Creationism vs. Evolution

ok, thanks for the clarification Lost Humanity.


So if a few of these animals never evolved, then what did they start out as? Because the evolutionary tree starts with a single cell, correct?

 

Well, let me just check back around 4 billion years ago, and we'll see. Oh. i guess google doesn't go that far back. Hpmh.

What he means is that these creatures didn't evolve past a certain point, while everything else enjoyed a 'boom' of evolution either due to climate change, ecosystem change, or addition/absence of predators i.e. dinosaurs.

Four billion years is a long time, a lot has happened, and science, no matter how advanced or intelligent it has become, can not see into the past as clearly as it would take to disprove or prove certain theories.

We do have good evidence that shows a likelihood, though. It may not be good enough for some, but for those of us that love facts and are not clouded with mythologies or religions (which blur scientific fact due to observer influence) science is the greatest measure to explain origins and the world around us.

When you build upon facts, and facts only, one cannot be dissuaded into believing in talking snakes.

 

Creation FTW!!!!

 

Animals evolve to a point where they can adequately survive...some animals are already very good at surviving in their environment, so the evolution of those animals won't be very noticeable. Other animals need to make drastic changes through evolution in order to survive. A perfect example of each includes crocodiles (which have remained relatively unchanged for millions of years) and whales (which lived on land and one point in time, and evolved to live in the sea).

Animals with less-desirable genes will die off sooner, and the animals with the desirable genes survive and pass their desirable genes onto the next generation. Eventually the less desirable gene no longer exists within that species, and only the desirable gene is left. I realize that is a very basic explanation, but I don't want to sit here all day to go into more detail.

Either way evolution is a fact, and anyone who has taken a basic BIO course knows this. Just because you simply deny that evolution occurs, does not make it so. PLEASE provide anything at all that substantiates creationism.

 

So you agree the Bible has errors and contradictions introduced by man, who is not perfect, as men attempted to write what God was inspiring them to say.

Then you agree that we cannot rely on the Bible as the Word of God because the errors introduced by men destroy its reliability. Then we agree the Bible is not the word of God, but requires you, a man, to interpret what was recorded accurately and truly represents divine inspiration, and what was introduced and all bolloxed up by the imperfect hand of man.

Congratulations! You have now stepped on the slippery slope and will skid straight thru to perdition like me. Wheeeee! It's been fun. Enjoy the ride. I have.

 

Wheee!!! I started this slide 4 years ago! It's really fun when you get to the end and get handed your humanity back. Wheeeeeee!

 

I'm curious why a perfect God would create an imperfect universe. I suspect that she is incapable of creating perfection, and thus imperfect herself.

 

Exactly. People reason backwards and look at the result and say, 'It couldn't happen by chance.' With evolution and life on this planet it certainly is not chance, because there are certain laws and principles inherent in nature.

But let's take an example that is pure chance, like flipping a coin a billion times. If we applied the same backward reasoning and said it can't be pure chance that the coins fell exactly the way they did, from the point of view of the result, the backward reasoning is obvious.

Yet that is exactly what the creationist argues, forgetting that there are trillions of potential worlds and trillions of years for things to happen.

Given enough monkeys, typewriters, and time, a monkey really will type a word, or even the entire Bible, as absurd as that may sound.

 

I have taken biology courses and they teach evolution as its fact but when I challenged my teachers to provide me proof of evolution and asked why they dont teach creationism also they got flustered. They could not provide Solid evidence of evolution. Again, show me...

 

Google is not necessarily a credible source. The natural History museum makes mistakes all the time on the fossil recovered. How can you create animal, its mate, what it ate, and where it lived, and what it "evolved" into by a knee bone. There are animals at the museum of natural history in DC that they have extensive information on that they barely have a single bone on, yet they have the full skeleton developed.

 

Yeah......anyways, this is getting tired now. Are there things that I can't explain? Yep. Are there things that you can't explain? Yep. It's comical that our 2 brilliant minds can't end the debate of creationism vs. evolution once and for all................................on a truck forum on the internet. If you don't see the humor in that, I would say you have no humor. There are no absolute proofs that can prove either point beyond ANY doubt. If there were don't you think that someone much smarter than both of us would have mentioned it by now? I believe that I can feel the presence of the Holy Spirit and that The Lord hears me when I pray to Him. I've seen prayers answered and when I read the Bible, I have a much easier time dealing with daily life and it's temptations. You can call it coincidence and chance but it is real to me. I went to a mens prayer group tonight and we discussed this debate. Some of the smarter men reminded me that I'm never going to argue or debate someone into believing. We could keep going at this for days and weeks but in the end that is just foolishness. I don't have time to do that anyway. I appreciate you, if for no other reason, that you kept this civil. I can't convince you that I am right anymore than you can convince me that you're right. So, (I'm sure with your background you've heard this a million times) I'll continue to pray for you. Not just that you will come back, but for your health and happiness as well. I'll check back from time to time to see how heated it gets in here, kind of like TW's own little reality show. But I'm done posting, I've stated as much as I can stand to and it just gets boring after a while. I wish you the best DanT.

 

We should start this conversation by agreeing that assumptions are not proof.

Please take that to heart.

 

how can a whale over a period of time go from living on land to living in water? and don't just say "evolution". i mean how is it that one whale thrives off the land, and then has to retreat to the water and does so just fine? i realize that in evolution that process takes years and years, so i'm not recognizing that it was ONE whale that said "shit i need to move to the water" and did so with ease. but it seems like if an entire generation of whales couldn't live in water at first, then how can they "convey" that message to their offspring that they need to start figuring it out. the more and more i hear about evolution, it seems like people really believe in a more heightened sense of ADAPTATION.

with all this being said, in now way to intend to offend or bring your beliefs into question, i'm just a curious little mind.

 

The ones that really get me are the ones that started in the sea then decided one day to come on land and live for a million years then only about a third of them didnt like their species anymore and decided one at a time (until their feet turned to flippers) to go back to the sea. So If I go swimming and never get out, and bring my wife, and we have kids in the water, and they get hitched (i guess someone else will have to jump in the water with us otherwise our family is getting a bit too close here.) then they have kids in the water and so on and down the line somewhere we will be some kind of sea human with flippers and possibly gills or something that can survive in the water.

The point is about both sides there isnt enough Physical hard evidence to prove either point. so arguing about it to each side does nothing. Remember we are commanded to go out unto all the world teaching all nations. Thanks to the Internet it makes it a little easier. All I have to do is to tell. I have done my job.

 

More dishonest malarkey from amateurs unqualified to study the issue, motivated by their religious beliefs. These guys can't get any of this published in peer reviewed scientific journals, but only in religious tracts.

The Institute for Creation Research is promoting a new research focus aimed at discrediting radiometric dating methods. The group in charge of this recent effort chose the acronym R.A.T.E. (Radioisotopes and the Age of The Earth). Their 'research' efforts are aimed at discrediting modern geochronologic methods (using flawed experiments as discussed below) and replacing it with some form of miraculous isotopic behavior. So what exactly is the RATE group attempting and who is in charge of the research effort?

Point #1: Although the RATE group has undertaken a massive fund-raising effort amongst ye-creationists, none of its members has experience or training in experimental geochronology. Two members, Austin and Snelling have written a number of articles in creationist magazines, but neither has published articles using radiometric dating in the mainstream literature. Their IMPACT series articles, IMP326, IMP319, IMP309, IMP307, IMP301, IMP224 along with several 'technical articles' (eg. St Helen's Dacite) attempt to discredit radiometric dating based on 'anomalous' results. The problem is that the anomalies were all generated via experimental flaws on the part of the investigators or simply misinterpreting technical articles from peer-reviewed scientific literature. Refutations and discussions of these flaws abound (see, for example: Austin Grand Canyon study) and will not be repeated here. The main point to be made is that accurate radiometric dating requires certain analytical care. It's easy enough to collect a rock and send a check to Geochron Labs and have them produce a 'date' (which is exactly what Austin does). It is quite another thing to collect the proper sample, conduct the mineral separations (checking for possible inclusions and overgrowths), do the column chemistry, prepare the bombs and analyze the results. More on this in a moment--because the argument that no member of the RATE group has proper geologic training to conduct the studies is germane to several of their proposals. In fact, far from being an ad-hominem attack, it demonstrates a basic level of misunderstanding on the part of the RATE group that is sure to produce additional bogus science.

 

For the long answer read Dawkins THE GREATEST SHOW ON EARTH. For the short answer as to evidence that whales evolved from land mammals, their flippers have bones that look like giant human hands.

http://www.canada.com/vancouvercourier/news/story.html?id=8b46567d-b691-4f58-9585-7fb4cf1f9c06

Creationists apparently don't have the imagination or intelligence or scholarship to understand things. Their childlike simplicity is satisfied with 'god did it with divine magic'

Folks, the debate has been over for many years among educated people. 99.85% of biologists do not believe in creationism and believe in evolution.

 

If they get 'flustered' it's probably because they are surprised there any people left who actually still believe their imaginary friend did it with divine magic and are able to ignore the mountains of evidence that support the fact of evolution.

You really ought to read Dawkins or any modern text on evolution so you can quit embarrassing yourself by such silly statements as 'They could not provide Solid evidence of evolution.'

No one can provide 'solid evidence' of anything if he's presenting the evidence to a tree stump.

 

There's change from parents to children. So why do people have such a hard time thinking that all these little changes add up over time?

So it isnt a whale that goes "on land" - it's some other beast entirely. You see a whale as a static animal because our limited experience with whales, or animals in general, is that whales do not become other things. They are only marginally different.

Since not even twins are identical, there is clearly change in genetics. Even in humans. So, how much change is occuring? And, is the change uniform from Animal A toward Animal B, or is it just random? Well, I'd guess it's random, but favors whatever works. If you survive because you resist disease better than other individuals, and you pass your genes on- then the logical next step is that this action is repeated over and over and over and over and over- and if the drift is far enough away from the original beast, then you have a different beast.

What's the problem? Ego. We want to think we're special and that some creator made us on purpose (perhaps this is true, but there is zero evidence to support this), and that human beings will be like us in the future. It's only natural. Then you make up a story about how the creator loves you, and how he made it rain so that your cops survived (because you were good this year). And that's how stupidity works. Too bad it's natural to make up silly stories.

I think it would be great if we all started from an obvious logical place and then move carefully from place to place.

Does anyone have all the answers? No. But when you consider religion's answer is "from nothing, an intelligence made itself and then everything" - that's a mighty leap of doubt. Evolution's answer is orders of magnitude less complex than that. We start with what we can observe and test, and then we have more complex ideas that are plausible and testable. And through Adaptation Genetic drift Gene flow Mutation Natural selection and
Speciation, it becomes obvious that natural changes happen.


Google "baleen whales vestigial hind limbs" and check out turkey and Cassowary wings. Whale pelvis. Human skin response called "goose bumps." Human Coccyx. Human wisdom teeth and duodenum. Dandelions sex. Vestigial behavior in Whiptail lizards. Male breasts and nipples.



And if that dosnt convince you that change occurs, then try goggling the Cape Buffalo. It's a new species and cannot mate with the older cape buffalo...

 

Well done.

 

That doesnt prove anything thats just my friends foot! hahaha. J/k but seriously his foot looks identical to that. I guess he is evolving into a whale or something too. But he cant swim. Survival of the fittest.