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Chemistry guides evolution, claims theory
NewScientist.com ^ | Jan 20, 2003 | Robert Williams and Joäo José R. Fraústo da Silva

Posted on 01/20/2003 7:01:47 AM PST by forsnax5

That enduring metaphor for the randomness of evolution, a blind watchmaker that works to no pattern or design, is being challenged by two European chemists. They say that the watchmaker may have been blind, but was guided and constrained by the changing chemistry of the environment, with many inevitable results.

The metaphor of the blind watchmaker has been famously championed by Richard Dawkins of the University of Oxford. But Robert Williams, also at Oxford, and Joäo José R. Fraústo da Silva of the Technical University of Lisbon in Portugal say that evolution is not strictly random. They claim Earth's chemistry has forced life to evolve along a predictable progression from single-celled organisms to plants and animals.

Williams and da Silva take as their starting point the earliest life forms that consisted of a single compartment, or vesicle, enclosing the cytoplasm that produced polymers such as RNA, DNA and proteins. That cytoplasm was partly dominated by the reducing chemistry of the primitive oceans and atmosphere from which it formed, and has changed little since, says Williams.

As these primitive cells, or prokaryotes, extracted hydrogen from water they released oxygen, making the environment more oxidising. Ammonia became nitrogen gas, metals were released from their sulphides, and non-metal sulphides became sulphates.

These changes forced the prokaryotes to adapt to use the oxidised elements, and they evolved to harness energy by fixing nitrogen, using oxygen, and developing photosynthesis. But these oxidising elements could also damage the reducing chemistry in the cytoplasm.

For protection, there was just one option: isolate the elements within internal compartments, says Williams. And that gave rise to eukaryotes - single-celled organisms with a nucleus and other organelles.

Quiet revolution

Harold Morowitz, an expert on the thermodynamics of living systems at George Mason University in Fairfax, Virginia, says these ideas are very exciting. "It's part of a quiet paradigm revolution going on in biology, in which the radical randomness of Darwinism is being replaced by a much more scientific law-regulated emergence of life."

According to Williams and da Silva, eukaryotes also had to evolve a way to communicate between their various organelles. The surrounding raw materials dictated how this could be done. Calcium ions would have routinely leaked into cells, precipitating DNA by binding to it. So cells responded by pumping the ions out again.

Eukaryotes evolved to use this calcium flow to send messages across internal and external membranes. Similarly, sodium ions formerly expelled as poisonous became the basis of communication in nerve cells.

Life continued to react to Earth's oxidised environment. Hydrogen peroxide gave rise to lignin - an oxygen-rich polymer that is the chief constituent of wood. And eukaryotes used copper oxidised from copper sulphides to cross-link proteins such as collagen and chitin, which help hold nerve and muscle cells in place. Such evolution of materials suitable for multicellular structures paved the way for plants and animals.

Chicken or egg

Not everyone is convinced. Evolutionary biologist David Deamer of the University of California, Santa Cruz, says the claim that evolution followed an inevitable progression should be qualified: "The inevitability depends on the origin of life and oxygenic photosynthesis."

He agrees that life arose in vesicles, but says that oxidative chemistry cannot explain everything from prokaryotes to humans.

Williams admits their theory has limitations. For instance, he agrees that Dawkins's argument is correct in that chance events drive the development of species. But he does not believe random events drive evolution overall. "Whatever life throws away will become the thing that forces the next step in its development."

However, David Krakauer, an evolutionary theorist at the Santa Fe Institute in New Mexico, says Williams and da Silva have simply listed the chemical processes that coincided with each evolutionary transition, which does not prove that the chemistry caused the transitions. But Williams says that the environmental changes had to come first, because they occur faster than changes in biological systems.


TOPICS: News/Current Events; US: California; US: New Mexico; US: Virginia
KEYWORDS: biology; chemistry; creationism; crevolist; evolution; life; science
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To: Piltdown_Woman
Sorting - The range of sedimentary grain sizes that occurs in sediment or sedimentary rock. The term also refers to the process by which sediments of similar size are naturally segregated during transport and deposition according to the velocity and transporting medium. Well-sorted sediments are of similar size (such as desert sand), while poorly-sorted sediments have a wide range of grain sizes (as in a glacial till). A well-sorted sandstone tends to have greater porosity than a poorly sorted sandstone because of the lack of grains small enough to fill its pores. Conglomerates tend to be poorly sorted rocks, with particles ranging from boulder size to clay size.

IE you don't explain sorting, you describe it with a cited commentary from somewhere. So, let's consider a bag of cat litter, shall we. If I upend it's contents into a pan, what happens? The smaller granular material and the larger pebbles come to rest and sit there. One can blow a fan across the top of the pan and perhaps remove a dusting from the top layer, but it otherwise leaves the lower layers untampered with. IE it will not sort on it's own. Try it. It's a cheap experiment. No matter how long you leave the pan unaffected by other than wind, it will not sort itself. It's a matter of physics. Rather than describe sorting, you migh prevail upon us to explain how it happens in absence of a flood, earthquake or other natural happenstance such as a Volcano.

Liquefaction then occurs in "cohesionless" (won't stick together) material during an eathquake. These materials all display the same characteristic - well-rounded or spherical grains that simply slip past each other during an earthquake to temporarily form a viscous liquid that behaves much like quicksand, as opposed to most clastic material which are not spherically rounded and do tend to "stick together". The process of liquefaction is of some importance not only for earthquake-prone regions today, but also to investigate the extent of earthquakes historically. Paleoliquefaction features in the St. Louis, MO region are being analyzed today as geologists work to understand the extent and potential hazards of the New Madrid (pronounced "MAD-rid" for the uninformed) seismic zone.

Ah, now you are presuming that liquefaction requires an earthquake. How far we've come. Liquifaction doesn't require cohesionless material during a flood. Cohesion is due, not to partical shape; but, to it's particular want to act cohesively under specific circumstances which are governed as readily by the amount of Water present as by the action going on around about it. Try mixing clay sometime. When one adds too much water, clay loses cohesion. This is specifically why water is added to it on a spinning wheel or a block in order to shape it into useful items. It's also why clay gets baked. The absence of water strengthens the cohesive nature of clay. Go buy yourself a box of premixed Marblex craft clay. It comes wet and packaged. It doesn't require baking. and an unsurprising quality of it is that if it becomes humid after once drying, it swells, and cracks - loosing cohesion. This is demonstrable with any number of other soil types as regards their cohesive or adherent properties. The variance is in the amount of water required to destablize. I would think this would be readily apparent too to those who have indoor plumbing and wash their dishes. Food particles act in the same way. Dryed spaghetti sauce is murder to get off a pan; but, sit it in water for an hour or two and it's amazing how the sauce gives up cohesion and decides to act more freely. Simple examples; but, that's part of science - understanding through observation. Not dictums via unproven theory.

Incorrect. I refer you to my previous post and Steno's Laws

Particulate matter is as old as the matter. Something made 200 years ago landing on top soil today and covered in soil will still be 200 years older than the level of the soil it resides in. The dating of the material of the soil itself is quite another matter. The soil wasn't made today, though it lands on the ground today. Clay that has been shaped into a pot is older than the pot itself. Just because you remove the water from it, it doesn't loose it's age. Sedimentation layers on the other hand, are made up of an odd lot of geologic trash if you will that comes to rest on the topsoil today, tomorrow, the next day. Introduce a flood and let nature take it's course - tidal action will mix and sort sediment such that 100, 1000, or 3000 years worth of layering is obscured. It is correct. For once your actual layers give up their original resting place and begin movement either up or down your ability to date via depth is ruined because the depths have changed for each layer of strata being affected. Introduce another event, and you compound the problem. The area around the Mississipi River in certain regions are great examples of this. The river overflows it's banks on a fairly regular basis over time and causes sorting of sedimentary layers continuously. In those regions, dating by depth would not only be folly it would be a grand display of ignorance. The deeper the flood, wider it's range and longer it lasts, the more material is affected. Another factor would be the relative closeness to the water table for the given area. Should be a no brainer; but, theory doens't much care when it's trampling the obvious.

Wrong again. The modeling is highly complex and utilizes Biot's equation to understand wave propagation in soils.

Wave propogation is a property of that which we are discussing. This is true regardless of whether we are talking about an earthquake related event, a flood or volcano. It is inherent. I was arguing in general terms as to the extent to which liquefaction is capable of disturbing layers. Given that wave action is part of liquefaction, it's an argument without a difference to state that wave propogation takes place therefore we arent' addressing full scope. Rather, it is because wave action takes place that the conversation is necessitated. Its as though I said 'how far one can travel in a car is a product of the amount of gas in the vehicle and the variable nature of the efficient use of that gas by the engine so long as the person is in travel' while you retort, 'wrong again, there have to be tires on the car.' Which seems more than a bit disengenous.

I haven't any idea what you are babbling about here. Liquefaction leaves readily-identifiable features such as "sand blows".

As a matter of fact, it does not leave readily identifiable features unless judged on scale. The longer it takes place, the more thorough the sorting and therefore the less evidence of any natural tampering. In otherwords, merely stating it does not make it so. But then Geologists have been studying Valcanos far longer than they have studied liquefaction and only now is it coming out that water levels in the soil and rock around a valcano account for a good part of the devastation created. As water heats and rises above it's normal levels due to magma flow, cohesion of rock and soil is lost at the top layers along the incline of the mound. One would think this would have been considered long ago; but, the blatent obvious doesn't seem to occur. IMO this is part of the problem of specific science. People get so close to what they study that they can't see the bug walking across the leaf of a tree for the forest they are pondering. When the bug occurs to them, we're supposed to throw up our hands and say Eureka, you're smart. Some of us say, "Duh". Not because we have little sympathy for you; but, because any idiot looking at it knows water expands in general terms when you heat it - might have something to do with observing it daily on a stove. If it weren't for the liquefaction studies, the obviety of water meddling in volcanic blasts might not have become so obvious.

No, you have this liquefaction-thing so stuck in your head that reason is given no opportunity or quarter. Bedrock is "the solid rock beneath the soil and superficial rock. A general term for solid rock that lies beneath soil, loose sediments, or other unconsolidated material. By way of example, here is a website that describes the bedrock of Vermont, which include gneisses, carbonates, quartzite, slate, schist and granite. Would you please tell me how liquefaction forms metamorphic bedrock? Perhaps you could also tell me how meters-thick bedrock can be folded and faulted from such liquefaction? Here's a site that might help: Chronological Summary of Bedrock Geology: Madoc Area of Eastern Ontario. Which states that, "the geology is irregularly dominated by 40 or so intrusive plutons and localized deposits of volcanic basalt. Most of the area is underlain by Proterozoic metavolcanics and metasediments which increase in metamorphic grade (degree of thermally induced chemical alteration) from south to north. These structures are typically 27,000 feet thick, and are highly folded and faulted and exhibit regional variations of metamorphic grade."

Now we're being absurd. I didn't argue that liquifaction produced rock or that it bears on rock layer faulting or movement. If I were to consider such things, it would first have to be proven that plate tectonics was other than a theory. Faulting doesn't require any "plate" movement, it merely requires a weakness in the rock strata. That the continents lie on the sea floor is without question. That they are attached irretrievably to some moving plate is quite another thing that is neither required nor hinted at. We know the continents were once joined. For them to come unjoined they had to detach, accelerate apart then decelerate. Deceleration of something so massive, no matter how it is accomplished will affect the mass. This is viewable in the massive horizontal compression of North American rock strata, which I believe Walt Brown Discusses. In fact, here is an example he employs:

..Now, if horizontal compression can cause this, then it can also weaken lower layers sufficiently to cause ongoing faulting which would not require any would be plate movement. Volcanoes take time to mount up and build enough pressure to cause an eruption. It's as simple to understand as acne or an infection. Something which I would imagine everyone here not only has experience with; but, can readily speak to. Pressure builds as Magma escapes and mounds up. Over time, the mound will tend to lose stability due to saturation. Once the smooth upward flow of magma is impared by Natural limitations of the material to continue building up, it is only a matter of time before the top blows off and the process begins anew. And Water saturation is a large part of earthquakes. How it bears on the whole picture is worth discussion; but, plate tectonics are not required for Quakes any more than for volcanoes. The reason quakes can't be predicted is pretty simple. It's as obvious as why tectonics is theory.

Yes, indeed! Sedimentation takes a VERY long time. Now you're catching on!

Gee. That sedimentation takes a long time is part of my ongoing argument. It is the reason that a flood can imasculate reasonable attempts at viewing strata as forms of measurement. Long periods of time measured in sedimentation can be disrupted quickly with a minor flood or a major one. If it didn't take a long time, flooding would have little impact on the reading of it. Who needs to catch up? It's obvious you know something. What you know is not in question. What is in question is whether or not what you were taught is correct - that is not a measure of your intelligence. What would be is your willingness to hold to faulty notions just because that's the way you were taught. In which case generations of idiots can be readily produced by way of schooling.

Well duh! Of course, you nitwit, you've used styrofoam and shaken the beegeezus out of your mixture. Has anyone spoken to you about appropriate models for your "system"? Perhaps something you should investigate.

And why do you think I chose it?! Nitwit indeed. Example should be chosen on it's ability to clearly relate a problem and demonstrate it as such. One needen't shake the 'beegeezus' out of the mixture but merely duplicate tidal action. One could as easily employ any number of things. But in illustrating a problem, you make it obvious. One wonders if you protest the obviety of the example or the example itself given that.

BTW, a geologist who is unable to identify regressions, transgression and turbidites isn't worth the ink his or her degree is printed on.

In the modern where it is apparent, that may be the case. But in the Geological record as it is want to be called, it is another matter altogether when past events are unknowns. What this tends to render is an analysis of the evidence that is not so much a matter of the facts as of how well it is liked or deemed to fit preconcieved notions. The which is our general debating point. One might as well say that a scientist who isn't able to prove by scientific method that which he hypothesized and proclaimed fact isn't worth the ink his degree is printed on. Which leads us right back to evolution.

It is interesting then that insurance companies rely upon my "largely useless" geologic principals.

Begs the question. In old times, in whom did sailors put their trust that the earth was flat and they could sail off of it?

Oooooh! I guess aeolian sandstones are simply a figment of many collective imaginations. Tell me, oh Grand Poobah of Geology, then how can liquefaction explain relic dune structures found in many sandstones?

Many sandstones. Gee, there we are again - not all sandstone forms in the same way. You admit it but want yet another tangent. How about we do one better and ask how you explain cross grained sandstone layers that are deposited in all directions on the semi vertical and topped with a horizontal layer..

Hmmm...if my notions are so nonsensical, then why is sandstone made up of silicon dioxide? Given your hypotheses, sandstone could be made up of anything...even coal.

Here you are matching the behavior I was dealing with before in another. I didn't say this nor did I alude to it. Sandstone is obviously sand - thus sillicon. Try going back and actually reading what I said and responding to that rather than making things up as you go. Seems to be a standard pattern with you guys. Perhaps if you go off in enough directions, the argument will get lost or people will get confused - eh?

Pure gibberish. Had you submitted this paragraph to me as an assignment, I would have given you an "F".

Not gibberish. You just seem incapable of following without pictures I would presume,

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
BBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBB
CCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCC
DDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDD
EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE
figure 1

A represents top most layer and e the bottom most for our demonstration. strata dating would hold that layer A is the newest and E the oldest. However, knowing that layers are put down as an amalgam, we should see the following instead:

ABECADBCAEDABECADBCAEDBCAD
DBCAEDABECADBCAEDBCADCDABE
ABECADBCCABCADBEDCAAEDBCAD
ABEBBCADCEECDABEDBCAEDBCAD
ABECADBCAEDABECADBCAEDBCAD
figure 2

Now, if we know layers are mixed at the outset and yet we are seeing well defined strata - seperated as in figure 1, then we must ask why it doesn't actually look like figure 2 and explain how it got that way. Sedimentation is a random Chaos as it neither lays a uniform uncontaminated sheet of one type of pariculate matter, nor does it lay that matter in a uniform way as regards volume depth across a plane. Sand dunes are a very good example of this - there is a wave action that presents itself in the appearance of the sediment drifting. This is not, however, what is seen in subsurface strata. And if strata are a cross section of one time top soil amalgam sediments frozen in time, then they should reflect behavior as having been such. Absent that, you have explaining to do on how the chaos produced uniformity and why. Which puts us right back to the central argument again. Clever that.

Need I remind you that the "Theory of Gravity" is exactly that...a theory. You have not made any cohesive or convincing argument.

And I would remind you that the "Theory of Gravity" is a theory that is actually falsifiable. The laws of Gravity are testable and have been tested endlessly - ie it is observeable. This is something that evolutionary arguments do not have. It is the difference between Actual science and Junk science. Actual science is falsifiable. Junk science swims in a pool of theory that resists proof and rather condemns the assertion of the truth that it is not proven.

Again, your babbling makes it difficult to ascertain exactly what you are driving at, but I sense an insult. Tut, tut, my dear fellow...a college education just might be of some assistance. I suggest you try it.

Babbling? No. Just restating in sum that you evolutionists feel mocked when one points out that your endless theorizing with no proof and no falsifiable testing as junk science. No doubt you do sense an insult. But when you are looking for something to disagree with, how can one blame you for trying to insult yourself in another's words even when it isn't there. We have to be the bad guy otherwise the self-righteousness you present yourself with seems misplaced. Perhaps that is what confuses you. Should I act nasty and make you feel better?

Please tell me which Universities are currently teaching a course in "Creationist Liquefaction Studies".

Please tell me which universities are actually held accountable for what they teach and held to prove that about which they theorize. I think that's a rather blatent "touche'".

141 posted on 01/26/2003 5:04:32 PM PST by Havoc ((Honor above convenience))
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To: Right Wing Professor
You claimed geologists hadn't thought about it. Some geologists have made it their life work, and that has precious little to do with 'liquefaction'. Other geologists actively study how sedimentary deposits are transformed into rock.

A matter of argumentation, or did you miss that in being hypertechnical and overly focused? I thought it obvious what I was getting at was quite simple and straight forward. Liquefaction studies are fairly new in regard to how serious they are taken. Just as the effect of Water saturation on volcanic domes is a fairly recent thing for them to get worked up about. Go back and look at early geology at the time these theories of strata dating methods were coming about and see how much discussion you can find on liquefaction. Truth is that Global catastrophies are only considered *if* there is no linkage to Christianity. The Scientific community by and large utterly rejects a Global flood and will not entertain discussion of the notion without dismissiveness as though it were some quack theory. That is what we call Bias. Though all the signs be there right under their noses. If it were a burned house we were examining, by comparison, Scientists would look for every other concieveable notion that might destroy a structure before relenting to the notion that wood being charred meant that there had been a fire. Geologists don't pay it much heed with regard to old strata.

We were talking tertiary and quaternary strata here. Do try to keep up. Pleistocene and late quaternary deposits aren't ancient, and largely they aren't 'rock' either. They still show stratigraphy that can be integrated into a self-consistitent and logical picture of the last 10 million years or so, on the great plains.

In terms of this argument and time in general, that is ancient. And I'd argue that your 10 million years figure is arbitrary. You might as well say 20. It lends no proof to what you say. Strata is strata. It might make for interesting conversation; but, the idea that depth or placement relative to depth elsewhere means age is ludicrous unless you can prove continuity and absence of natural meddling or contamination. You can do none of these things. And furthermore, you can't fix any accurate dating. The only reason an Ancient earth is argued for is that it gives evolution time to play about and stack up happenstances one after another for which the odds against any one of them ever occuring is astronomical. to say nothing of the odds of all of it happening. The earth neither has to be very old or very young. It merely has to be what science can prove. And unfortunately, science has been more about creating theories based on bits and pieces rather than identifying facts and following where they lead. One is a waste of time and the other is good investigative technique. You don't go about solving a murder by stating that "the butler did it" then hypothesizing endlessly about the ways in which it might have happened. You do so by looking at the facts and admitting the wife did it, when the evidence leads you there, even if you suspect the butler. Science won't consider anything but the butler and won't follow where the evidence leads. If evolutionists were cops, you'd all be fired for lack of getting anything done and probably sued by the butler for impropriety.

You probably don't believe in plate tectonics either, though. Presumably earthquakes and volcanoes are acts of God, eh?

One doesn't need plates or plate tectonics to have earthquakes or volcanoes either one. I'm sure that statement bothers you; but, then you're being argumentative, so why shouldn't I. Volcanoes happen because a fisure in the strata exposes a path of least resistance through which magma flows upword as a relief of pressure off the core. Magma forms a mound that, over time, destablizes and together with saturation principles causes a restriction to the flow that has been enjoyed up to the point of criticality. Eruptions then occur. And tectonics have neither a place in the process nor is the notion even required for the process to happen. Quakes need only a fault in the strata combined with ground level saturation in order to happen. If plate tectonics were a reality, then why the striations on the ocean floor parallel to continental drift vectors? Right, they just appeared from no where or were formed by slow moving mud flows.. And I'm King of france.

You think there are no signs of eroded mountains in South Dakota and Montana? Have you ever been to either state?

And the pattern continues. Respond to something I haven't said as though astounded that I'd utter such a thing. Be astounded. I didn't utter it. Read.

We use carbon dating to get ages for dinosaurs. Sure.

No kidding.

We can't date back a significant way into the Pleistocene with 14C dating. However, Pleistocene deposits are recent, near the surface, and we can easily extend what we know about the present and the recent past back to the Pleistocene.

So you say anyhow. Wait, see that, the world just stopped in anticipation of hearing how this is accomplished - actual proof for dating..

I can look at 9 million year old ash layers,

No, you can look at ash layers and theorize that they're 9 million years old. What you can prove is quite another thing or we would'nt keep running around in circles while you cite specific dates with nothing to back them up other than an underlying hypothesis.

142 posted on 01/26/2003 5:40:06 PM PST by Havoc ((Honor above convenience))
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To: balrog666
BWAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHAHAHAHA! That one sets a new record for applied stupidity.

Is that why no one will debate him? I've read his work, and he demonstrates what he speaks of. His methods are testable (ie falsifiable) and predictions based on his conclusions time after time are not only possible, but shown to be true. In short, he has everything going for his theory that evolution lacks. To you, I can imagine how threatening that must be.

143 posted on 01/26/2003 5:44:50 PM PST by Havoc ((Honor above convenience))
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To: Right Wing Professor; Piltdown_Woman; Dan Day; balrog666
Boy. I was just talking about remains of things being where they aren't supposed to and what crops up; but, something else for you guys to get in a snit about.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/830123/posts
144 posted on 01/26/2003 6:01:51 PM PST by Havoc ((Honor above convenience))
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To: Havoc
WHat does his silly theory have to do with evolution?

His theory is about geology, not biology, or evolution or any living thing. It sounds like he trying to explain the flood parables and also seems to believe in a young earth.

And in all honesty, his theory sounds ridiculous from a quick look, but I will take a closer look at it, just for fun. I have a feeling I will know exactly what I will find.
145 posted on 01/26/2003 6:04:53 PM PST by Aric2000 (Are you on Grampa Dave's team? I am!! $5 a month is all it takes, come join!!!)
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To: Havoc
Is that why no one will debate him?

No one "debates" Bozo-the-Clown either, and for the same reasons. And, frankly, he has everything going for his theory except the absence of any facts, objective obervations, or logical conclusions.

Interestingly, that was the same problem "medved" had with his Velikovskian-Saturnalia idiocy...

146 posted on 01/26/2003 6:07:55 PM PST by balrog666 (If you tell the truth you don't have to remember anything - Mark Twain)
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To: forsnax5; *crevo_list
Hydroplate Theory Bump
147 posted on 01/26/2003 6:16:15 PM PST by Nebullis
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To: Havoc
Well, that was fun.

Considering that this theory disobeys the law of physics. Basically if the water had indeed done what he claims it did, it would be on it's way out into space right now, his theory is total hogwash. There would not have been a flood or anything else, the water would have reached escape velocity and been gone.

http://mypage.direct.ca/w/writer/hydro.html

Here try and read through that, if it gets to be too much, let me and a few others know and we will try to explain it to you.

Thanks for the laugh though, it's always fun to look into these things. Too bad it's bogus, but they normally are.

Stick with theology, leave science to the scientists.
148 posted on 01/26/2003 6:30:03 PM PST by Aric2000 (Are you on Grampa Dave's team? I am!! $5 a month is all it takes, come join!!!)
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To: PatrickHenry
End of session placemarker.
149 posted on 01/26/2003 6:58:55 PM PST by PatrickHenry (Creationists agree that PH is a really great guy!)
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To: Aric2000
Well, there are any number of things wrong with the rebutt. First of all, it assumes that the continents float on the water pocket beneath. Brown did not hypothesize this.

Second, The force of jetting on release for which the rebuttal is considered does not account for a fissure that expands around the planet jetting evenly and therefore at even pressure. It is assumed that a portion of the water reaches escape velocity. Given that the guy was given sketchy information and didn't apply the known quantities of the theory and the facts it deals with, it's hardly a surprise what conclusion he would reach. The only way for pressure of release to remain consistant is if a single exit point were determined and it niether shrunk nor grew during time of expulsion. The theory however, doesn't just note the midoceanic ridge as a fracture point; but, notes other vent points around the world that erupted as the continents began to move and shift under stress.

In short, it helps to actually respond to the theory rather than respond to a bad summation of it in a 1 dimensional manner. And considering the amount of time it took you to both read Brown and this response. One wonders if you didn't just cut and paste the response as an ad hoc rebuttal. But we'll leave that for you to quarral with yourself over. One more disengenuous response chalked up.
150 posted on 01/26/2003 7:07:40 PM PST by Havoc ((Honor above convenience))
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To: PatrickHenry
double-secret-encrypted placemarker
151 posted on 01/26/2003 7:27:18 PM PST by longshadow
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To: Dan Day
[Behe writes:] When a photon first hits the retina, it interacts with [snip] So this is what modern science has discovered about how Darwin's 'simple' light sensitive spot functions.

Now which one of the two is science and which one is not?????-me-

Darwin's is, since he lays out a specific hypothesis which can be examined and tested (and if found wanting, falsified).

What a laugh, Darwin has been refuted by science and shown that his simplistic nonsense is total bunk, but he is correct? You evolutionists have a funny definition of what is true - somewhat like that of the Communists - totally backwards.

152 posted on 01/26/2003 7:43:24 PM PST by gore3000
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To: Dan Day
First, no one puts forth the Darwin passage as "proof" of the evolution of the eye, for it quite obviously is not. Period.

I am glad you admit that Darwin's discussion of the eye is total BS. Seems we agree on something. However, this is one of the important foundations of evolutionary theory. It is often cited as proof that almost anything can come about gradually. Clearly Behe showed it up for what it is.

Instead, Darwin was only setting up a rhetorical position,

Just what I said, it's BS - just as the rest of Darwin's writings. Lots of rhetoric, no science.

153 posted on 01/26/2003 7:52:39 PM PST by gore3000
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To: Phaedrus; Dan Day
How a nerve comes to be sensitive to light, hardly concerns us more than how life itself first originated;-Darwin, "On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life"

Facts? What facts? Who needs facts? We got BS, that's all that's needed according to Darwin.
... And some people call this garbage science!

154 posted on 01/26/2003 8:04:19 PM PST by gore3000
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To: Dan Day
Shrug. Well, here's my rebuttal again then, and I didn't even need to waste bandwidth by reposting it.

Aaah, refusal to address the points made by the opponent, how evolutionist of you!

155 posted on 01/26/2003 8:07:18 PM PST by gore3000
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To: Havoc
Lets take a trip out to the desert and grab about six or eight inches of sedimentation off the the ground. What do we see? An amalgum, Dust, sand, grit, pebbles, bits of pulvarized sea shells and tiny bones or glass. The desert version differs only slightly - an amalgum. What does it prove?

I'm sooooo glad you asked. If sedimentation is laid down the way your geologists pretend, then it should be observeable. Yet if we examine a place on earth where sedimentation (blown sand and dust) is displayed to the utmost, we find that it is lain down as an amalgum, not as well sorted layers.

Great point! This is another one where the evolutionists have it backwards. Rocks become sand, and that can be observed in numerous places. However, for sand to become rock, it takes a really extraordinary event.

156 posted on 01/26/2003 8:14:39 PM PST by gore3000
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To: rmmcdaniell
Imagine these changes happening over a period of two million years

Not so easy as you say as Behe's description in Post# 62 shows very well. This is the problem with evolution it ASSUMES that given enough time anything is possible. The proof that this assumption is false is that since supposedly these changes are going on all the time in every one of the million and a half species known to us we should be able to see them somewhere. We have never seen any mutation which is creating a more complex creature anywhere.

157 posted on 01/26/2003 8:25:54 PM PST by gore3000
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To: Havoc
Is that why no one will debate him?

No, it's because he refuses invitations for debate or discussion:

On May 5, 1997, I emailed a notification of this page to a now-defunct mailing list which used to operate from Walter Brown's website. I expressed willingness to either discuss its contents with Brown, or to link to any response he made. Despite Brown's professed eagerness to debate evolutionists, I never heard back from him. Neither did any of a number of others who critiqued his writings in the same forum.
-- Jim Foley, author of Fossil Hominids: Response to "In the Beginning"
I've read his work, and he demonstrates what he speaks of.

You mean, he declares his correctness, and presents carefully selected "evidence" supporting it (while neglecting to mention evidence which is incompatible with his hypotheses).

I've "read his work" too, and he's a typical crank, picking and choosing his "data" as needed to make his ideas look more plausible.

His methods are testable (ie falsifiable) and predictions based on his conclusions time after time are not only possible, but shown to be true.

By *whom*, please? Be complete and specific...

Whenever I've seen his ideas put to the test, they've fallen flat on their face.

In short, he has everything going for his theory that evolution lacks. To you, I can imagine how threatening that must be.

Dream on.

158 posted on 01/26/2003 8:29:16 PM PST by Dan Day
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Comment #159 Removed by Moderator

To: gore3000
"Shrug. Well, here's my rebuttal again then, and I didn't even need to waste bandwidth by reposting it."

Aaah, refusal to address the points made by the opponent, how evolutionist of you!

Why do you destroy your credibility by trolling?

I *did* "address the points made by the opponent", as you well know -- as anyone would know who bothered to read my post.

And you *did* read it, because you responded to it. (Unfortunately, you chose to respond to it with another troll which purposely took disconnected fragments of my argument out of context then pretended to misunderstand it -- grow up.)

But when Phaedrus had no better comeback but to repost, *verbatim*, his/her original post -- which I had already addressed -- then a link back to my original rebuttal is all that's necessary.

I repeat the question -- why do you stoop to trolling? Out of actual substance already?

160 posted on 01/26/2003 8:45:55 PM PST by Dan Day
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