Nondescendants Of Adam

[Log]

What are your particular questions? It really sounds like you just want to argue.

The questions are those in this post. You're walking in on a conversation that's already a couple of years old. And, if I seem testy, it's because of the amount of obfuscation and equivocation that has ever attended this subject.

Edited April 14, 2012 by Log

[katherine the great]

The questions are those in this post. You're walking in on a conversation that's already a couple of years old.

This thread started a few days ago. Your question that interested me was: "What is the evidence that random mutation and natural selection are the sole processes by which biological complexity has reached its current state?" The question shows a very incomplete understanding of evolutionary theory. The other questions seem tongue in cheek. Evolution is perfectly feasible explanation for the variety of life we have living on the planet today in light of the great amounts of time it took to bring them about.

[Log]

This thread started a few days ago. Your question that interested me was: "What is the evidence that random mutation and natural selection are the sole processes by which biological complexity has reached its current state?" The question shows a very incomplete understanding of evolutionary theory. The other questions seem tongue in cheek. Evolution is perfectly feasible explanation for the variety of life we have living on the planet today in light of the great amounts of time it took to bring them about.

Alas, KTG, the thread is a few days old. This current conversation within this thread is, however, years old, between TSS, BCS, and myself.

The questions are most definitely not tongue-in-cheek. I invite you to answer them.

As for a "very incomplete understanding of evolutionary theory," I would simply invite you to show how shuffling variant alleles around has any relevance to producing the variant alleles in the first place. You can positively contribute in that fashion.

Of course, if gene flow and genetic drift do not contribute to producing the variant alleles in the first place, then perhaps it is not my understanding of evolutionary theory that is incomplete.

Edited April 14, 2012 by Log

[katherine the great]

As for a "very incomplete understanding of evolutionary theory," I would simply invite you to show how shuffling variant alleles around has any relevance to producing the variant alleles in the first place. You can positively contribute in that fashion.

You didn't SAY that in your first post. I see now that you are talking about mutation being the sole method of producing new alleles. So what? It doesn't happen in a vacuum. Other forces are acting upon it to drive it's survival or it's demise and these processes happen over vast amounts of time. If the mutation survives and is advantageous in that particular environment and adds to the reproductive success of the organism, it survives. If it doesn't, it dies out. This is only a part of the evolutionary process. I decline to answer your other questions because I do not share the viewpoint of the poster who you were debating those things with.

[Log]

So what?

You might try answering the question you chose to respond to in the first place - "What is the evidence that random mutation and natural selection are the sole processes by which biological complexity has reached its current state?"

Your post, you see, simply restates what is meant by random mutation and natural selection.

It looks like you are actually declining to answer any of the questions in my post.

Edited April 14, 2012 by Log

[katherine the great]

You might try answering the question you chose to respond to in the first place - "What is the evidence that random mutation and natural selection are the sole processes by which biological complexity has reached its current state?"

Your post, you see, simply restates what is meant by random mutation and natural selection.

It looks like you are actually declining to answer any of the questions in my post.

I'm sorry, but are you dense or just being contrary? Random mutation and natural selection are NOT the sole processes by which biological complexity has reached it's current state. The process of TIME is a very large factor. The process of SEPARATION from the parent species and lack of gene flow is is a very large factor in the process of speciation. We would have many MORE variations in our genetics if so many species had not died out from inability to adapt to catastrophic ENVIRONMENTAL conditions, and the ones that survive do so largely because of gene flow. You are only looking at a small part of the entire process--an important part, yes, but there is more than you are considering.

[Log]

I'm sorry, but are you dense or just being contrary?

If a proposed material process is asserted to increase genetic variation, it may be referred to by the generic term "random mutations."

If a proposed material process is asserted to eliminate genetic variations, it may be referred to by the generic term "natural selection."

So, when you can stop restating the particular components of random mutation and natural selection and answer the question, that would be great.

Edited April 14, 2012 by Log

[shalamabobbi]

Time does not contribute to complexity.

Certainly not in your case..

Secular knowledge and spiritual knowledge can complement each other. Because God created the earth and the things that inhabit it, studying geology, physics and biology teaches us more about the greatness of our Creator.

Both secular knowledge and spiritual knowledge benefit from dialogue. Both require observation, work, and practice. So although we sometimes think of secular and spiritual as opposites or even as contradictory, a true knowledge of God and the world He created shows us that understanding one helps to understand the other.

http://mormon.org/learning?gclid=CLyCnrC7ra8CFWYJRQodDlhEmA

[Log]

Certainly not in your case.

Thanks for the snub. Care to answer the questions?

I wonder, why the efforts at avoiding giving a straightforward answer to a series of straightforward questions?

[zerinus]

I'm sorry, but are you dense or just being contrary? Random mutation and natural selection are NOT the sole processes by which biological complexity has reached it's current state. The process of TIME is a very large factor. The process of SEPARATION from the parent species and lack of gene flow is is a very large factor in the process of speciation. We would have many MORE variations in our genetics if so many species had not died out from inability to adapt to catastrophic ENVIRONMENTAL conditions, and the ones that survive do so largely because of gene flow. You are only looking at a small part of the entire process--an important part, yes, but there is more than you are considering.

I am not trying to speak for Log. He can speak for himself. But Evolution still remains a theory. It is not a proven scientific fact. It has not, and cannot in fact be proved scientifically that one species has evolved from another. Evolution is simply a good theory for allowing skeptical scientists to explain the diversity of species without believing in creation.

[JeremyOrbe-Smith]

Panspermiaaaaa.

/drive-by post attempting to introduce a fourth way capable of cutting through the nonsense which has accumulated on every extreme of the "creation/evolution" debate by positing certain materialistic/naturalistic premises which discredit strict Creationism, Intelligent Design, and Neo-Darwinism with something (coincidentally?) close to LDS teachings, woooo

/Fox Mulder-esque enthusiasm

[Log]

Jeremy,

Panspermia, or the notion that some unspecified form of life was deposited here from elsewhere, does nothing to address the issue of origins (except to push abiogenesis offworld). All of the other issues pertaining to evolution are unanswered.

Also, your link is inaccurate when it conflates Creationism with intelligent design theory.

[shalamabobbi]

I am not trying to speak for Log. He can speak for himself. But Evolution still remains a theory. It is not a proven scientific fact.

I am not trying to speak for KTG. She can speak for herself. But Evolution is a theory and a fact.

What are you doing with the facts of ERV evidence?? If you do not consider that proof of evolution you must not accept that the earth is other than flat for the evidence is every bit as strong.

It has not, and cannot in fact be proved scientifically that one species has evolved from another.

Ever hear of ring species??

Evolution is simply a good theory for allowing skeptical scientists to explain the diversity of species without believing in creation.

And Jesus wept. John 11:35

Notice that Ken Miller is a devout Catholic and that his belief in evolution has nothing at all to do with finding a way to disbelieve in creation. It has to do with understanding what we can about how creation took place.

[Log]

So, you, like the rest, decline to answer the questions.

How expected.

Edited April 14, 2012 by Log

[shalamabobbi]

So, you, like the rest, decline to answer the questions.

How expected.

Your questions are irrelevant. They don't matter. Why? Because within the framework of science they cannot be addressed. Science has bounds and limitations. Does that make it meaningless in your view? Is the discovery of aerodynamics diminished because it isn't space travel?

Edited April 14, 2012 by shalamabobbi

[JeremyOrbe-Smith]

Panspermia doesn't address the issue of "origins" (a rather flawed Aristotelian concept) because it hypothesizes that there was no origin! That's what's so exciting and paradigm-shifting about it. Much like some "eastern" religions (and LDS theology!) which teaches that element and the Intelligences of humanity are Uncreated and Eternal, it posits that complex life is an intrinsic part of the natural world. It may undergo changes of form, and living beings may "organize" subsections of the Chaos, but at root, nothing that exists is "created from nothing." Creation ex nihilo, introduced into Christianity rather late, is simply impossible, and unnecessary.

This is not evidence-denying "Creationism" or God-of-the-Gaps "Intelligent Design" or "Darwinism" of whatever brand is popular with the New Atheists at the moment. It does away with the problematic bits of conventional religion and conventional science not by filling our current paradigm's holes, but rather by changing the fundamental nature of the question.

It is completely compatible with materialistic/physicalist philosophy (as is LDS theology, which vehemently contradicts the traditional "spiritual" absurdity of "immaterial material"), it accounts for evolutionary changes (Latin evolutionem, "unrolling [of a book]"), both "micro" and "macro" by horizontal gene transfer through retroviral insertions from offworld without the need for a "necessary" Aristotelian first-cause "designer", and yet it also explains the possibility of anthropomorphic beings on other worlds genetically related to us, just as the rest of life is!

In other words, it accounts for all the known physical evidence uncovered by science, and yet it also leaves space for Gods -- not for the immaterial transcendent mystical monotheistic God of the philosophers imported into practically every religion these days (ye worship ye know not what), but for the historically-witnessed family of embodied Gods present in "primitive mythology" which was restored through LDS teaching!

I'd believe panspermia even if I wasn't LDS, because it makes too much sense out of all the various disciplines.

From Cosmic Ancestry, the best panspermia source: "The religious tendency among us is persistent. Our religious traditions tell us that a god lives in the sky and made us in his image. Such beliefs are literally true, if we have cosmic ancestors. This doesn't mean that our cosmic ancestors are gods with supernatural powers. They would be mortal gods, with great, but not supernatural, powers. They would be gods such as we Earthlings might become, if we continue to evolve."

Edited April 14, 2012 by JeremyOrbe-Smith

[Log]

Within the framework of science [those questions] cannot be addressed.

Then evolution, defined as random mutation and natural selection (you can chuck gene flow, genetic drift, and sexual selection in with natural selection), as the sole process by which life hit its current state of complexity from the first cell that *poofed* into existence (use whatever word for *poof* you prefer) is unscientific, being unfalsifiable, and also, apparently, without evidence to support it.

Thanks for the concession. I wonder if others will be as forthcoming.

Edited April 14, 2012 by Log

[Log]

Panspermia doesn't address the issue of "origins" (a rather flawed Aristotelian concept) because it hypothesizes that there was no origin!

The hypothesis is self-evidently false in a universe with a beginning such as the Big Bang.

[JeremyOrbe-Smith]

The Big Bang was the brainchild of Georges Lemaître, a Catholic priest, and you clearly have not actually examined panspermia.org in any depth. Read the entire thing, then judge.

[Log]

That's true; when I saw their deceptive mischaracterization of intelligent design theory, I declined to pursue any further truth they might have to offer. Life's too short to go weeding in someone else's garden.

In any event, here's the critical admission: "Of course, the actual mechanism whereby life might invade a new universe is unknown."

Either you have the answer, or you don't, and you don't. As I said, it is self-evidently false.

Edited April 14, 2012 by Log

[JeremyOrbe-Smith]

There are countless unknowns in science, not the least of which is the cause of the Big Bang. If you actually examine the persuasive evidence presented in the many pages leading up to the aforementioned "critical admission" snipped out of context, you might reconsider the idea that the theory is "self-evidently false", since nothing is "self-evident" and all data from all sides is theory-laden. I can't do justice to it in a few tiny posts here, hence the (necessarily-oversimplified) drive-by.

[zerinus]

What are you doing with the facts of ERV evidence?? If you do not consider that proof of evolution you must not accept that the earth is other than flat for the evidence is every bit as strong.

Ever hear of ring species??

And Jesus wept. John 11:35

Notice that Ken Miller is a devout Catholic and that his belief in evolution has nothing at all to do with finding a way to disbelieve in creation. It has to do with understanding what we can about how creation took place.

None of the above constitutes scientific "proof" of Evolution.

As for the Catholic guy, the Catholic Church officially adopted Evolution ages ago; still no scientific proof of Evolution.

Edited April 14, 2012 by zerinus

[Log]

There are countless unknowns in science, not the least of which is the cause of the Big Bang. If you actually examine the persuasive evidence presented in the many pages leading up to the aforementioned "critical admission" snipped out of context, you might reconsider the idea that the theory is "self-evidently false", since nothing is "self-evident" and all data from all sides is theory-laden. I can't do justice to it in a few tiny posts here, hence the (necessarily-oversimplified) drive-by.

Jeremy,

That admission goes right to the heart of the matter - and the context doesn't help you. Scientific naturalists posit abiogenesis on this earth and evolution by the Darwinian mechanism of random mutation with natural selection to get to where we are today. You've replaced abiogenesis with ... forgive me... a self-evidently false notion of a beginningless chain of creatures that somehow materially go from one universe's big bang / heat death to the next (which was the context of that confession), and in the rest... well, it doesn't really matter. Or maybe there's a steady-state universe, but it appears such a viewpoint is in the extreme minority, and for justifiable reasons - even in that case, the notion of a beginningless material chain of life is false.

Yes, some things are self-evident. Did you know Galileo never actually performed a physical experiment to show that different weights fall at the same rates? He conducted a simple thought experiment - in other words, it was self-evident. No data needed. Also, interpretation of data is not always theory-driven. If that were the case, babies could never interpret data, worlds without end.

And, since the site you're relying on cannot be trusted to get intelligent design correct, why should I trust it for anything? Incidentally, if design theory is true, the beginningless material chain of life is false, so I can see why they might be motivated to misrepresent it.

Edited April 14, 2012 by Log

[bu11fr0g]

It is impossible to ever prove something is random with 100% confidence. That is the nature of science. Things can be shown to be consistent or inconsistent with randomness and this is where most nondescriptive science lies.

The confidence levels of many genetic studies are over 99.999%

New traits can arise from insertions, deletions, duplications, recombinations, substitutions at levels from single basepairs in regulatory domains to entire chromosomes. These events are ongoing and commonplace and cause much of the variation we see in people. Twins are in contrast to this.

[bcuzbcuz]

It's not an argument - at all.

And it wasn't a question, either. The questions that I did write, however, you have avoided answering.

You state it quite succinctly. That's called "obfuscation and equivocation".