Views on Intelligent Design
Because several commenters here have asked for my views on intelligent design, I decided to write this post. Because I did not want to create confusion by having two original posts on the same subject, I was considering placing this message on the comment thread that I have already established for discussing ID and irreducible complexity, but I decided that it would be better to make a new post instead. Copies of comments or complete discussions that were posted on the other ID thread are of course welcome under this new post.
Of course, I still believe that Judge Jones should not have ruled on the scientific merits of ID in the Kitzmiller v. Dover case -- see "Traipsing into breathtaking inanity -- absurd rulings in Dover Intelligent Design case." This belief is not based on my view that ID has scientific merit -- I would feel the same way about anti-evolution arguments based on the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics, which I feel do not have scientific merit.
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Claim -- ID is just a religious concept -- it is just creationism in disguise
Answer -- I think that the name "ID" is unfortunate because it implies the existence of a "designer," and then people start asking questions like "who is the designer?" and "what does the designer look like?", and it often does no good to explain that ID is not supposed to speculate about a designer. I think that it would be much better to stick to names like "irreducible complexity." I don't even like to use the name ID, but I am afraid that if I don't, some people might not know what I am talking about.
Claim -- ID is not a scientific "theory" or "hypothesis"
Answer -- If scientific "theory" and "hypothesis" are defined as complete scientific explanations for natural phenomena, then I agree that ID is not a scientific "theory" or "hypothesis." But why should science be arbitrarily limited to complete scientific explanations? Why cannot a naturalistic criticism of a scientific theory also be considered to be scientific ? Often, describing why something does not work can be as important as introducing something that works or appears to work. When Thomas Edison was accused of not making progress in his efforts to invent a practical electric light, he said, "I've made lots of progress -- I now know lots of things that won't work."
Claim -- ID, unlike evolution, does not make predictions and is not testable or falsifiable.
Answer -- Because macroevolution in progress cannot be directly observed, the "predictions" that evolution theory makes about macroevolution are just predictions of likely future finds of more circumstantial evidence of macroevolution -- for example, the fossil record is used to make predictions of likely future finds of "missing link" fossils. And evolution theory is not testable or falsifiable at all in regard to the claim that macroevolution was driven solely by natural genetic variation and natural selection. In many ways, evolution theory is no more scientific than ID and is often even less scientific than ID because evolution theory often strays beyond what can be proven or supported by scientific evidence. If evolution in fact occurred solely by "natural" occurrences, then those occurrences would have been either extremely unlikely or not "natural" in the usual sense.
Claim -- ID is the only scientific (or pseudoscientific) challenge to evolution theory
Answer -- Of course, Darwinists do not make this claim outright -- they only imply it because the Dover decision explicitly banned only ID. Some other challenges to evolution theory involve -- (1) co-evolution, (2) the propagation of beneficial mutations in sexual reproduction, and (3) the mathematical probability of evolution.
Claim -- raising doubts about evolution theory is going to hurt the technological competitiveness of the USA
Answer -- Most practical applications of the theory are based on microevolution, whereas the big controversy is over macroevolution. Also, scientists can still use the tools and concepts of evolution theory even while believing that all or part of the theory is untrue, in the same way that electrical engineers use complex-number math to analyze AC circuits even though the complex numbers and complex-plane vectors bear no direct relationship to the physical quantities of the circuits. Furthermore, many foreign countries have ID movements of their own -- see
http://messageboards.aol.com/aol/en_us/articles.php?boardId=558015&articleId=12673&func=5&channel=News (note -- most of the URL links on this webpage do not work just by clicking on them because parts of the links are not highlighted in blue -- it is necessary to copy and paste the complete link. On the link to the reports on Australia, Eastern Europe, Germany, etc., just clicking on the link will work but will bring up the wrong webpage -- it is necessary to copy and paste the entire link including the part that spilled over into the next line )
Claim -- ID is scientifically vacuous and makes no worthwhile contribution to science.
Answer -- Even if ID is false, it nonetheless expands scientific knowledge, and the questions raised by ID could lead to important scientific discoveries. We should not place artificial boundaries on scientific inquiry.
Claim -- the concept of "exaptation" has completely refuted ID
Answer -- "Exaptation" is the concept that features that evolve for one function may be converted to serve another function and that hence many of the parts of irreducibly complex systems may have come ready-made or nearly so. However, exaptation does not change the fact that all of the parts of an irreducibly complex system must come together simultaneously in their final forms to create the complete system, and that is very unlikely. Also, a feature that is already serving an essential or important function may not be available to help form the irreducible system unless a duplicate is created.
Also, the scientific merits of ID are discussed in the Discovery Institute's book "Traipsing into Evolution" and online in "Dover in Review" by DI's John West.
Of course, I still believe that Judge Jones should not have ruled on the scientific merits of ID in the Kitzmiller v. Dover case -- see "Traipsing into breathtaking inanity -- absurd rulings in Dover Intelligent Design case." This belief is not based on my view that ID has scientific merit -- I would feel the same way about anti-evolution arguments based on the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics, which I feel do not have scientific merit.
======================================
Claim -- ID is just a religious concept -- it is just creationism in disguise
Answer -- I think that the name "ID" is unfortunate because it implies the existence of a "designer," and then people start asking questions like "who is the designer?" and "what does the designer look like?", and it often does no good to explain that ID is not supposed to speculate about a designer. I think that it would be much better to stick to names like "irreducible complexity." I don't even like to use the name ID, but I am afraid that if I don't, some people might not know what I am talking about.
Claim -- ID is not a scientific "theory" or "hypothesis"
Answer -- If scientific "theory" and "hypothesis" are defined as complete scientific explanations for natural phenomena, then I agree that ID is not a scientific "theory" or "hypothesis." But why should science be arbitrarily limited to complete scientific explanations? Why cannot a naturalistic criticism of a scientific theory also be considered to be scientific ? Often, describing why something does not work can be as important as introducing something that works or appears to work. When Thomas Edison was accused of not making progress in his efforts to invent a practical electric light, he said, "I've made lots of progress -- I now know lots of things that won't work."
Claim -- ID, unlike evolution, does not make predictions and is not testable or falsifiable.
Answer -- Because macroevolution in progress cannot be directly observed, the "predictions" that evolution theory makes about macroevolution are just predictions of likely future finds of more circumstantial evidence of macroevolution -- for example, the fossil record is used to make predictions of likely future finds of "missing link" fossils. And evolution theory is not testable or falsifiable at all in regard to the claim that macroevolution was driven solely by natural genetic variation and natural selection. In many ways, evolution theory is no more scientific than ID and is often even less scientific than ID because evolution theory often strays beyond what can be proven or supported by scientific evidence. If evolution in fact occurred solely by "natural" occurrences, then those occurrences would have been either extremely unlikely or not "natural" in the usual sense.
Claim -- ID is the only scientific (or pseudoscientific) challenge to evolution theory
Answer -- Of course, Darwinists do not make this claim outright -- they only imply it because the Dover decision explicitly banned only ID. Some other challenges to evolution theory involve -- (1) co-evolution, (2) the propagation of beneficial mutations in sexual reproduction, and (3) the mathematical probability of evolution.
Claim -- raising doubts about evolution theory is going to hurt the technological competitiveness of the USA
Answer -- Most practical applications of the theory are based on microevolution, whereas the big controversy is over macroevolution. Also, scientists can still use the tools and concepts of evolution theory even while believing that all or part of the theory is untrue, in the same way that electrical engineers use complex-number math to analyze AC circuits even though the complex numbers and complex-plane vectors bear no direct relationship to the physical quantities of the circuits. Furthermore, many foreign countries have ID movements of their own -- see
http://messageboards.aol.com/aol/en_us/articles.php?boardId=558015&articleId=12673&func=5&channel=News (note -- most of the URL links on this webpage do not work just by clicking on them because parts of the links are not highlighted in blue -- it is necessary to copy and paste the complete link. On the link to the reports on Australia, Eastern Europe, Germany, etc., just clicking on the link will work but will bring up the wrong webpage -- it is necessary to copy and paste the entire link including the part that spilled over into the next line )
Claim -- ID is scientifically vacuous and makes no worthwhile contribution to science.
Answer -- Even if ID is false, it nonetheless expands scientific knowledge, and the questions raised by ID could lead to important scientific discoveries. We should not place artificial boundaries on scientific inquiry.
Claim -- the concept of "exaptation" has completely refuted ID
Answer -- "Exaptation" is the concept that features that evolve for one function may be converted to serve another function and that hence many of the parts of irreducibly complex systems may have come ready-made or nearly so. However, exaptation does not change the fact that all of the parts of an irreducibly complex system must come together simultaneously in their final forms to create the complete system, and that is very unlikely. Also, a feature that is already serving an essential or important function may not be available to help form the irreducible system unless a duplicate is created.
Also, the scientific merits of ID are discussed in the Discovery Institute's book "Traipsing into Evolution" and online in "Dover in Review" by DI's John West.
Labels: Intelligent design
posted by Larry Fafarman | 4/25/2006 04:54:00 PM
82 Comments:
Also, scientists can still use the tools and concepts of evolution theory even while believing that all or part of the theory is untrue, in the same way that mechanical engineers use real-number math to analyze structures even though the real numbers and real-plane vectors bear no direct relationship to the physical quantities of the structural members.
(for the humor-impaired, that was a parody)
W Kevin, while your post may be a parody, nevertheless the "humor-impaired" are in the same boat as pretty much everyone else when it comes to being amused by your "parody" i.e. don't quit your day job.
I'll bet you have better things to do then smear your crap around your mental cage. While that part of your self parody is actually humorous to watch it's also sad to see i.e. a mind is a terrible thing to waste.
Maybe you think that by putting on your supernerd costume and defending mom, apple pie, and the nerdy little gay darwinian way, that you're winning battles in the nerdy little gay mental war you and the brain atrophied cretins who think like you get all hot and bothered about i.e grow up and get a life poindexter.
Kizzzmet, I think it was a good thing that Kevin noted it was a parody, becuase you obviously did not get it. Humour-impaired indeed.
"In many ways, evolution theory is no more scientific than ID and is often even less scientific than ID because evolution theory often strays beyond what can be proven or supported by scientific evidence."
This was humour, right? You accuse evolution theory of straying beyond what can be proven, and place this in constrast with ID? You also constrast the scientific evidence of evolution against that of ID?
So, what is the "scientific evidence" for ID?
Renier said ( Wednesday, April 26, 2006 1:35:07 AM ) --
>>>>"In many ways, evolution theory is no more scientific than ID and is often even less scientific than ID because evolution theory often strays beyond what can be proven or supported by scientific evidence."
This was humour, right? You accuse evolution theory of straying beyond what can be proven, and place this in constrast with ID? You also constrast the scientific evidence of evolution against that of ID?<<<<
There is good scientific evidence for evolution theory's claims of "changes with time" and common descent, but there is little or no scientific evidence supporting the claim that evolution was driven solely by natural genetic variation and natural selection, but evolutionists make that claim in an effort to make evolution theory a complete scientific explanation for the origin of species. ID -- or at least irreducible complexity -- is much more modest because it makes no wild speculations about things that are not solidly supported by the evidence. I see ID as mainly just a challenge to the idea that evolution was driven solely by natural genetic variation and natural selection. Michael Behe, who as you know is one of the leading proponents of ID, does not challenge the ideas of an old earth, changes with time, and common descent.
>>>So, what is the "scientific evidence" for ID?<<<
Irreducible complexity, for one. The evolutionists' claim that the concept of "exaptation" ( the idea that a feature that evolved for one purpose can be converted to serve another purpose ) has completely refuted irreducible complexity is badly flawed. Exaptation does not change the fact that all of the parts of an irreducible system must come together simultaneously in their final forms to create the complete system. Also, the changes required in the parts are often drastic ( e.g., jawbones allegedly evolved into middle ear bones ) and a part that is already serving an essential or important function may not be available to help create the irreducible system unless a duplicate for that part is created.
The study of irreducible complexity and other scientific challenges to evolution theory contribute to our knowledge of science, and these challenges, even if false, can advance science by forcing scientists to confront weaknesses in the theory. There should be no artificial limits placed on scientific inquiry. And even if one alleged example of irreducible complexity is proven to be false, there are always other examples. As a mathematics professor of mine once said, nothing in mathematics can be proven by example because we can never run out of examples. Similarly, irreducible complexity cannot be proven to be false just by showing that examples of it are false, because there may be one or more examples out there that are true.
Also, I strongly recommend reading the following --
(1) An amicus brief that 85 scientists submitted in the Kitzmiller v. Dover case. This brief urged Judge Jones to refrain from ruling on the scientific merits of ID.
(2) An article titled "Do Car Engines Run on Lugnuts" by Casey Luskin, which challenges the claim that the idea of exaptation refutes irreducible complexity.
There isn't any evolutionary theory yet. I thought everyone knew that. What we have are tested and failed hypotheses, notably Darwinism amd Lamarckism and as yet untested ones like the Prescribed Evolutionary Hypothesis.
Einstein's Special Theory of Relativity was an hypothesis until 1919 when it was supported by astronomical observations during a total eclipse of the sun. Darwinism has never been supported beyond the establishment of varieties. All the selection in the world, natural or artificial, never produced a new species and never will. Natural selection is very real but it preserves the status quo just as Reginald C. Punnett and Leo Berg both realized nearly a century ago. Darwinians are slow learners. I'm not.
There is one aspect of Lamarckism that is potentially of some significance. He explained the origin of new structures as the result of what he called an "inner urge." One thing he definitely got right. It was an inner, not an outer source that produced the new structures. Mutations had absolutely nothing to do with any of it because the new structure was already present as a blueprint in the genome of the evolving ancestor, no doubt in my mind about it. In short the new structure was, in a word, PRESCRIBED. Show me some evidence that it wasn't. That is what science is all about. It is time for a new paradigm and with the help of some great predecessors I have offered one.
"Everything is determined... by forces over which we have no control."
Albert Einstein
Improvius the only thing Luskin has proved is his own argument from ignorance and the only thing you have proved is your own "I think I'll hop on any bandwagon any half wit drives around if it somehow deludes me into thinking I'm not a complete friggin wanker"
Well...think again poindexter. Any half a retard can understand that IC is common sense, it's only the complete imbicils who argue against it. Their/your moronic arguments prove only how pathetic they/you are...nothing else.
Take the eye for example; the eye, even so called primitve eyes, are all fully dependent on all of the parts in order to function. Until all of the parts are in perfect synchronization, perfect fit, size and weight, perfect chemical composition, etc, the eye will not function. What value does a lens have without the rest of the contraption? What value does any part of the eye have until it is fully functional. Every part of every body is the same when looked at closely. But does this obvious blow to evolutionary theory make any sense to brain dead darwinists? Of course not. When you refuse to accept any other possibility other then evolution then you are forced to accept the absurd. The biggest retards amongst you then go around and argue the case for the perfection of your absurdity. Read Don Quixote to see where that ship of fools is sailing towards...
Kizzmet
Are you denying a past evolution? It sure sounds that way. If so what is your scenario? Special Creation maybe?
"A past evolution is undeniable. A present evolution is undemonstrable."
John A. Davison
I love it so!
John I believe that "God" exists everywhere, everything is comprised of God, and that everything ls controlled by God. I reject all forms of evolution (micro-evolution is a misnomer and doesn't count as evolution in my book).
From my experience I have learned that reality as we know it is smiliar to a computer generated virtual reality world. In a virtual reality everything you see is nothing more then a combination of pixels controlled by a computer which has been designed and is controlled by a person.
In our reality everything is comrpised of essentially the same pixels or quantum particles. Like a virtual reality world the quantum particles or pixels can be arranged to create an infinite variety of things.
Everything is essentially part of a unified field of superconscious energy. That energy exists in more then our 3 dimensions, it also exists in sub quantum dimensions. It is conscious, intelligent, and possesses vast talents and energy. It is a living cosmic computer. The natural world was designed and brought into existence by it's well thought out plan after a very long time of gaining knowledge and experience. It's older then you can imagine. Matter is simply a manipulation of it's own being/energy from the sub quantum dimensions. Kind of like the condensation of gas into liquid. It's consciousness/energy/self is everything, everything is comprised of it's consciousness/energy/self. It is fully conscious at every and any point within itself, which is everywhere on towards infinity. Your consciousness and mind exist in a subquantum dimension, your consciousness and mind exist as part of it's consciousness and mind, as does everything else.
We can only know of it's existence if it's our time. When it's your time it reveals itself to you one way or another. There is no other way to know "God" exists. It controls everything about everyone's life, including what you think and what you perceive...everything. There is a purpose to life and that purpose is to eventually be elevated to a higher plane of existence free from death, old age, or suffering of any sort. It takes many lives for our consciousness and mind to evolve to the higher stage. At that stage God reveals everything to you, directly. Earth is a transitional stage for us. There are many many earth type planets in the universe. There are other higher type planets where enlightened people live with "God" as a friend. God takes human form and lives with his/her family on those planets. "God" is like us in that enjoyment is the goal of life for him/her. Life there is without old age, disease, violence, death, nor any negativity. In order to live there we have to be perfect. That is why we are not there yet, we are on the path to perfection.
Improvious; Luskin isn't a moron you are. The quote you provided from him is an argument from ignorance i.e.
"Only by reverse-engineering a system to test for function at each transitional stage can one determine if a system has reducible complexity or irreducible complexity."
How about simple common sense? I don't need to reverse engineer an eyeball in order to know that until it is fully functional it has absolutely no purpose whatsoever. He's trying to win an argument with morons by proposing some complicated impossible event when IC is simple and easy to understand...unless you don't want to.
Kizzzmet said ( Wednesday, April 26, 2006 8:55:55 AM ) --
>>>Improvious; Luskin isn't a moron you are.........How about simple common sense? I don't need to reverse engineer an eyeball in order to know that until it is fully functional it has absolutely no purpose whatsoever. <<<<
Thanks, Kizzzmet. It looks like the Darwinists don't do so well where the opposition is not deleted, bathroom-walled and banned like I was on Panda's Thumb.
Improvius; so your saying IC cannot be refuted by current scientific ability? You called Luskin a moron, so I guess you're admitting to be a moron?
Larry they never do well in a debate, they think they do because they have ruled out any other possibility other then evolution. When you rule out any chance of evolution being wrong then essentially any argument against it no matter what the value of it is, is rejected without due consideration. Any problem pointed out in evolutionary theory is inconsequential because they accept evolution as an article of faith. It cannot be wrong. Therefore any seeming inconsistency is ruled to be the fault of our inability to understand evolution. Evolution is perfect, we are imperfect. Evolution is all powerful and mysterious in it's mystic powers. Evolution is the religious dogma of nature worshippers, primitive sorts, good for a laugh now and then, what what.
Dover proves that IDC is for losers, you lost so get over it for cryin' out loud.
You'll lose again and again.
I love it so!
improvius said ( Wednesday, April 26, 2006 5:58:41 AM ) --
>>>If scientific "theory" and "hypothesis" are defined as complete scientific explanations for natural phenomena......
(Hint: they aren't.)<<<
Well, if what you say is true, then there is one less reason to say that ID is not a scientific theory or hypothesis.
I think that the idea that the explanation must be complete is implicit in the definitions of "scientific theory" and "scientific hypothesis." A "scientific theory" may be defined as "an explanation of a set of related observations or events based upon proven hypotheses and verified multiple times." But if the explanation is not complete, then the "theory" has not really "explained" the set of related observations or events. For example, irreducible complexity is not an "explanation" for observations of the fossil record -- it is just a challenge to evolution theory.
If completeness as an explanation is not a necessary part of being a theory, then why have evolutionists included in evolution theory the notion that evolution was driven solely by natural genetic variation and natural selection even though that notion is not well supported by the evidence and common sense ?
kizzmet said:
How about simple common sense? I don't need to reverse engineer an eyeball in order to know that until it is fully functional it has absolutely no purpose whatsoever. He's trying to win an argument with morons by proposing some complicated impossible event when IC is simple and easy to understand...unless you don't want to.
Oh, good. Creationists are using common sense now. My common sense is quite clear on whether the sun travels around the earth or vice versa. Heck, I even saw the sun come up, just this morning!
And I agree that IC is easy to understand. What is also easy to understand is that we expect such structures to result from natural selection, and, in fact, NS is the only well-understood process that could, in principle, give rise to such features.
A couple of questions, there, kizzmet:
When, in your understanding, did this "unified field of superconcious energy" came into existence?
Was everything in the living world designed, or just things that are IC? Was everyhting designed at the same time?
Why are there so many extinct species?
Thanks so much.
larry farfaman said...
>>>I'm glad I could help you come to understand and accept the truth, Improvius.
Wednesday, April 26, 2006 11:32:41 AM <<<
The above comment was not written by me, but by someone impersonating me. That is not nice. You are taking advantage of me because of my no-deletions policy.
The giveaway here is that my name is misspelled in the comment header. This could not possibly be an accidental misspelling because my name is stored in the computer -- I do not have to enter it when I post a comment.
How many times do I have to tell you? There is no evolutionary theory, just some failed and as yet untested hypotheses. Get with the program.
I love it so!
This could not possibly be an accidental misspelling because my name is stored in the computer -- I do not have to enter it when I post a comment.
Hey, design detection! Right on.
But, are you sure you don't want to run it through the Explanatory Filter first, just to make absolutely sure it's not the product of chance or necessity? LOL
JAD, what about the tons of scientific articles?
Oh yes, you don't read them, I forgot.
Anonymous said ( . Wednesday, April 26, 2006 10:02:02 AM ) --
>>>Dover proves that IDC is for losers, you lost so get over it for cryin' out loud. <<<
All Dover proves is that Judge Jones is a lousy judge -- see "Traipsing into breathtaking inanity" on this blog.
The Dover decision is not going anywhere -- it is just an unreviewed decision of a single federal district court judge. As such, the Dover decision just reflects the lone judge's prejudices, whims, and eccentricities, which are considerable. In fact, a few years ago the federal 9th circuit court of appeals, the largest federal circuit except for the Federal circuit based in Washington D.C., had a rule that no district-court opinion could be cited in any court of the 9th circuit -- I don't know if this rule is still in effect.
There is a theory that the expert-witness testimony of conspiracy-theorist Barbara Forrest was a major factor in the Dover decision, but there is no guarantee that she will testify in any future trial or that another judge will accept her arguments. See Panda's Thumb and Uncommon Descent.
cj you wrote:
"And I agree that IC is easy to understand. What is also easy to understand is that we expect such structures to result from natural selection, and, in fact, NS is the only well-understood process that could, in principle, give rise to such features."
The problem is that natural selection doesn't change bodily structures, all it does is decide what survives. Mutation is supposedly what changes bodily structure. Chance mutation somehow built bio technology so complex that we cannot even begin to replicate it nor really understand how any of it works in great detail. A series of mutations built an eye? built a hand? built a nervous system? built wings? built mango seeds? built a rose? How can blind chance mutations build highly sophisticated bio technologically integrated massively complex information storing and reading life forms? That's like believing if you zap an amoeba and it's offspring with radiation for long enough that it will turn into an apple tree by chance. Or if you throw paint at a canvas long enough you'll get the Mona Lisa. It's just plain dumb.
You also wrote:
"A couple of questions, there, kizzmet:
When, in your understanding, did this "unified field of superconcious energy" came into existence?"
Many if not most physicists already believe and have hypothesized about a unified field of energy throughout the universe for some time now. When you want to consider the origin of matter/energy in the universe you have to come to a point where you say matter/energy has always existed. Why? Because if anything exists then there was never a time when nothing existed. This is because if there ever was a time when nothing existed then nothing would ever come into existence because nothing produces nothing. So the conclusion according to the current accepted laws of physics is the matter/energy can not be created nor destroyed. All it does is change into different types of matter/energy.
So where did the universal superconscious unified field come from? It was always here. Although the consciousness and mind was in a potential state until some unknown change came about. The universe (infinite universe not the big bang bull) came alive at some point in time a very long time ago. It developed from an ignorant state into a supra intelligent state. This is how it had to happen because knowledge is not inherent in anything. All knowledge has a source and must be acquired. Therefore "God" was born totally ignorant and then developed over a very long period of time until eventually he/she was able to entertain itself. When you're the only conscious entity in existence with nothing to do but exist in infinite space all alone you are highly motivated to change that situation. The earth and similar planets are the result of "God" wanting something to do and intelligent people to relate with.
Then you wrote:
"Was everything in the living world designed, or just things that are IC?"
All the product of design, "God" controls everything and everyone. We and everything else exist within and are a part of and depend on "God" for our existence.
Then you wrote:
"Was everyhting designed at the same time?"
"God" has to actually make a plan and design things just like anyone else, so no it took a long time to design everything. But everything we have experience of on earth was designed trillions of years ago. "God" is very very ancient. Earth is just a tiny planet amongst trillions of similar and better planets with humans on them. Humans are the forms "God" created to enjoy with and to give other people lives to enjoy with. Our bodies are not the product of chance, they are the ultimate enjoying machines (potentially, when you have evolved your consciousnes to the perfected stage then you are given a perfect body and you will live on a perfect planet with no disease, death, old age etc)
Then you asked:
"Why are there so many extinct species?
Thanks so much."
It's all a part of a historical plan. History is not chaotic, it's all planned out and it happens in the same way on countless other earth type planets. The way history on earth has unfolded is for a purpose. It's like a movie in that it plays out according to the script and the director for a purpose. That purpose is to elevate our consciousness, evolve our consciousness. So the ancient earth existed for modern day purposes, for modern day debate. You must remember that until a little over one hundred years ago the very ancient past of earth had never been known by any humans throughout history. It's only in modern society where we have learned about the earth's distant past. What happened millions of years ago on earth was for the purpose of discussing it in modern society, to incite debate on these topics, to show us something e.g. the great age and planning skill of "God".
jeasnnot
I read real science not Darwinian drivel. There is nothing in Neodarwinism that will pass the rational test, absolutely nothing. It is all based on the unjustified and unsubstantiated assumption that phylogeny had an identifiable testable external cause. Such a cause has never been found because it never existed. Neithet does ontogeny have an external cause. I thought everyone knew that. Oh no, not jeannot, nor any of his "groupthink" atheist cronies from Der Fuhrer's Terminal Tomb and Bunker over at Panda's Dislocated Pollex, the last fortress of Darwimpian mysticism, the Alamo of internet insanity, Der Fuhrer Esley Welsberry's (pronounced Velsberry) last stand. Got that? Write that down and remember who it was that told you.
There indeed has been tons of nonsense published, intellectual rubbish by the trainload in some of our otherwise most distinguished journals, but not for much longer. Trust me.
It is hard to believe isn't it?
Naturally,
I love it so!
Bill Dembski just announced he worked closely with Ann Coulter on some chapters in her latest book:
Godless: The Church of Liberalism
Read more at the link:
Ann Coulter weighs in on Darwinism
"jeasnnot
I read real science not Darwinian drivel. There is nothing in Neodarwinism that will pass the rational test, absolutely nothing. It is all based on the unjustified and unsubstantiated assumption that phylogeny had an identifiable testable external cause. Such a cause has never been found because it never existed. Neithet does ontogeny have an external cause. I thought everyone knew that. Oh no, not jeannot, nor any of his "groupthink" atheist cronies from Der Fuhrer's Terminal Tomb and Bunker over at Panda's Dislocated Pollex, the last fortress of Darwimpian mysticism, the Alamo of internet insanity, Der Fuhrer Esley Welsberry's (pronounced Velsberry) last stand. Got that? Write that down and remember who it was that told you."
A embittered Internet crank who suffers from the idea that he has some amazing proof that 150 years of science is entirely wrong yet refuses to claim his Nobel Prize, who specialises in sub 5-year old playground namecalling, and who is called John A Davison?
"There indeed has been tons of nonsense published, intellectual rubbish by the trainload in some of our otherwise most distinguished journals, but not for much longer. Trust me.
It is hard to believe isn't it?"
Is this the latest prediction of evolution's imminent Waterloo?
Larry
"Improvius" is also a spoof. The first letter is a lower case L not an upper case I.
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
>>>The above comment was not written by me, but by someone impersonating me. That is not nice. You are taking advantage of me because of my no-deletions policy.<<<
Welcome to the internet, Larry. In fact, welcome to life. Some people see an edifice as an excuse to paint it with grafitti. Other people see a party as an excuse to blare their own favorite music at all times, regardless of what the host or other party-goers want to listen to, and claim persecution when others try to put on something else.
>>>Larry
"Improvius" is also a spoof. The first letter is a lower case L not an upper case I.
Posted by DaveScot at 4/26/2006 04:23:33 PM
<<<<<<<
I have seen that trick used on the AOL message boards to mimic another member's AOL email address prefix, because messages are posted under this prefix. But here it would have no effect because commenters may post under any names they choose.
Thanks for the observation, though -- I was beginning to suspect that the Improvius message was a spoof, too.
Sorry, folks, I recently deleted one of my own messages -- a response to CJ O'Brien -- because it was posted on the wrong thread. It belonged on the "Co-evolutionary paradox" thread.
ben said
In response to your last question -
It sure is!
Who is next?
I love it so!
You have made the same mistake that most make. You equate evolution with Darwinian mysticism, the biggest and most long lived hoax in the history of science. Let me put it this way for you.
"A past evolution is undeniable. A present evolution is undemonstrable."
John A. Davison
"Everything is determined ... by forces over which we have no control."
Albert Einstein
Got that now? Write that down.
I love it so!
The proof that natural selection, the cornerstone of the Darwinian fairy tale, was a pipe dream was supplied first by St George Jackson Mivart when he asked the simple question - How can natural selection have been involved with a structure that had not yet appeared? That was in 1871, a mere twelve years after Darwin's great opus minimus. Several authors since have done the same. That question has never been answered because Darwinism never had anything whatsoever to do with true speciation or any of the higher categories. That is why. It dwarfs the Phlogiston of Chemistry and the Ether of Physics in its complete lack of any significance whatsoever. It is a joke and I am laughing my ass off.
How do you like them skewered Darwimpian shishkabobs? I hope they give you the runs.
I love it so!
I see Stravid Dinger is back but a much kinder and gentler Dinger. It looks as if Wembski must have had a fatherly talk with his blogczar suggesting he tone down his rabid rhetoric a few decibels. Of course If I am wrong, I am sure Dinger will remind me in short order. For a while I thought he might be on his way to Vermont to give me that whipping he seems to think I deserve. Bullies are like that don't you know, all mouth.
I love it so!
JohnADavison said ( Wednesday, April 26, 2006 6:47:37 PM ) --
>>>The proof that natural selection, the cornerstone of the Darwinian fairy tale, was a pipe dream was supplied first by St George Jackson Mivart when he asked the simple question - How can natural selection have been involved with a structure that had not yet appeared? <<<
JAD, what was the context of the statement, "How can natural selection have been involved with a structure that had not yet appeared?"
I never heard of Mivart before, but he was a major critic of Darwinism in the 19th century, and even Darwin took him seriously. The Wikipedia article titled "The Origin of Species" noted,
"In January 1871 Mivart published On the Genesis of Species, the cleverest and most devastating critique of natural selection in Darwin's lifetime. Darwin took it personally and from April to the end of the year made extensive revisions to the Origin, using the word 'evolution' for the first time and adding a new chapter to refute Mivart."
Some of Mivart's writings about the origins of species are philosophical and theological, as on --http://www.fordham.edu/HALSALL/MOD/1871mivart.html
Larry
It is quite impossible to refute Mivart. Like Adam Sedgwick he put his finger on the Achilles heel of the Darwinian paradigm, the appearance of a new structure. Darwinian gradualism can only modify that which is already present which in the beginning was virtually nothing. Surely you can see that can't you?
The PEH recognizes this profound defect and postulates that which is the only conceivable explanation. All new structures were present in latent form in the genome of the evolving forms. Today we call that front-loading, as good a term as any. How this information was intially stored and then released in an orderly progressive, goal seeking fashion is not yet understood but that it must be have happened that way is unavoidable, even firmly established.
It is not surprising that the computer experts are interested in this problem as that is exactly the sort of thing they do for a living, store information in a latent form so that it can be retrieved in an ordered way. I just wish they wouldn't treat biological scientists such as myself as morons writing "goofy" papers which some of them most certainly do.
The utter failure of the Darwinian model has been recognized from the moment of its inception. Even "Darwin's Bulldog"
Thomas Henry Huxley exposed its failure within a year following the publication of the Origin. Huxley defended Darwin for the same reason Dawkins does. They were both atheists by congenital nature and neither had much respect for the clergy. Dawkins has none. When you begin with that sort of genetic predisposition what else can you expect? Even Juian Huxley, Thomas Henry's grandson, found it necessary to criticize Robert Broom for simply using the word Plan to describe his view of the evolutionary sequence. This while Julian Huxley had literally stolen Broom's evidence that evolution was finshed. It is a scandal among many others that have been perpetrated by the atheist Darwinian camp. They are like a dog with a bone with their infernal atheist Darwinism and I doubt if they can even help it. It is just one more manifestation of their "prescribed" fate. Some of us have been luckier than others. Without being arrogant I can honestly say I have been one of the lucky ones right along with every one of my distinguished sources. None of us were ever able to accept the most blindly ideologically inspired, the most unfounded, the most anti-intellectual product of the human imagination in the history of civilization. Our historical reward has been either to be studiously and deliberately ignored or worse, vilified and ridiculed by a bunch of congenital atheist blowhards who are incapable of accepting the notion that there might have been a plan and a purpose in the universe. They deserve all the contempt they are finally begnning to receive. The sad part is they probably can't help themselves. They were "born that way" you see.
There is no longer any question that, like just about everything else in our lives, our belief or lack of same in a Creator has a firm genetic component, a component that is closely linked to our political views. I refer you to Wlliam Wright's aptly titled book "Born That Way," needless to say, just one more manifestation of the Prescribed Evolutionary Hypothesis.
"Our actions should be based on the ever-present awareness that human beings in their thinking, feeling, and acting are not free but are just as causally bound as the stars in their motion."
Albert Einstein
I love it so!
W. Kevin Vicklund said ( Wednesday, April 26, 2006 5:29:21 PM ) --
>>>"The above comment was not written by me, but by someone impersonating me."
Welcome to the internet, Larry. In fact, welcome to life. Some people see an edifice as an excuse to paint it with grafitti.<<<
What bothers me is that this blog is less than two weeks old and already this stupid moron has found it. I think that all the banning and deleting crap that goes on in the Internet has created a lot of resentment and some people vent their frustration on innocent people. In another thread here, I made the following comment,
"All of this banning and deleting crap that occurs on the Internet is defeating one of the Internet's biggest potential advantages -- an opportunity for all viewpoints to be heard. Before the Internet, It was not practical to disseminate more than a very limited number of brief public-opinion statements in newspapers, magazines, and radio talk shows."
The best comments are those that take a long time to write because they are carefully written and carefully researched. Comments that contain only insults and ad hominem attacks take no time or effort at all. Guess which kind of comment is most likely to be deleted on Panda's Thumb, and which comment whose author is most likely to be banned by Panda's Thumb.
Also consider the great advantages of email, besides instant delivery. I have sent emails to over a hundred people at a time (AOL does not like me to do this too often, however ), and an undesired email can be trashed with the click of a button. Compare that to snail-mail. Yet some people actually get angry when they receive an email from someone they don't know. A first-time request I once received asking removal of an email address from my mailing list was not polite.
There are a lot of boorish, inconsiderate Internet users who just don't know proper Internet etiquette and don't appreciate the Internet's great capabilities.
And again I ask -- since you knew that I was banned from Panda's Thumb by mistake, why didn't you tell me the truth sooner ? Instead, all you did was try to get me banned and deleted again by pointing me out to the PT staff. That was not very nice. And at least the PT staff had a reason for not telling me the truth -- they were glad to have an excuse for getting rid of me.
BTW, Kevin, the only reason why Panda's Thumb gets away with all that deleting, bathroom-walling, and banning crap is that the great majority of the PT commenters approve of these actions. Without the commenters, PT would be nothing -- for example, it would not have gotten that Scientific American magazine web award. If many commenters decided to gang up on the PT staff by doing such things as condemning PT's censorship, boycotting PT, and setting up alternative blogs ( as I did ), PT could not get away with this crap.
John you wrote:
"Today we call that front-loading, as good a term as any. How this information was intially stored and then released in an orderly progressive, goal seeking fashion is not yet understood but that it must be have happened that way is unavoidable, even firmly established."
That's completely false. There isn't a shred of actual evidence supporting "front loading". That theory is purely speculative.
improvius if you take yer head out of yer ass then my comments may not look like shit to you.
JohnADavison said ( Thursday, April 27, 2006 2:38:28 AM ) --
>>>It is quite impossible to refute Mivart. Like Adam Sedgwick he put his finger on the Achilles heel of the Darwinian paradigm, the appearance of a new structure. Darwinian gradualism can only modify that which is already present which in the beginning was virtually nothing.<<<<
JAD,
As for your statement that "Darwinian gradualism can only modify that which is already present," it is true that most of the mutations I have seen have not been whole new structures but have been just modifications or even extra copies of existing structures -- for example, I have seen a sheep (or was it a goat?) with an extra leg, a man with an extra finger, and a fish with an extra mouth.
Considering that Mivart was a prominent critic of Darwinism and that Darwin even added a new chapter to The Origin of Species to rebut him, one would think that Mivart would be better known. I checked Panda's Thumb and found little mention of him there, and it seemed that all or most of that came from you.
I'm sorry (clears throat and pulls out megaphone), actually what I said was, "How would you like to suck my balls, improvius?
John,
How about providing some evidence of your assertions? You know, the 'evolution is finished' and 'front loading' stuff.
Besides your recent discovery of chromosomal speciation, I have yet to see some content in your posts.
Can you also explain why the tons of scientific pappers are all wrong?
Since you're a scientist, it should be easy for you to demonstate where an experience is biased or how its results were misinterpreted.
Be specific please.
Thanks.
Larry
Here are some other authors for you to check at Google and see who has given them favorable treatment and see who has either ignored them or vilified them.
Robert Broom, William Bateson, Leo Berg, Pierre Grasse, Otto Schindewolf, Reginald C. Punnett, Richard B. Goldschmidt, a veritable honor roll of the finest minds in evolutionary science, not one a Bible-waving Fundamenslist and not one a compulsive chance worshipping atheist Darwiian mystic.
Those are my sources, the minds that botn sides in this idiotic debate steadfastly insist never existed. It is an old story and one of my declared purposes is to resurrect these scholars from the oblivion both factions have interred them. What we have a are a bunch a chair-ridden publicity-seeking, uneducated, ideologues desperately writing one book after another in an attempt to force their mindless drivel down the throats of naive audiences. Here they are in no particular order. Ernst Mayr, Stephen J. Gould, Richard Dawkins, William Provine, Phillip Johnson, Jonathan Wells, William Dembski, not a scientist in the lot, just a bunch of sedentary blowhard wordsmiths making money while cluttering up the world's library shelves with pure science fiction and theological nonsense. There is more science in any given chapter by any one of sources than in everything these phonies have committed to hard copy combined. Got that? Write that down.
How do you like them skewered pork tenderloins with all that cholesterol laden gravy on them? I hope it gives everybody gas followed by roaring apoplexy.
There now. I feel much better. Thanks Larry for this opportunity to vent a little.
I love it so!
jeannot
How about you reading my papers you mindless creep?
Your pappers don't anwser my questions.
They sure as hell do you illiterate moron.
Jad, do you think Common Descent is true? Now, before you go off insulting me, I am trying to find out what you think to be true and what you disagree with.
Larry, "Irreducible complexity" is not proof for ID.
Larry wrote " And even if one alleged example of irreducible complexity is proven to be false, there are always other examples."
Yes, retreat to another gap.
Jad, what is your take on "Irreducible complexity"?
renier
I am not about to answer questions I have already addressed both in hard copy and and several times on internet forums. You obviously are not interested in learning anything. All you want to do is see your name in the ephemeral print of cyberspace. Carry on without me.
"You can lead a man to the literature, but you can't make him comprehend it."
John A. Davison
I love it so!
Plus ça change...
Hi John
I remind you about those you often cite in support of your PEH idea as follows:
George Mivart (English comparative anatomist) died 1 April 1900 was excommunicated by the Catholic church for suggesting separation of science from religion.
Alfred Russel Wallace (English naturalist) died 7 November 1913, suggested Herbert Spencer's phrase "survival of the fittest " to Darwin and remained a lifelong supporter of evolution.
William Bateson (English geneticist) died 8 February 1926, brought the work of Gregor Mendel to the attention of a wider audience. "Bateson had a combative, forceful personality, well suited to his self-appointed role of Mendel advocate. However, Bateson was reluctant to believe in the chromosomal theory of inheritance. He was vocally antagonistic to the idea and it wasn't until 1922 after a visit to Thomas Hunt Morgan's fly lab that he publicly accepted chromosomes and their role in heredity." From http://www.dnaftb.org/dnaftb/
Reginald Punnett (English geneticist) died 3 January 1967 (aged 92, retd. 1940) Co-discoverer with Bateson of genetic linkage.
Henry Fairfield Osborn (American paleontologist) died 6 November 1935. From 1891 was associated with the American Museum of Natural History and established one of the foremost collections of fossils. His name has been linked to the idea of "orthogenesis"
Robert Broom (Scottish paleontologist, but spent his working life in South Africa) died 6 April 1951. Had a distinguished career searching for and studying hominid fossils.
Richard B. Goldschschmidt. (German geneticist) died April 1958 (aged 80). Suggested the idea of macro-mutations sometimes referred to as "hopeful monsters".
Otto Schindewolf (German paleontologist) died 10 June 1971 (retd. 1964). Has been associated with Goldschmidt's idea of "hopeful monsters" and saltation.
Pierre Grassé (French zoologist) (1895-1985) Wrote "Evolution of Living Organisms" with many comments expressing scepticism with the theory of evolution. Seems to be not highly regarded in his native France, as little source material is available on French websites.
Leo Berg (1876 - 1950)Russian biologist, author of Nomogenesis, 1922.
One similarity that strikes me is that all these distinguished scholars are dead. Indeed, all except Grassé seem to have finished their careers before the deciphering of the genetic code. I wonder how these scholars would have incorporated the huge amount of research, evidence and information that has since become available, had it been known to them while they were at the peak of their careers. One thing is certain; we are unable to ask them now.
I wonder if Professor Davison could cite any living scientist that takes his ideas seriously.
Also a reminder that you were cynically used for the cachet of your scientific credentials at Uncommon Descent and dispensed with when your individual commenting style was judged counterproductive by Dembski and Springer.
6:11 PM
DaveScot said...
Wow John! You're such an ass. I bend over backwards to help your goofy papers get some positive exposure and you insult me. No wonder UVM isolated you from your students. I had to isolate you too. You're one big failure at just about everything you ever did... family, friends, career. I challenge you to name one thing you ever did that could be called a success. Bitter old fart.
And get this straight. Biology isn't rocket science and you're a functional illiterate in just about everything. I'm surprised you can tie your shoes.
And don't you dare flatter yourself that you led me to anything. I found you after *I* had studied the evidence and concluded that front-loaded evolution best fit the known facts. I was googling for "c-value paradox" + "ameoba dubia" and ran across you. And, professor slowpoke, it didn't take me 30 years of being a physiologist to figure it out I figured it out in a few months. But hey, like you said, better late than never!
And I am sure that it is Mr Springer who is attempting the anonymous derailing of this blog.
So there.
7:15 PM
"Jad wrote : I am not about to answer questions I have already addressed both in hard copy and and several times on internet forums. You obviously are not interested in learning anything. All you want to do is see your name in the ephemeral print of cyberspace. Carry on without me."
I just asked what your views are on Common Descent and IC. I have not been following your every idea on the net, else I would not have asked. Please ignore my post to you on the other thread too. Thanks.
Renier said ( Friday, April 28, 2006 1:33:02 AM ) --
>>>>>Larry, "Irreducible complexity" is not proof for ID.<<<<<
As I explained in my opening post, I never liked the name "intelligent design" because it implies the existence of a supernatural "designer."
What irreducible complexity can do is show beyond a reasonable doubt the falsity of the notion that evolution was driven solely by natural genetic variation and natural selection.
>>>>>Larry wrote " And even if one alleged example of irreducible complexity is proven to be false, there are always other examples."
Yes, retreat to another gap.<<<<<
Isn't that what evolutionists do also ? For example, evolution theory was in serious trouble because the fossil record showed species suddenly appearing without precursors and then remaining unchanged for millions of years until the present day or until they became extinct -- this was contrary to the idea that evolution consisted of gradual and continuous change. So in response, evolutionists "moved the goalposts" by coming up with the idea of "punctuated equilibrium," the idea of short spurts of evolution followed by long plateaus. And when evolution theory was threatened by the idea of irreducible complexity, evolutionists came up with the idea of "exaptation," the idea that parts of the irreducible systems previously had other functions and thus came ready-made or nearly so. But exaptation does not change the fact that all of the parts must come together simultaneously in their final forms to create the complete irreducible system. And the changes required for exaptation are often far-fetched -- e.g., jawbones evolving into middle-ear bones. And if a pre-existing part needed to form the complete irreducible system has an essential or important function outside the system, that part may not be available to help form the system unless a duplicate is created.
Alan Fox said ( Friday, April 28, 2006 4:28:22 AM ) --
>>>>George Mivart (English comparative anatomist) died 1 April 1900 was excommunicated by the Catholic church for suggesting separation of science from religion.<<<<
Does that make his ideas any less worthy ?
Why is it that Mivart, a prominent critic of Darwinism who was taken very seriously by Darwin himself, is almost unknown today ? The Wikipedia online encyclopedia says of Mivart,
"In January 1871 Mivart published On the Genesis of Species, the cleverest and most devastating critique of natural selection in Darwin's lifetime. Darwin took it personally and from April to the end of the year made extensive revisions to the Origin, using the word 'evolution' for the first time and adding a new chapter to refute Mivart."
-- from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Origin_of_species
@Larry.
I just thought it was an interesting point that Mivart had an acrimonious dispute with the Catholic church on the one hand, while also being, at one time, the critic that Darwin took most seriously.
My main point is that John's sources are all dead and there have been huge developments in evolutionary biology since the 1950s, not least in the discovery and elucidation of the (practically universal) genetic code. I wonder what Mivart would have made of all that new information. I doubt he was a reality denier. But as I said, we will never know.
Alan Fox
Mivart neither invoked nor denied the supernatural in his criticism of Darwin. It wasn't necessary then and it isn't now. He was excomminicated by the church because his views could not be reconciled with scripture. Since then the Roman Church has proved to be far more willing to accept organic evolution including the production of man. It is the Protestant evangelicals that have always foot-dragged and continue to.
The Roman church was always the friend of science even in Galileo's day. It is the Protestants that have always had a strong anti-science contingent. The vast majority of themstill don't even believe in evolution. Just look at the membership over at Dembski's forum. Apparently Dembski has finally accepted that man was not divinely created de novo, but I for one can't really be sure what he believes because he keeps his mouth shut on such matters and lets his slave David Springer carry the ball for him. I am sure if he denied a special creation for Homo sapiens he would lose a big fraction of his loyal followers. The same can be said for Dembski's hero, Phillip Johnson. Apparently Johnson doesn't believe in evolution in any form. He blew me off long ago but never in hard copy. He knew better.
To deny reproductive continuity in the chain that ultimately produced the last product of organic evolution, ourselves, is unthinkable. We are first and foremost "animals," as any observer of the human scene can plainly see. This blog is frosting on that cake!
"The idea of a personal God is quite alien to me and seems even naive."
Albert Einstein
"The main source of the present-day conflicts between the spheres of religion and science lies in the concept of a personal God."
ibid
I love it so!
Larry, you completely misunderstand the context of punctuated equilibria. This is not an ad hoc theory, it was not suggested as a response to some 'problem' with the fossile record.
It's just a theory of rapid speciation, a phenomenon that can be observed in the lab and in the wild.
Incidentally Alan, it is the NEW information that is putting Darwin into its grave. That is why I describe your home base as The Tomb and Terminal Bunker for the Darwinian fairy tale. That in no way diminishes the great contributions of my sources all of whom are indeed dead. That is what makes their significance all the more important. Like myself, they have not been allowed to exist by the ruling establishment, one that is about to be permanently deposed.
I can't wait to see how Dawkins is going to handle it. It will be great sport. He will probably try to wriggle out of it all with another book. Writing science fiction is all he ever did, just like Stephen J. Gould and Ernst Mayr, collectively the "Three Stooges" of atheist Darwinian mysticism. Two down, one to go.
I love it so!
Larry
Don't pay any attention to jeannot. Punctuated equilibria are nothing but two words that Eldredge and Gould dreamed up to characterize the fact that evolution always occurred in spurts. They offered no mechanism for evolution whatsoever. All they did was to butcher two words that used to have real meaning. It was all pure wordsmithing and meaningless, mindless hype, all that any of the Darwinians have ever been able to produce. There is absolutely nothing in the Darwinian model that ever had anything to do with evolution except for the trivial production of intraspecific varieties. The whole damn construct is nothing but an illusion produced by the insistence on the part of its believers that evolution had an identifiable tangible external cause. Such a cause never existed. They even named that non-existent cause - Natural Selection. It was real allright, no question about it. It PREVENTED evolution and ensured extinction just as it still does. St George Jackson Mivart knew it, Reginald C. Punnett knew it, Leo Berg knew it, Pierre Grasse knew it and I know it too.
I love it so!
John
We appear to agree that it is the (US based fundamentalist right-wing) protestant evangelical movement who have a problem with reality. Where it conflicts with their world view, reality must be wrong.
The Catholic church has taken a more pragmatic view over the centuries and has survived with its wealth, if not its integrity, intact.
We also agree about the integrity of Dembski (and Springer the opportunist psychopath), Johnson I don't concern myself with as he has passed his peak.
I don't seek to diminish your sources, other than to point out that they are unable to consider the current state of available evidence.
But what do you mean by "I can't wait to see how Dawkins is going to handle it.?
I am sure Sir Richard is unaware of your existence, and has no idea of what "it" might be, as neither do I. Perhaps you could explain.
Re your last post, I have been trying to relocate a passage from one of Dawkins' books where he agrees with you about sexual reproduction normally tending to maintain the status quo. I don't have as much time now as I am back at work now, but I will get there eventually.
@ Jeannot
rehab t'attend!
Ann Coulter is the ugliest transvestite I have ever seen in my life.
Now Dr Davison, after reading some of your posts (not all), I can only conclude you're nothing more than an old creationist who have the worst difficulties to reconcile reality with his religious ideas.
Since the evidence of common descent was so overwhelming, you tried to build a theory of 'prescribed evolution'. By twisting the arguments of some old researcher (most of which published before WW2) you work out a strange untested model of semi-meiotic speciation (which sounds like stasipatric speciation) that is supposed to activate some front loaded information.
But your big concern is random mutations and NS. How can you reconcile that with God, who created us and stopped evolution after reaching such perfection (your "evolution is finished" stuff)?
There you're position is interesting. You keep repeating the argument made by an evangelist at a time we know almost nothing about mutations and take it as a proof that NS can't act.
Then, when one try to remind you the huge amount of scientific research on mutations and NS, which even IDers admit as ‘microevolution’, you just qualify this as drivel, without providing any explanation.
Therefore, stuck in this untenable position, you're getting cranky, insulting almost everyone who asks question, like a 10-year-old child. Did you answer your students this way?
You have fallen from a descent scientist to one of the crankiest IDiots in the Internet, looking like a fool before the whole cyberspace. In a sense, JAD I should pity you,
But I don’t. You may not know it, but us rational people don’t have to listen or read your nonsense nor argue with you. We do it because we enjoy it. Reading your idiocies and insults is quite entertaining. Your last exchange with Davescot made our day at ‘the bunker’.
So keep tossing insults, keep yelling you have proved 150 years of research wrong and that Darwinism will soon reach its Waterloo, you’ll only make it funnier. :D
Or do as you said, don't waste your time arguing with some lowly unpublished jerks, and GET OUT.
Alan Fox said ( 4/28/2006 07:19:37 AM ) --
>>>>I just thought it was an interesting point that Mivart had an acrimonious dispute with the Catholic church on the one hand, while also being, at one time, the critic that Darwin took most seriously.<<<<<
What is even more ironical is that Mivart received a doctor of philosophy degree from the pope and a cardinal later denied him the sacraments of the church. See http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/10407b.htm
Today, the Catholic church is tolerant of a broad range of views on the origin of species. On the one hand, Catholic leaders who have supported ID include Popes Benedict XVI & JP II and Cardinal Christoph Schonborn, the chief editor of the Catholic catechism (JP II's statement that "evolution is more than just a hypothesis" has been quoted out of context). On the other hand, Vatican chief astronomer Father George Coyne supports evolution theory and the Vatican newspaper published an article supporting evolution theory (though the newspaper does not represent official church policy). So in a twist of irony, the Catholic church that persecuted Galileo is today tolerant of differences of opinion on the origin of species, while the Darwinists have become the dogmatists and inquisitors.
>>>>My main point is that John's sources are all dead and there have been huge developments in evolutionary biology since the 1950s, not least in the discovery and elucidation of the (practically universal) genetic code. I wonder what Mivart would have made of all that new information.<<<<
A lot of the knowledge acquired since Mivart actually challenges rather than supports evolution theory. The finding that there is a general absence of "missing links" in the fossil record is a big challenge to evolution theory. Biological systems that have been discovered in molecular biology and microbiology have the appearance of irreducible complexity or "design." And I have heard that some discoveries in genetics do not support evolution theory.
LArry, when can we talk about the Holocaust?
I guess I have been too totally brainwashed by the MSM's decidedly pro-science and pro inter-species sex stances. Um... nevermind.
Jeannot said ( Friday, April 28, 2006 12:30:20 PM ) --
>>>>Larry, you completely misunderstand the context of punctuated equilibria. This is not an ad hoc theory, it was not suggested as a response to some 'problem' with the fossile record.<<<<<<
Here are imaginary exchanges between fundies and Darwinists --
fundy #1-- The theory of punctuated equilibrium is an attempt to explain away the observation that species suddenly appeared in the fossil record without precursors and then remained unchanged for millions of years until the present day or until they became extinct.
Darwinist #1 -- Wrong. Punctuated equilibrium has nothing to do with it.
fundy #2 -- How do you explain the observation that species suddenly appeared in the fossil record without precursors and then remained unchanged for millions of years until the present day or until they became extinct ?
Darwinist #2 -- The explanation is called "punctuated equilibrium."
They get you both coming and going.
"Ann Coulter is the ugliest transvestite I have ever seen in my life."
Yet still she'd never look twice at dirt like you.
There is as yet no evolutionary theory, just failed hypotheses and untested ones. Among the former are Darwinism and Lamarckism. The PEH is being tested every day and receiving support from every quarter. I am content.
Keep heaping insults. It is music to my ancient ears.
I love it so!
The johnadavidson comment just before my last one on this thread is vintage Spravid Dinger, cowardly, thinly disguised, bullying as only he knows how. What a lightweight! Crawl back tO Wembski Dinger. He needs you back at the Baptismal font.
I love it so!
I love it so!
It pains me to see Larry wasting his time railing against ET when there's still so much work to be done on the real explanation behind meteor showers
"The finding that there is a general absence of "missing links" in the fossil record is a big challenge to evolution theory."
Oh, Larry, Larry, Larry, you run the funniest blog on the internet.
Of course there are big gaps in the fossil record. They are to be expected with a saltational evolutionary mechanism as independently postulated by Schindewolf and Goldschmidt long ago.
Schindewolf even went so far as to remind us that we might as well stop looking for the "missing links" as they never existed. My God there are not even any two members of the so called "horse series" that can even be placed in the same Genus!
It is likely that the Genus Equus was independetly produced on more than one occasion. George Gaylord Simpson seemed to think so. The same can be said for our own Genus, Homo. There is not a single evolutionary series that pleads for gradualism. All new forms differed dramatically from their producers. That in no way speaks against reproductive continuity. It is exactly what is to be expected in a "prescribed" scenario which is implemented through chromosme restructuring. The same genes can produce drastically different phenotypes when rearranged. Those same rearangements ensure sterility between the parent and derived species. There is NOTHING in the Darwinian scheme that ever had ANYTHING to do with organic evolution beyond the trivial production of varieties. One of these decades that will sink into both the Fundamentalist and Darwinian firmly entrenched factions, neither one of which is worth a plug nickel. In the meantime they will continue to butcher one another much to my delight.
I love it so!
Anonymous said ---
>>>>It pains me to see Larry wasting his time railing against ET when there's still so much work to be done on the real explanation behind meteor showers<<<<<
I may not have asked the questions about meteor showers very well, but I learned that these showers are named for particular constellations because even though the meteors occur all over the sky, the directions of the meteors trace back to the constellation bearing the name of the shower. Also, I learned about the magnitude of the effect that gravity has on meteor direction and I learned that this effect even has a name, "zenith pull." The only dumb people are those who don't know what questions to ask. Anyway, my questions about meteor showers have been answered to my satisfaction -- my questions about evolution have not.
Furthermore, whoever posted the above comment has not even shown that he is smart enough to enter a name into a computer.
Larry
You are right on about the Roman Church. They have always been very pro-science, even in Galileo's day. There is today a Pontifical Academy of Science with Nobel Prize winners among its membership. Where is there a Protestant Academy of Science? It is the Protestants, especially the Evangelicals, who have always been anti-Science especially anti-evolution.
Mivart made the same mistake Galileo did. He refused to accept the Biblical account and tried to ram his own version down the throat of the Church. It doesn't work that way. What was needed was proof. We now have that proof and the Catholic Church has acknowledged it as you have indicated. It sure as hell has not acknowledged the biggest myth in the history of science (Darwinism)as the mechanism though.
"A past evolution is undeniable. A present evolution is undemonstrable."
John A. Davison
I love it so!
Chris Hyland said --
>>>>"And when evolution theory was threatened by the idea of irreducible complexity, evolutionists came up with the idea of "exaptation," the idea that parts of the irreducible systems previously had other functions and thus came ready-made or nearly so."
Are you really saying that these things were created to rebut IC? The term exaptation was coined in the early eighties.<<<<
It has been said that IC is really just a rehash of old ideas, and apparently some of the rebuttals to IC are rehashes of old ideas, too. The Wikipedia online encyclopedia's article on exaptation gives some examples of previous applications of the concept of exaptation ( Wikipedia comes to the rescue again). Thanks for correcting me on that historical point. Anyway, today it appears that exaptation is the principal argument against IC.
>>>>"And I have heard that some discoveries in genetics do not support evolution theory."
Do you have any citations for this?<<<<<<
Not at the moment -- it was just hearsay. But I know that scientists have tended to gloss over data that contradicts evolution theory, so I found it easy to believe the claim that some discoveries in genetics do not support evolution theory. I would not be surprised to find out that this is true.
JohnADavison said...
>>>>Larry
You are right on about the Roman Church. They have always been very pro-science, even in Galileo's day.<<<<<<
Not true -- the Catholic church persecuted Galileo.
Horseshit Larry. That is an old wives tale. I just addressed it elsewhere on your own blog. Read it and weep. Whatever you do, never apologize.
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Answer -- If scientific "theory" and "hypothesis" are defined as complete scientific explanations for natural phenomena, then I agree that ID is not a scientific "theory" or "hypothesis." But why should science be arbitrarily limited to complete scientific explanations? Why cannot a naturalistic criticism of a scientific theory also be considered to be scientific ? Often, describing why something does not work can be as important as introducing something that works or appears to work.
That is a true statement Larry and I'm glad you agree with the first bit too. If RM+NS didn't explain speciation explaining why it didn't work would be valuable science.
Kizzzmet said...
Maybe you think that by putting on your supernerd costume and defending mom, apple pie, and the nerdy little gay darwinian way, that you're winning battles in the nerdy little gay mental war you and the brain atrophied cretins who think like you get all hot and bothered about i.e grow up and get a life poindexter.
You make a huge assumption that we actually care. Newsflash: We are actually making fun of you to get our jollies. We sit here jacking off and imagining the looks of fear, rage and confusion on all you fundy jackasses faces when you read this crap.
PS we spew on our keyboards then type
ANd trust me when I say I looo -uhn- ooove it so ahhh.
Let's talk science for a change, shall we?
I think the intelligent designer is Mr Potato Head. I mean it should be obvious to anyone.
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-American Proverbs
a thief is an anonymous coward. This blog is teeming with them.
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