Darwin Was Wrong About Geology

CEH ^ | December 2, 2009

[GodGunsGuts]

Dec 2, 2009 — Field geologists have revisited a site Darwin visited on the voyage of the Beagle, and found that he incorrectly interpreted what he found.  A large field of erratic boulders in Tierra del Fuego that have become known as “Darwin’s Boulders” were deposited by a completely different process than he thought.  The modern team, publishing in the Geological Society of America’s December issue of the GSA Today,¹ noted that “Darwin’s thinking was profoundly influenced by Lyell’s obsession with large-scale, slow, vertical movements of the crust, especially as manifested in his theory of submergence and ice rafting to explain drift.”  Lyell, in turn, felt vindicated: “Lyell celebrated these observations because they supported his idea of uniformitarianism—that continued small changes, as witnessed in the field, could account for dramatic changes of Earth’s surface over geologic time.”  In this case, though, a more rapid phenomenon provides a better explanation for the observations...

[RoadGumby]

Natural Law, the words ‘no longer applicable’ do not equate with ‘incomplete’.

The Bible is EXACTLY as complete as God intended for us to have. He is not fallible.

The Roman Catholic Church is a different subject, it has teachings I disagree with. My Savior is Christ, not a church, not a priest, not a Pope, certainly not Mary.

IF the Roman Catholic Church accepts ideas counter to the Bible, then, IMHO, they are Wrong. Sorry if that upsets you.
If you can point at the writings you call ‘Scripture’ and then say they are ‘wrong’ or ‘incomplete’, then you are just as wrong. Sorry if that upsets you.

[Blood of Tyrants]

Why don’t you figure out what the odds of a few hundred thousand amino acids (and of all the amino acids, only the ones that form living things) getting together in just the right combination and shape to from a living creature? (Hint: start multiplying 1x2x3x4....100,000)

[Blood of Tyrants]

Look, believe in the evolution lie all you want. I don’t care one way or another.

[Moonman62]

That’s an incorrect model. A particular protein can be coded in many different ways, plus the model must account for cumulative selection.

[Natural Law]

"The Bible is EXACTLY as complete as God intended for us to have."

Your beef is not with me. I didn't bring up the subject of "ignore that part of the bible", "this part has been superseded", "this is literal, that isn't", "this is symbolic, but that isn't". I only responded. Even you will not stand behind every word and phrase in the bible because you have applied some filter like the examples I published above.

Your beef is that I look to the Roman Catholic Church, whom I believe to be guided by the Holy Spirit and governed by Apostolic Succession, instead of Calvin, Luther, the Rev. Billy-Bob Rolex, and the Young Earth Creationists for that guidance.

[RoadGumby]

You endorse evolution. It is false. The Roman Catholic Church, per you, I would imagine, endorses it also.

My beef is a bunch of evo’s deliberately attempting to discredit the Bible, beginning in Genesis, calling it a lie, or, in your case, ‘incomplete’.

We are called to walk by Faith, not by sight. I care not a wit what your man-made theories say regarding our origins. My Faith says we were Created by God from the dust of the earth, He breathed life into us, NOT a precursor to us.

[Natural Law]

1) Neo-anything is "pseudo-taxonomy", it is undefinable since theories change on a constant basis.

2) "Doctrines" are external mechanisms applied to the body of science, they are not science.

3) Punctuated Equilibrium would seem to have been around a long time if you are 70. Within the context of evolutionary processes Punctuated Equilibrium was indeed discussed by Dr. Niles Eldredge in 1971 and Dr. Stephen Gould in 1972. However, even in this field there are a number of historical antecedents. Eldredge and Gould relied heavily on the works of Dr. Thomas Dobzhansky (Genetics and the Origin of Species 1937), Dr. Ernest Mayr (Systematics and the Origin of Species 1942), Dr. George G. Simpson (Tempo and Mode in Evolution 1944).

4) I'm more convince now than before that I was right in my earlier posting.

[Natural Law]

"You endorse evolution. It is false. The Roman Catholic Church, per you, I would imagine, endorses it also."

99% of all of the Christians that are alive or have ever lived have been Roman Catholics. That is a whole lotta opportunity for the Holy Spirit to guide and influence. If you believe that Heaven is reserved for that 1% who have been clever enough to break the code then either you alone will be saved or will be qualified to write a Dan Brown novel.......I'm just sayin'.....

[aruanan]

1) Neo-anything is "pseudo-taxonomy", it is undefinable since theories change on a constant basis.

You're appealing to an ad hoc definition to define something you want to exclude as undefinable. It isn't working.

2) "Doctrines" are external mechanisms applied to the body of science, they are not science.

Again, you're making up definitions in an ad hoc fashion.

3) Punctuated Equilibrium would seem to have been around a long time if you are 70. Within the context of evolutionary processes Punctuated Equilibrium was indeed discussed by Dr. Niles Eldredge in 1971 and Dr. Stephen Gould in 1972. However, even in this field there are a number of historical antecedents. Eldredge and Gould relied heavily on the works of Dr. Thomas Dobzhansky (Genetics and the Origin of Species 1937), Dr. Ernest Mayr (Systematics and the Origin of Species 1942), Dr. George G. Simpson (Tempo and Mode in Evolution 1944).

Geez, there are historical antecedents to everything in every field. Even Newton said he saw what he did because he stood on the shoulders of giants. Eldredge and Gould without doubt read the works of Dobzhansky, Mayr, and Simpson, but what they proposed was not a repackaging or reworking (heavy reliance) of any of these scientists. Mayr, from whom Eldredge got some ideas about geographic speciation, said as much when he congratulated Gould and Eldredge on their way of dealing with the problem of evolutionary stasis. Gould and Eldredge proposed relatively rapid evolutionary change that was still the result of gradual changes but over a period of geological time too short to be "documented" by fossilized representatives across the period of the change. You could say this idea of rapid change was anticipated by Simpson in Tempo and Mode when he discussed differing rates of evolution, but it wasn't the clear exposition of punctuated equilibrium that Gould and Eldredge's work is recognized for. Nor was G&E's idea of PE a repackaging of Simpson's ideas of "quantum evolution" that he derived earlier from Wright's work on random genetic drift.

If anything, they held to the by then-standard view of evolutionary change as being the result of changes acquired through random genetic mutations and selected for by physical environment and competition from other living things. One of the messages I got from Gould's Wonderful Life: The Burgess Shale and the Nature of History, was that in the environment crap happens and that when it does certain mutations are more heavily favored than others and are able to take advantage of the change and predominate in their niche and do it all in a geologically relative short span of time. If the crap hit the fan in a different manner then something else would have developed in a different way. As the characteristics of biological life are contingent on random genetic mutations, so species, their appearance in the geological record, longevity, degree of dominance, and disappearance are contingent on random changes in environmental conditions.

4) I'm more convince [sic] now than before that I was right in my earlier posting.

You're too easily convinced.