Creation: Darwinian Evolutionary Frauds Pt. II
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Hallee the Homemaker
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Thank you for posting this. I am looking forward to reading other posts in this vein.
For a vestigial structure to have or retain some function does not mean it is not vestigial. That idea is not counter to evolution, and in fact it makes sense that there would be cases where that happens.
I took a quick look and found this article on dolphins.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1482506/?tool=pubmed
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If traces of mutations counteracting hindlimb development in cetaceans are found, I think that would be more supporting evidence for the idea that the hindlimb remnants are vestigial, remnants of the whale ancestors which were four-legged land-living creatures. There may be no point in your spending time thinking about it while it is too early to explore the possibility or existence of that kind of evidence. But if there does come a time when pseudogenes for limb development are found in cetaceans, I wonder what your response will be.
Hey Gregg, I don’t always have time to read your Sunday posts but did today and learned a lot. That must have taken you a long time to research and write, thank you! :)
Kelly
Hi Gregg,
I’m glad your description of pharyngeal pouches is more accurate this time. I’m afraid I don’t have time to do a point-by-point analysis, but your description of the tail/coccyx is inaccurate. The apparent tail is not a result of the development of the brain and spinal column outpacing the rest of the body. It’s the result of the spinal column outpacing its final development. There are initially 12 vertebrae in that section of the spinal column which get reduced to four which form the coccyx. The eight lost vertebrae and other tissue associated with them are destroyed through programmed cell death. I’m guessing the book you’re reading forgot to mention that…
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/comdesc/section2.html#ontogeny_ex4
May peace be with you,
Neil.
Given a set of facts and then given an additional set of facts — does not make any of the facts on the table “inaccurate.” Perhaps you mean incomplete? I felt the description was both as accurate and as complete as was necessary to make my point.
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I enjoy the use of the word “programmed” as in “programmed cell death.” I find this to be entirely accurate. The question is, where did the information come from? Who wrote the program? I would say this is evidence of design. You would more likely believe this to be the result of random chaos and chance. I wonder what the odds are of that? That only these particular cells are destroyed and never more and never less. That this is programmed and highly specific at the cellular level. Also, talkorigins is very spun toward evolution. The fact is that cells are destroyed, not bones. There is no certainty that those cells would ever form vertebrae and no one is ever born with a boney tail. Not ever. My interpretation of those facts supports design, not random chance.
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God Bless,
Gregg
You said, “For a vestigial structure to have or retain some function does not mean it is not vestigial. That idea is not counter to evolution, and in fact it makes sense that there would be cases where that happens.”
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This is contrary to the original argument that “vestigial” organs/structures or whatever no longer served any purpose or function. You have now restated the modern argument which has been revised over the last hundred or so years as functions have been identified for each and every one of the previously “useless” items. This supports my point, actually.
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Darwinists say, “If an organ no longer serves a purpose, then THAT is an argument for evolution. But if an organ still serves a purpose, then THAT ALSO is an argument that supports evolution.” Well, color me impressed. While that is a great way to have your cake and eat it, too, but not a stellar argument in support of your point based on either logic or science.
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The fact is that there are no “vestigial” organs. If we had such structures, there would be millions of them in our bodies and subsequent generations would develop all new structures under the influence of “evolutionary forces” while discarding less efficient structures. The further fact is that this does not occur. Not ever. The entire “vestigial” fraud is purely notional based on very slim evidence and a ton of assumptions.
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We can “if” all day long. “If” in the future some overwhelming evidence for Darwinism comes to light, then it will shift the paradigm. So far, in the last 200 years or more, no such evidence has surfaced. Only more of this surrounding every side of the argument and saying, “Well, then that supports evolution, too!” Which, you know, is nonsense. But we are all free to speculate.
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“IF” God announces, “Yeah, I made it all” then that will be a rather significant paradigm shift toward my world view. Oh, wait. God has done that already.
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Anyway, as always, I appreciate your input.
Gregg
Hi Gregg,
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You wrote “The fact is that there are no “vestigial” organs. If we had such structures, there would be millions of them in our bodies and subsequent generations would develop all new structures under the influence of “evolutionary forces” while discarding less efficient structures.”
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I think this indicates a flaw in your argument. Evolution predicts that an organ which has no function but has a cost will eventually disappear. It’ll truly be discarded. Individuals with smaller versions of such organs will be favoured over individuals with larger versions. Do you really think that “survival of the fittest” favours an organism with millions of useless organs?
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To clarify what Wiedersheim meant when he used the word “vestigial”, in his introduction he said “By such organs are meant those which were formerly of greater physiological significance than at present.” This would allow for organs which have lost most of their function as well as those which have lost all their function. By using the phrase “as was pointed out in the introduction” before the second definition, he clearly meant to refer back to the original definition. The two definitions are consistent if you take “lost their original physiological significance” to mean “lost most or all their original physiological significance”.
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http://www.archive.org/stream/structuremanani00berngoog/structuremanani00berngoog_djvu.txt
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So it looks like this is all a bit of a misunderstanding. There has been no revision of the term vestigial.
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May peace be with you,
Neil.
Hi Gregg,.
The incorrect statement which you gave was “This gives the end of the spinal cord a superficial resemblance to a tail.” This isn’t true. The resemblance to a tail is given by the fact that there’s a lot more developing vertebrae below the leg limb buds in an embryo than in an adult..
I’m sure you enjoy the word programmed. You ask where the information came from… Not from chance and chaos, that’s for sure. It came from natural selection. Individuals with shorter but well formed tail had a better survival chance than individuals with longer or badly formed tails. As a result, those individuals and their offspring prospered. All this requires is for there to be some variation in tail length within the species. The coccyx in humans consists of three to five vertebrae. If there was that kind of variation in the tail length of our ancestors then that would be enough for natural selection to take place..
As for TalkOrigins being spun towards evolution… that’s a matter of opinion and I doubt we’re going to be able to agree on it. At least it presents evidence and references to sources so that you can check them yourself and come to your own conclusion..
Perhaps you could do the same. What’s your evidence or source which tells you that “no one is ever born with a boney tail. Not ever”?.
May peace be with you,
Neil.
You ask: What’s your evidence or source which tells you that “no one is ever born with a boney tail. Not ever”?
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It only takes ONE human being born with a boney tail in all of human history to prove this completely wrong.
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As for the rest — natural selection cannot add information. It can only reduce or rearrange extant information. Where did the original information come from?
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God Bless,
Gregg
Hi Gregg,.
So the claim that no human has been born with a boney tail is just an argument from ignorance then. In fact there have been several documented cases of humans with tails containing cartilage or up to five vertebrae.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tail#Human_tails.
I find it a bit disheartening that you just state that natural selection cannot add information when I’ve just explained the mechanism which allows it to do so. Did I fail to explain it properly? I can clarify it if you want me to. Let me try. Ultimately the information comes from the environment in terms of the types of organism which tend to function well within the environment. Initially a group contains members with a variety of characteristics but with no information about which ones work well in the environment. The individuals in a group which don’t function quite so well in the environment are removed from the group. The group as a whole is now slightly better at functioning in the environment and so information has been added to the group about what works well in the environment. The fact that natural selection removes individuals from a group does not mean that it removes information from the group. That’s similar to the way a sculptor removes chippings from a block of wood but adds information to the sculpture. Does this make sense?.
In any case, if natural selection cannot add information then genetic algorithms cannot work because they model natural selection in quite a direct way. The fact is that they do work and people make use of them. Somehow information gets added to the individuals in the population. How does that happen if natural selection can’t do it?.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genetic_algorithm
May peace be with you,
Neil.
The Wiki article you cite specifically states that these are not real tails, but either a rare form of spina bifida, a specific type of tumor (sacrococcygeal teratomas), or a “soft tail” which is essentially a flap of skin that is erroneously called a “tail.” Even the single cited case of the little one little girl whose growth contained cartilage and bone — even that was not an actual tail, but rather yet another type of tumor, specifically a dermatological congenital malformation. I can see how you might have been misled since the citation in the article is entitled “True Tail in a Newborn” and apparently “true tail” is the erroneous and highly misleading misnomer used to describe this very rare particular dermatological condition. The fact is, an actual boney tail contains nerve tissue, attached muscle, well formed bone and cartilage, and is subject to control of its owner. In other words, it can wag, you know? What a real tail is not is a mass of boney tumerous malformed flesh that must be surgically removed except perhaps to those who are subject to some really wishful thinking.
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So, once more, no human beings are ever born with boney tails. Call it an argument from ignorance if you wish.
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Your notion of adding information is grossly oversimplified and relies upon your own argument from incredulity. Specifically, “Somehow information gets added to the individuals in the population. How does that happen if natural selection can’t do it?”
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I can imagine another way the information got there that does not rely upon natural selection. Specifically, I believe the information was programmed into the DNA at the beginning and has been reshuffled ever since. Just because you cannot imagine, conceive of, or accept that does not make the argument invalid — nor does it leave your conclusion as the only possibility that one is permitted to consider or accept.
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Thanks again for your comments.
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God Bless,
Gregg
Hi Gregg,
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I think we’re just have different definitions of the word tail. I don’t think a tail needs to have vertebrae, but you do. I agree that according to your definition, humans don’t have tails, at least not that I know of.
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I’m not sure if you understood my point about information. In particular, when I said “Somehow information gets added to the individuals in the population”, I meant in the context of a genetic algorithm. In that case we know that the information isn’t in the original genetic code (not DNA) because the original genetic code is random. i.e. contains no information.
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Your claim was that “natural selection cannot add information. It can only reduce or rearrange extant information”. I’ve twice attempted to explain why your claim is false. Since it’s your claim, please would you explain why it’s true?
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May peace be with you,
Neil.
A tail without vertebrae is a useless flap of skin. A tail that an organism has no motor control over is a, well, a tumor. What is your definition of a tail?
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I do not believe that the original genetic code is random. I respect that you disagree with me that natural selection cannot add information. Please respect that I am presently just too tired to argue the point in depth but I am not shying away from such a debate.
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Allow me to conclude my “Frauds” series and then I will dedicate a series to “information.” If you would like to prepare to argue me, please read William Dembski, Michael Behe, and/or Stephen Meyer. I will rely heavily upon their argumentation and examples.
A good summary and a short read is also “The Case for the Creator” by Lee Strobel, who is a pretty famous journalist who wrote for such notables as the Chicago Tribune. In this book, he interviews numerous scientists and they cover a broad range of topics from a Biblical perspective similar to my worldview.
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Another resource I could point you to for the information debate is http://www.intelligentdesign.org/
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Again, thank you for your comments and participation.
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God Bless,
Gregg
Hi Gregg,
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According to Wikipedia, “the tail is the section at the rear end of an animal’s body; in general, the term refers to a distinct, flexible appendage to the torso. It is the part of the body that corresponds roughly to the sacrum and coccyx in mammals and birds.” Not all tails have vertebrae, for example the Barbary Macaque does not.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barbary_Macaque
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This link shows photos of a moveable tail.
http://www.anatomyatlases.org/AnatomicVariants/SkeletalSystem/Images/19.shtml
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I’ll look forward to your future posts. For the post on information, I’d be particularly interested in a definition of information along with how one might measure it, at least in the case of a simple organism. This should help to ensure we’re not talking at cross purposes.
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Thanks for the links. I read case for the creator and was not impressed. Lee Strobel seems like an intelligent man but didn’t seem to understand the case for evolution so the book had lots of straw man arguments. That’s as I remember it anyway. I’ll have a look at the other sources though.
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May peace be with you.
Neil.
Wiki is a notoriously bad source of information since absolutely anyone can edit it. The Merriam-Webster Dictionary http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/tail does not define the word “tail” thusly. Even so, a “flexible appendage” does not imply a useless and immobile lump of tissue. To me, at least, it implies something that can at least wag and under the control of its owner. I believe confusion can arise in that many things are called “tail” that are not, strictly speaking, a tail. This is why I specified a “boney tail” but perhaps I should have been even more specific.
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I could not open the second link you provided. Understand that my connectivity is rather limited at best due to the nature of where I presently live and work.
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As far as my definition of information, I think I can work with this one from Merriam-Webster. http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/information
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There are two chapters in the Stroebel book which are good summaries. One has to do with information/intelligence and the other has to do with consciousness.
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God Bless,
Gregg
Hi Gregg,
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Semantics aside, a vestigial tail is not a fully functional and useful tail. That’s why it’s called vestigial.
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The definition of information from Mirriam-Webster allows me to recognise information but doesn’t allow me to measure it. If we’re going to talk meaningfully about information increasing or decreasing, we need to be able to attach a single number to the amount of information in an organism or gene. Otherwise I’ll end up saying that information increased in a particular case and you’ll just say that the information didn’t increase in that case. We won’t be able to decide who’s right because we won’t have an objective measure of what information is.
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I’ve been reading an article, linked off the site you mentioned which gives a measurable definition of information in Shannon information theory and explains why it’s inadequate, but the replacement definition is rather vague: “joint properties of complexity and functional specificity or specification”. The problem comes in cases where complexity increases but functional specificity decreases (or vice-versa). We can’t tell from the definition whether information increases or decreases.
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May peace be with you,
Neil.
“Semantics aside, a vestigial tail is not a fully functional and useful tail. That’s why it’s called vestigial.”
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Circular reasoning.
Hi Gregg,
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No it’s not. It’s just sensible use of the terms “tail” and “vestigial tail”.
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May peace be with you,
Neil.
Your argument is “[A] vestigial tail is not a fully functional and useful tail. That’s why it’s called vestigial.” That is only sensible if one follows the circular reasoning that the conclusion relies upon the premise which relies upon the conclusion ad infinitum. In other words, it is only sensible if one accepts as fact an entire encyclopedia of unsound and unproven assumptions. Circular reasoning does not prove the existence of “vestigial” anything. If you could remove yourself from your bias, which is strongly influenced by your Darwinian evolutionary worldview, you would have to conclude that it is not sensible, nor logical. In fact, it is a pretty good example of a circular argument.
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Remove all assumptions. What “proves” that anything, anything at all, is a remnant of Darwinian evolution? Without accepting thousands of assumptions, the intellectually honest answer to that question is “nothing at all.”
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(p) IF evolutionary theory is true, THEN (c) “vestigial” structures must exist. The premise is not proven, therefore neither is the conclusion. This is simple logic. To look at a round structure that might fit into a certain square peg, label it “vestigial” and point back to the premise is absolutely an example of circular reasoning.
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God Bless,
Gregg
Hi Gregg,
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That wasn’t what I was saying at all. Let me clarify. The definition of the phrase “vestigial tail” is a tail which has reduced functionality. So if a vestigial tail exists then it cannot have full functionality. This means that if a tail has full functionality it cannot be a vestigial tail. Therefore your argument that humans don’t have vestigial tails because they don’t have fully functional tails doesn’t make sense.
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There’s a good explanation of the evidence for evolution based on vestigial organs on TalkOrigins. If you want to understand what the arguments are for evolution, you need to go to a pro-evolution site because the arguments for evolution on creationist sites are often straw-man versions.
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/comdesc/section2.html#vestiges
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May peace be with you,
Neil.
Again, in my opinion, TalkOrigins is spun so far to the Darwinian side of the debate that it is nearly useless as a resource. I understand that someone with a Darwinian worldview would feel this sentiment to be blasphemous and believe with a deep, faith-based ferver that every word on that website is the equivelant of holy writ. Therefore, I apologize if you feel this is an attack against your fundamental religious beliefs. It is merely my opinion.
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You said, “The definition of the phrase “vestigial tail” is a tail which has reduced functionality.”
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While that may be your interpretation, that is not the definition.
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Mirriam-Webster says: Vestigial= a (1) : a trace, mark, or visible sign left by something (as an ancient city or a condition or practice) vanished or lost (2) : the smallest quantity or trace b : footprint 1
2 : a bodily part or organ that is small and degenerate or imperfectly developed in comparison to one more fully developed in an earlier stage of the individual, in a past generation, or in closely related forms
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I’ll assume the latter definition to be the most closely related to your argument and it only further supports my point. My point is that since evolution is a THEORY, it is therefore literally not proven to be true. Ergo, your conclusion that any organ or structure is by definition “vestigial” — specifically an underdeveloped leftover from a previous generation in the evolutionary tree of life — is likewise UNPROVEN. Most especially if we are spanning multiple species or kinds, but that isn’t even required.
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The bottom line is that to even call a tail “vestigial” is therefore an assumption, based on the unproven assumption that Darwin’s THEORY is factual, which it has not proven to be in over a century. That begs the question. “Since evolution is true, this must be a vestage.”
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To point to an underdeveloped organ or structure–or state that because an organ or structure has reduced functionality — it is therefore “vestigial,” as in a “vestage” of that organism’s Darwinian evolutionary heritage, any of that amounts to circular reasoning because you are supporting the premise with the conclusion and vice-versa after begging the question.
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I think I am finished making this point because it is starting to seem as if you are choosing to be intentionally obtuse.
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God Bless,
Gregg
Hi Gregg,
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The definition of vestigial I’m happy with is “a bodily part or organ that is small and degenerate or imperfectly developed in comparison to one more fully developed in […] closely related forms”.
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So how is it we’re failing to communicate?
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I wrote “Therefore your argument that humans don’t have vestigial tails because they don’t have fully functional tails doesn’t make sense.”.
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You wrote “Ergo, your conclusion that any organ or structure is by definition “vestigial” — specifically an underdeveloped leftover from a previous generation in the evolutionary tree of life — is likewise UNPROVEN”.
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That wasn’t my conclusion. I didn’t mention anything about underdeveloped leftovers from previous generations. I really don’t think I’m being obtuse here.
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May peace be with you,
Neil.
>>>”I think I am finished making this point because it is starting to seem as if you are choosing to be intentionally obtuse.”
It seems to me that only in Neil’s last comment was it completely clear what he meant, and only in your last comment was it completely clear what you meant, and the two of you were talking about two different things.
I was just sent a link to this post; I should really be working, but this is more interesting…
In a way I think it’s unfortunate that we call apparently-useless organs ‘vestigial’. It carries with it the assumption that they are a ‘vestige’ of something, when it’s also possible that they were part of God’s design from the beginning. For example, the diptera (two-winged flies) have halteres: structures which look like the beginnings of a second set of wings. Biologists tend to believe that the diptera evolved from ancestors which had two sets of wings, but that is only one of the possible explanations. It’s also worth nothing that the halteres are required for balance in flight.
To see what the halteres tell us about evolution, we have to take a step back and ask how we evaluate any theory. The point is that a good theory will simplify our view of the world. We start off with an empty worldview where everything is arbitrary and unpredictable. The apple falls down from the tree for some arbitrary reason, and it might equally well have fallen up. (Common sense would tell us that we should expect objects to fall downwards, of course. I’m just beginning with something very simple for clarity.)
We then start adding theories which predict the world’s behaviour. We might come up with a theory that, “Objects which are released fall downwards.” This seems like a good theory. It’s simple, and it makes the world much more predictable.
Much later, we add Newton’s laws of motion, and we get to predict how long objects will take to fall, and things like that. Then we find that Newton’s laws don’t explain some astronomical observations properly. We have a choice between saying that Newton’s laws work except for a lot of arbitrary stuff, or adopting relativity. Relativity is more complicated than Newton’s laws as originally formulated, but it’s less complicated than Newton’s laws plus lots of arbitrary exceptions. So physicists tend to favour relativity.
The existence of halteres (and the other ‘vestigial’ organs) can be explained in a very nice way by the theory of evolution. In that sense they lend support to the theory. Newton’s laws explained lots of observations of objects in motion, so we think (thought) it was a good theory. Evolution explains lots of observations of the natural world, like halteres, so we think it’s a good theory too. It’s possible it may be contradicted by future observations, as Newton’s theory was. Who knows.
You emphasise that evolution is a “theory” and I think you’re quite correct. At the moment, I think it’s a well supported theory, but it’s possible that some future observation might give us a surprise. Would you be happy for Christianity to be described as the Christian theory? It seems to me that the case for Christianity and God was stronger a few hundred years ago than it is now, following various scientific observations. In other words, Christians did get exactly the kind of surprise I was talking about.
Finally, I wanted to say that I don’t think we can ever know what is “true”. You might die, go to heaven and meet God. You would probably see this as confirmation of your beliefs. What you don’t know is that there is a meta-God who is playing with believers. Your Muslim neighbour goes to a heaven where he meets the appropriate number of young women. Your Hindu neighbour is reincarnated. Richard Dawkins, of course, has no afterlife at all. You see what I mean: we call the simplest explanation “truth” but we can never rule out the possibility that reality is more complicated than we thought.
I apologize for commenting to long after this has been posted, but I just have to ask some questions…
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Placing the whole “god vs. Darwin” scenario aside, are you saying you disregard any kind of evolutionary proof whatsoever? I’ll give some examples: blind mole rats have tiny eyes, covered up with a flap of skin, that they never use; ostriches and emus both have wings that cannot be used for flight; hind dew claws in dogs have no use as they are only attached by a piece of skin.
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Take the case of domesticated animals: we’ve bred animals for certain attributes– from wolves, we’ve bred dogs that can comfortably be carried in a purse; we’ve bred wild sheep to have cottony hair, instead of their natural, wiry fur; we’ve bred horses and cattle down to the size of a large dog. If we can do all these things, only as man, why wouldn’t god give all life the ability to do this, themselves, to adjust to their environment, and survive on, for many generations?
Even though I’m pretty sure you don’t care what my answer to this is, every example you have stated is an example of what Darwinists call micro-evolution, not macro-evolution. In other words, every single example is an example of changes within kinds. A blind mole is still a mole. A flightless bird is still a bird. Big horses or small horses are still horses. Of course God with a capital “G” gave all living things the ability to adapt. This is stated in the book of Genesis time and again as “changes within their own kind” and we observe this every day. What has never been seen is one KIND of life become another KIND of life. A horse has never become a cow and a bird has never become a salamander and a frog has never become a lizard and none of them have ever turned into a plant.
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Thanks for your comment.
Gregg
Thank you for answering my comment. I didn’t realize there were different “types” of evolution ( I wouldn’t exactly consider myself a Darwinist).
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So, would you say that vestigial organs are possible, but only in terms of micro-evolution?
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And I do care what your answer is. =)
Aimee
I wrote a pretty comprehensive post on vestigial structures here. The meat of it is this. Back in 1893, Darwinist and humanist Robert Ernst Wiedersheim published a list of 86 human organs that had, in his words, “lost their original physiological significance”. Theorizing that they were vestiges of evolution, he coined them “vestigial”. Later versions of Wiedersheim’s list were expanded to as many as 180 human “vestigial organs”. Today, that list stands at exactly zero. While that is actual science, and the truth, I’ll bet they don’t teach that in school.
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Thank you for your comment,
Gregg
Wow Greg. I just read through this. I’m pretty sure you are not a real scientist. It seems that you don’t give much respect to the scientific process. It sounds to me that you would rather just be happy the God (with a capital G) created everything and that should be the end of the discussion. Too bad not everyone is happy to blindly believe what your pastor says.
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Since Darwins time the theory of evolution has itself evolved a little, slowly over time, as more and more evidence has been found in support of the hypothesis. The mounds of fossils continue to support predictions made by scientists about the process.
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The presence of certain organs in the human body that seem to have no purpose may have been used by some people to attempt to ‘prove’ evolution, but good science never really proves anything. Science looks at what might be the best explanation of our surroundings based on observation and evidence that we have. Let me ask you what the courts have asked intelligence design proponents.
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What evidence do you have that God (ith a capital G) created man?
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I predict that you’ll use circular reasoning just as you accuse Darwinists of using. Typically it’s explained by creationists by stating that it says so in the bible and the bible says that the bible is true so it must be true that god created man.
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That may be fine in sunday school class, but real grown up people demand a better explanation. Even though we may never fully understand how we came about, the answer that God did it is very unsatisfying. If we, as an inquisitive people, never questioned our preachers and teachers, we would probably still be in the stone age.
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Good science is void of political and religious precognition. As soon as you prescribe to a certain outcome, your results will be biased. Good scientists are able to make conclusions based on evidence alone. Not doctrine or platforms.
Wow Rus. I just read through this. I’m pretty sure you are not a real scientist, either. It seems that you don’t give much respect to the scientific process. It sounds to me like you would rather just be ignorantly happy with the idea that randomness created the universe and that should be the end of the discussion. Too bad not everyone is happy to blindly believe what fallible man proclaims as truth.
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Since Darwin’s time the theory of evolution has itself been frantically revised each time it was refuted, slowly over time, as less and less evidence has been found in support of the hypothesis. The entire theory is essentially an argument from ignorance at this point and the best examples of the theory possibly being true are either outright frauds or extremely fragile assumptions based on yet more assumptions. The relatively few fossils we have added in the last century and a half continue to refute predictions made by Darwin and his ilk, particularly the less than 600 named species of dinosaurs, the complete lack of ANY transitional forms, and the complete absence of so-called human ancestors.
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The presence of certain structures in living things that seemed to serve no purpose were used by Darwinists in an attempt to ‘prove’ Darwinian evolution as a basic argument from ignorance, but good science never really ‘proves’ anything — which supports my claim that Darwinism is a religion claiming an exclusive ownership of all knowledge and all truth. Good science looks at what might be the best explanation of our surroundings based on observation, experimentation, and empirical evidence.
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This is far different than a legal or logical argument. But let me ask you what the courts should have asked Darwinists.
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What evidence do you have that God did NOT create man?
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You see, a complete lack of evidence neither supports nor refutes a premise of an argument. An absence of evidence merely means, logically, that there is a complete lack of evidence.
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Nevertheless, in seeking to answer, I predict that you’ll use circular reasoning just as you accuse Creationists of using. Typically it’s explained by Darwinists who state that it “must be so” because Darwinian evolution is true, therefore particles-to-people happened as a result of Darwinian evolutionary theory because molecules to man is the “only reasonable” explanation, therefore molecules-to-man is true ad infinitum.
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That may be fine if one wishes to live in utter and abject ignorance without further critical thought or rigorous logic, but enlightened and truly intellectual human beings demand a better explanation and one that fits with both logic and observation absent any bias or preconceived notions based on an assumed world view. Even though we may never fully understand how life came about, the answer that nothing substantial at all outside of randomness and chance was the original cause is very unsatisfying. If we, as an inquisitive people, never questioned our so-called experts, we would probably still be stuck spouting judgements against those who are better informed about actual facts.
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Good science IS void of political and religious precognition. Darwinism has nothing to do with good science other than occasionally leveraging or subverting the scientific process, and even then only as it fits the Darwinist evolutionary world view. The moment you assign a certain cause for an effect, your observations are doomed to bias. Good science draws conclusions based on observed evidence alone. Darwinists are not good scientists and therefore do not practice good science.
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God Bless,
Gregg
Not sure this is the right post, but close enough – Gregg, you might be interested to know (if you don’t already) that this week’s Nature has an image of Haeckel’s embryos on the cover, and has two related articles (that I haven’t read yet) about developmental patterns of gene expression.
…You said this:
…..”The relatively few fossils we have added in the last century and a half continue to refute predictions made by Darwin and his ilk, particularly the less than 600 named species of dinosaurs, the complete lack of ANY transitional forms…”
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If you reject Tiktaalik as a transitional form, I have to suspect that you’ve defined ‘transitional form’ in such a way that it would be impossible for any fossil at all to meet your criteria for transitional forms.
Come on, hd. Out of the millions of species you are hanging your hopes and dreams on one example? In the millions of years model, should there not be billions or even trillions of examples of transitional forms in all those generations and the best you can do is toss out Tiktaalik as if that’s Zues’ lightning bolt?
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Would it not be fair to say that if that is the best you can do, it rather serves to prove my point?
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God Bless,
Gregg
Thanks. I’m not exactly close to a Books-A-Million at present — not like I can run down to the corner news stand — but I appreciate the info.
sorry – I thought you might have online access through your work.
Tiktaalik is a fairly recent and striking find.
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I don’t know much about fossils, but I think a paleontologist would say that formation of fossils relies on a set on unusual circumstances so that we’re lucky to have found as many as we have. And that there are a number of transitional fossils, but that creationists reject them as such.
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So no, I don’t think it proves your point.
Nothing a Darwinist paleontologist would say would surprise me in the least. The most outrageous claims ever from a dolphin rib to a donkey skull have all come from that source.
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I can fossilize an acorn under a rain downspout of my house in about 6 months, so, no — sorry — Fossilization is neither complicated nor extraordinarily rare.
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As for transitional forms: It is estimated that to turn a fish into a mouse would take a minimum of 50,000 sequential and dependent changes in physiology. Let’s pretend that nature has the ability to plan such a project with an anticipated outcome in mind, handle all the logistics involved, and manage resources to stage and implement based on triggers. Let’s further imagine that 100 such changes can take place in each generation. That still leaves 5000 generations between fish and small land rodent. That is one heck of a lot of theoretical transitional forms between diverse species. Where are they?
I don’t think your acorn observation is useful information.
What skeletal forms between fish and mice would you accept as transitional? Evolutionary biology says that one of the early amphibian land tetrapods would be ancestors of mammals, so some of those fossils would be part of the transition between fish and mice. Would you accept the fossil of a land-dwelling tetrapod as transitional or not? Would you accept Tiktaalik as an example of a transitional form between fish and mice? If not, why not?
Transitional fossil remains don’t have to have been the actual parents of animals whose descendents became mammals. They don’t even have to be from the same species; they could be from a related species which died out.
What makes the fact that fossilization is not exactly rare useless information? I can show you examples of modern fossils outside of, for example, Mt. Saint Helens that occurred inside of a single year. How is that not useful?
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As to the other, you kind of missed my point. My point is, the fish to the mouse example is just ONE chain of causality and I was extremely generous with the number of fundamental physiological changes that can occur — in order — in each generation. I granted 100 fundamental changes while keeping the organism alive. Would a more realistic number be somewhere around 3 to 5 fundamental “small gradual changes over time” according to the theory? And if that is the case, don’t you run out of time in only a few billion years?
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How many species are there on the planet today that allegedly arose from “simpler” and diverse species as a result of Darwinian evolution? Far more than one. In fact, every single plant and animal we observe, theoretically. Therefore how many billions or trillions of chains of causality should we have found in the fossil record by now? We should be up to our necks in them. I should not be able to turn a spade full of dirt in my back yard without pulling up a few dozen of them. They should not be rare to non-existent.
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Instead, since they are rare to nonexistent, Darwinists have to resort to fraud like in the case of Archeoraptor. Or did you find the Archeoraptor case not useful as well.
Sorry … you said, “Transitional fossil remains don’t have to have been the actual parents of animals whose descendents became mammals. They don’t even have to be from the same species; they could be from a related species which died out.”
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If a lizard-plant species (hyperbole) dies out without giving rise to either a race of lizards or plants, then logically it is not a transitional species between either lizards or house plants. It is merely an extinct hybrid race of lizard-plants. A transitional form would logically be a bridge between one distinct macro-evolved species and another distinct macro-evolved species. It would not be a carnival side-show exhibit. The fact that they don’t exist and have never been observed in all of human recorded history is one premise of my argument. Demonstrating an extinct hybrid only serves to support my argument, not diminish it.
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God Bless,
Gregg
It does appear that you reject all evidence that may support evolution, but you don’t offer any evidence that we came into existance any other way.
Please tell us. How did we come to be? You sound like an authority, so I’m anxious to hear your alternate explanation and the evidence you have to back your claims.
In science there is a saying that extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. So in the intrest of truth, please enlighten us all.
Mr. Butler,
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Wouldn’t we sound rather pompous and a bit ridiculous if we constantly spoke in the third person? The pomposity might be warranted if you could spell the words existence and interest correctly, and the royal we might be warranted if you are some kind of royalty, your majesty. But since neither is true, why not just speak for yourself?
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In your comment, you have committed some logical fallacies.
The first is begging the question. In claiming that I reject all evidence that may support evolution — you ASSUME that evolution is true and you ASSUME that such evidence exists and you ASSUME that it may support Darwin’s theory. Sort of like, “Do you think human beings are still evolving? Why or why not?” This is also a fallacy of the missing third, but I don’t want to go too far out of your depth.
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In asking how I think “we” came to be, you present what is called a false dilemma and piggy back it with an attempted argument from personal ignorance. It goes like this. “I can’t imagine how God might have created us, therefore He didn’t.” And “Since a) God didn’t create us, therefore b) Darwin’s theory is the only other possible alternative that must be true.”
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If you have ever actually read one of my Sunday posts all the way to its conclusion, you would know that I believe we are created beings and that I make no secret of it. This is because I believe that God is real and eternal and holy, holy, holy. I also believe that His word is authoritative and much more so than fallible man.
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Let me ask you something. How do you think the universe came into existence (note correct spelling)? Here are the only possible responses.
Correct me if I am wrong, but I think you will find that these are the only 4 possible answers to the question.
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So, if you believe the universe doesn’t exist and that there is no reality, please send me any and all money in your bank accounts since it isn’t real, you aren’t real, I am not real, and none of it really exists anyway. Then lets agree never to speak again, while I spend your money, since each of us is imaginary and what possible difference could it make to you while you ponder the great meaning of the meaninglessness of existence in an artificial universe.
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If you believe the universe created itself, then you believe that nothing can create something and the scientific fact is that nothing only ever comes from nothing while something only ever comes from something. Ex nihilo, nihil fit — from nothing, only nothing comes. Scientifically speaking, the law of cause and effect states that the effect can never be greater than the cause and nothing is never greater than something. You also violate one of the laws of thought. Nothing creates itself outside of metaphysics. Can the milk crate you are sitting on in your mother’s basement create itself? Did you create yourself? Can any one thing create itself? I don’t think so. Believing the universe created itself demonstrates that you have neither a logical nor a scientific mind.
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Therefore, you and I can safely conclude that the only two scientific possibilities remaining are that either…
If you believe the universe has always existed, then you may not be familiar with the second law of thermodynamics that basically teaches that the entire universe is using up all of its available energy to perform useable work. In other words, the entire universe is wearing down. While Hoyle’s solid state universe was comforting to unbelievers decades ago, the truth is that entropy is the rule everywhere you look. That means that the universe had a beginning and will one day have an ending. These are not characteristics of eternity.
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What alternative does that leave, Russ? Speaking for myself, a man with a highly logical and scientific mind, the scientific and logical conclusion I must reach is that the universe was created. Since the universe was created, it had a Creator. Since there is a Creator, I am going to do my best to get to know Him.
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I hope this explanation clears some things up for “us” Russ. And thank you for your comment.
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May God bless you in this holiday season.
Gregg
Gill Slits…
Vertebrate embryos universally have prominent structures in their neck region that are called by various names in the scientific literature: branchial, pharyngeal, or visceral pouches or grooves or furrows or arches. Because they may appear as a repeating series of slits in the neck of the embryo, resembling the pattern of repeated elements in the neck of adult fish, they have also been colloquially called “gill slits” or “gill pouches.” They are not, however, gills and scientists have not been claiming that they are. So what are they?
“Gill slits” are common structural elements of vertebrate development. “Common” is the important term here. It turns out that all vertebrates build their face in the same, somewhat improbable and counterintuitive way; it is this deep similarity that is the root of the evolutionary argument that it reflects common ancestry.
The head of all vertebrate embryos, whether they are a fish or a human, can be simply described as a curved tube largely made up of brain, with a series of 4 to 7 finger-like tissues hanging down from it, the pharyngeal arches. What we consider a face, everything from just below the eyes, back to the ears, and down to the neck, is absent. Instead, we have these dangling blobs, each of which will contain a cartilaginous rod, a column of muscle, a significant branch of the circulatory system, and an assortment of other cell types. These arches are reiterated modules that will subsequently merge and rearrange themselves (along with other material) to form the more familiar face.
They do so in similar ways in all vertebrates: the first pharyngeal arch, for instance, always forms the jaw, and the second arch always forms the hyoid. There are also differences that emerge in different classes. Pieces of the first two arches find their way into bones of the mammalian ear. The third and subsequent arches in fish end up in the gills, while those same arches in a human form a series of cartilages in the throat. The third fuses with the hyoid, the fourth forms a major part of the thyroid cartilage, and the fifth forms the cricoid and arytenoid cartilages. Non-cartilaginous elements of these structures end up incorporated into all kinds of tissues, glands and muscles and epithelia, of the neck and face.
This common pattern of development is a genuinely remarkable thing. It is one of the reasons that early evolutionary biologists, such as Charles Darwin, argued that the evidence of embryology was so important to his theory – we see such intricate processes redone over and over again in such similar ways in species after species. Given that the initial pharyngeal arches are radically rearranged over the course of development, there is no obvious reason why all vertebrate embryos begin with virtually identical structures that are equally remote from their final morphology, other than that they reflect a shared morphological foundation and a common ancestry.
You said, “Given that the initial pharyngeal arches are radically rearranged over the course of development, there is no obvious reason why all vertebrate embryos begin with virtually identical structures that are equally remote from their final morphology, other than that they reflect a shared morphological foundation and a common ancestry.”
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This is the fallacy of the false dilemma. The truth is, of course there are. In fact, there are probably multiple other possible and obvious reasons.
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Your entire comment begs the question along the lines of methodological naturalism with a secular humanist world view. Quite closed-minded, actually. While rather thin on facts and thick on interpretation of the facts, I will suggest the most likely alternate possibility: Instead of a common ancestry, how about a common designer for all living things?
Alright, if you disagree with the statement that there are “no other obvious reasons” and, as you say there are “probably multiple other possible reasons”, please give me a different, obvious natural explanation. Reaching out to a “common designer” or God, is outside the domain of science.
If you wish to believe in a supernatural creator, that’s up to you, but when a plausible naturalistic explanation is given, you dismiss it and offer up something supernatural as another possibility. If we are going to discuss the merits of scientific data then we should keep the speculation and explanations confined to he natural world.
Just out of curiosity, what school science books are being talked about in this statement Yet instead of teaching the truth, public schools still call them “gill slits” and state that they are evidence of a “throwback to the fish stage,” of our Darwinian evolutionary past. That is simple and intentional fraud.
I mean since science doesn’t refer to them as gill slits, and I know of no biologists who still hold to Ernst Haeckel’s ideas (phylogeny recapitulates ontogeny), we should both petition the various school boards around the country, to update the classroom science texts. But if your article somehow is insinuating that because schools classrooms are using out dated science books, that there is some conspiracy afoot to propagate bad information to students. Well where’s the proof?
Since we are talking science here, please give me a scientific definition for the word “kind” used in making groups of living things. If it has a scientific definition we should be able to specify exactly how to determine when something changes “kinds”
I do hope you realize just how utterly ridiculous your proposed conditions for this debate sound. Reaching out to “Darwinism” — aka “magic” — is equally outside the domain of good science or simple reason.
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I can point to case after case of that. The odds against abiogenesis alone are 10191 meaning absolutely mathematically impossible trillions of times over. It takes a very deep rooted and abiding faith in magic to believe in odds like that. The fact that nothing has ever been observed to create itself yet it is a tenet of the Darwinist religion that the universe created itself. The fact that there are absolutely no transitional forms between the Precambrian and the Cambrian in the fossil record yet Darwinists worship under the shade of the fictional TREE OF LIFE. Every experiment along the lines of Urey-Miller have been documented failures which have never produced any aminos when O2 was present and mixed left and right when O2 was absent.
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You accuse me of speculation? The book of Darwinism should open with the lines, “Let’s suppose that perhaps” followed by the millions of speculations and derivative assumptions required to twist your minds around that massive fairy tale into the semblance of faith you profess.
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If you are, therefore, attempting to engaging me in a faith based argument leveraging your very clear and obvious faith in the gods of Darwinism, it is only fair and reasonable that I discuss my faith in the one true God as well. Tell me what Darwinism has to offer me? Would you like to know what the God of Moses can offer you?
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Your very close minded approach is, however, an excellent demonstration of the methodological naturalist approach within the context of the secular humanist mindset. I take it you would agree with the late Carl Sagan who proclaimed that “The cosmos is all there is and all there ever was and all there ever will be” which is of course the materialist mantra. I suppose when you die you plan to simply rot in the dirt. In that case, I acknowledge that you are a true materialist. I also admire the condescending tone, and admire the arrogance, as if you feel pity for the poor, ignorant creationist. That is also helpful.
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I sincerely appreciate your recent participation, here, since it is driving home the points I have been making about Darwinism and Darwinist for over a year, now.
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God Bless,
Gregg
It really isn’t that difficult and it isn’t at all unscientific. Being of a KIND simply means that members of that kind can bring forth. “Let [all created things] bring forth…according to [their] KIND.” (Genesis 1:24-25) I realize that Darwinists mock the use of the word “kind” because, I suppose, unlike nearly everything within Darwin’s idiotic theory, the word kind is highly accurate and very specific. Accurate terms and specific facts tend to threaten to destroy the foundation of fallacies upon which Darwinists base their religion of secular humanism worshiped through the dogma of methodological naturalism.
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There are many different species of tomatoes. There are cherry and roma and heirloom and beefsteak to name just a few. Every species is all some KIND of tomato. They can all cross pollinate and bring forth more hybrid types of tomatoes.
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There are many different species of pears. There are bartlett and d’anjou and comice and bosc and the list goes on. They are all some KIND of pear. They can all cross pollinate and bring forth more pears.
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Likewise, in the animal kingdom, there are several different species of birds. There are giant ostrich and tiny hummingbird. There are delicious goose and less tasty crow. There are hundreds or thousands of subspecies of birds. They are all different KINDS of bird. There are several different species of fish and every species of fish is some KIND of fish. I realize that there may be some mechanical problems involved, but if those are overcome, they can bring forth according to their kind.
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That should suffice as for a definition. What are not kinds are those which cannot bring forth. Men and apes, therefore, are not the same kind since we do not bring forth.
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More information here: http://www.halleethehomemaker.com/2009/10/creation-micro-evolution/
I wasn’t trying to be pomp0us. and your attack on me is a logical falacy too. And spelling or grammer is really not important.
I don’t know how we came to be, but I’m not going to say, “Because I don’t know how, it must be God.” Which is what it seems you are saying.
I don’t appreciate you for your insults. Good luck in your future.
I’m done trolling your biased blog.
Buh bye.
Spelling and grammar. GrammAr!