbability of a given species being fossilized."
Then please explain why most fossils found are "evolutioned". We have many many species, including humans. With that many species, would common sense not dictate there would be many times more "evoluting" fossils found? Where are all the freaky evoluting species? Where the heck are all the inbetweens???
"Fossils are rare because the process needed to fossilize them was specific and virtually all that died back then did so under conditions that did not lend themselves to fossilization."
Then why do we find so many "evolutioned" species and not any "in the process of evolution" species?
"Fossils are rare"
Then why do we have so many of them?
"But science continues to look and find the answers."
Actually, the only thing they're doing is looking and coming up short of answers.... to their own questions that is. They have answered mine....."species could have appeared suddenly,"....which is what I have stated in my 1st post.
You did....."No. Most PhD's ask you don't call them doctor."
"yes, MEDICAL doctors insist upon being called doctor."
Yes, we get a couple here and there. Most MD's just give us their name, WITHOUT the Dr. But those phd's...boy are they sensitive little pansies!!!
You still don’t explain your lack of the “inbetweens”....which is what evolution means. Where are they?
Evolution. Some details are taught in schools, some more at the college level. By the way, there are non-deterministic algorithms, which out of chaos either create complex and information-rich data (e.g. programs for de novo design of peptides/proteins, based on Monte Carlo or genetic algorithms) or even self-program certain capabilities (e.g. artificial neural networks).
Ah, mere "songs" in the Bible, songs, which should not be interpreted literally? So maybe the Genesis is also an allegorical introduction to the Scriptures?
"And how do those verses say that the universe is geocentric?"
If the Earth is unmovable, and the Sun sets and rises, it implies that it circles the Earth.
"BTW, don’t scientists say *sunrise* and *sunset*? Don’t astronomers use the term *celestial shpere* when describing the heavens? Does that mean that they think the sun moves around the earth and that the earth in in the middle of a dome?"
My point exactly. We often abbreviate and simplify, but it does not mean these simplifications and abbreviations represent the whole and only truth. So abbreviates and simplifies the Bible, and you correctly argue that the Bible does it with respect to astronomy. Right? So why suddenly the passages which can be associated with biology are to be read literally?
Why would a narrative account be interpreted allegorically? Why would poetry be interpreted literally?
Have you no sense of grammatical style?
I take it then that you think that Abraham, Issac, and Joseph were also allegorical?
The Egyptians and the Middianites?
The cities of the plain?
If that is the criteria for interpreting the first few chapters of Genesis, then tell me why the rest of Genesis isn't interpreted allegorically, and how you make the distinction as to whether to interpret part of a book in one sense, and then change midstream and interpret it differently.
It’s not the topic at hand that determines how passages are to be read. It’s grammatical style.
Learn something about grammar, first.
Learn yourself. Poetic/allegorical expressions can be made without rhymes and melody. Anyway, the references to geocentricity and flat Earth are not only in the Psalms. If you treat the Genesis literally, treat them too.
The Scriptural Basis for a Geocentric Cosmology
http://hypertextbook.com/eworld/geocentric.shtml
Then answer the question.
I do interpret it allegorically, or just as a statement that God created (by some undisclosed means) the Universe, the Earth, and life. As for the Bible in general, I consider it a treatise about morality and ethics, not about natural sciences.
You are a lost soul, as am I...I will pray for the both of us.
What is an "in the process of evolution" species? What are you looking for, and how would we know it when we found it?
Where are all the freaky evoluting species? Where the heck are all the inbetweens???
The questions you're asking are the equivalent of asking why the offspring of a black parent and a white parent doesn't come out striped or checkerboard. I know I talked to someone else here once who really expected to find animals with four legs plus small, unformed wings, like Spyro, as the transitional between land animals and flying animals:
Is that the kind of thing you think evolution calls for? Because if so, you're mistaken.
True that many subjects in past centuries have been attributed to intelligence, or even deity, that later came to be understood as having a naturalistic explanation (an eclipse for example).
But regarding complex, specific information, we have numerous examples, experiences, and knowledge how information of this type comes about—and it is, and has always been, without fail, the result of an intelligent cause. We see such everyday.
So there is an explanation (intelligence) for the observed cause (origin of information). We could not say that about an eclipse because we had never seen an intelligent agent cause an eclipse or celestial event. So to prescribe intelligence to a celestial event was to reach for a mechanism that had never been observed. Not so with information.
Perhaps some naturalistic explanation will be demonstrated conclusively someday for the origin of the first biological information. Right now there is no naturalistic explanation. However, we do know a mechanism for how information arises, yet, strangely, to put this on the table as an explanation for the information in DNA is somehow prohibitive.
As I understand it, many evolutionist will say that evolution cannot, nor is within the scope of evolution, to explain the origin of the first DNA. So I would say evolution does not explain it.
Algorithms are intelligently designed and always, when looked at closely, infused with intelligence with an end in site, or at least a defined goal.
“First DNA” , “at least a defined goal.” - It’s called theistic evolution, and my personal views are not far from it. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theistic_evolution
Liberals really don’t like the word liberal. But we knew that.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.