Creation vs. Evolution

[BrutherSuperior]

Why do people age despite cells constantly regenerating? That mystery is quite curious and I would think, evolutionally speaking, that this would not be the case.

Furthermore, when did man stop throwing feces and grunting and start becoming a conscious thinking individual? I don't think that can be found in a fossil but I do not think it is a coincidence that only man has these gifts.

Sure, the dolphin you see at Sea World is smart & learns tricks...but it will never teach them to their offspring. There are creatures that have been around for a long time and/or have decedents going back to the days when oil was still in dinosaur form. Why don't those creatures, amongst all others, have a consciousness or the ability to think in the abstract? Why do birds still make nests from sticks and spit? Why do chimps fling poo by hand instead of making their life easier, and more accurate, and fashion a sling shot? Furthermore; where is the fossils that show a fish growing air, paws, lungs and crawling out of the water to become a bear?

Those fossils do not exist or they haven't been found. Same goes for the explanation of the Cambrian Explosion where new species literally popped up from nowhere going against the evolutionary grain.

Evolution, to me, is anything but proven. It's more of an idea that makes sense to a lot of people. That's not a bad thing though, we've only been hammering away at this science stuff for a short time. It was thought that the speed of light was the official speed limit of the universe...now that may not be true.

Lots of questions...unfortunately, I don't think we'll have definitive 'proof' for either creation or evolution in our lifetimes. Even then, it may be overturned by a new discovery.

 

[MikeTheHockeyFan]

I feel it is wrong to frame the argument in terms of "creationism vs. evolution". Creationism is based in faith. Evolutionary theory is based in scientific observation and reasoning.

It is extremely shortsighted to assume that evolution and God are mutually exclusive. Anyone who has taken basic biology and chemistry courses could see the mechanisms inside of these subjects as God-given, and it is silly to attempt to write off science in favour of creationism due to having to strictly follow the Bible (which is a thousand-year game of "telephone" on paper).

I was walking down a slippery sidewalk covered in ice today, and lost my balance for a second. I immediately felt a "compression" sensation in the area around my nose and forehead as I prepared for a fall; the exact same sensation one feels when about to receive a punch aimed at the face or in mid fall when your head is going to impact a hard surface.

How do our bodies know to trigger this innate and very subtle psychological reaction in situations of potential danger?

Through thousands and thousands of years of us bashing each other in the head. We've developed it through experience and it's now a part of us.

The proof of evolution is all around you in nature the moment you set foot outside your front door every day to fetch the paper.

Although, funnily enough, religious folk will say the same exact thing when pointing to the existence of God, so there you go.

Lots of questions...unfortunately, I don't think we'll have definitive 'proof' for either creation or evolution in our lifetimes. Even then, it may be overturned by a new discovery.

 

[homeforsummer]

Why do people age despite cells constantly regenerating? That mystery is quite curious and I would think, evolutionally speaking, that this would not be the case.

Cells replicate but never replicate perfectly. After about only 20 years old this constant imperfect replication means that the body ages.

There's no evolutionary benefit to not aging - if there was no aging, then there'd be no reason to reproduce to pass on genes, and without reproduction then accidents or disease could end an entire line of genes.

 

[Encyclopedia]

Why do people age despite cells constantly regenerating? That mystery is quite curious and I would think, evolutionally speaking, that this would not be the case.

Furthermore, when did man stop throwing feces and grunting and start becoming a conscious thinking individual? I don't think that can be found in a fossil but I do not think it is a coincidence that only man has these gifts.

Sure, the dolphin you see at Sea World is smart & learns tricks...but it will never teach them to their offspring. There are creatures that have been around for a long time and/or have decedents going back to the days when oil was still in dinosaur form. Why don't those creatures, amongst all others, have a consciousness or the ability to think in the abstract? Why do birds still make nests from sticks and spit? Why do chimps fling poo by hand instead of making their life easier, and more accurate, and fashion a sling shot? Furthermore; where is the fossils that show a fish growing air, paws, lungs and crawling out of the water to become a bear?

Those fossils do not exist or they haven't been found. Same goes for the explanation of the Cambrian Explosion where new species literally popped up from nowhere going against the evolutionary grain.

Evolution, to me, is anything but proven. It's more of an idea that makes sense to a lot of people. That's not a bad thing though, we've only been hammering away at this science stuff for a short time. It was thought that the speed of light was the official speed limit of the universe...now that may not be true.

Lots of questions...unfortunately, I don't think we'll have definitive 'proof' for either creation or evolution in our lifetimes. Even then, it may be overturned by a new discovery.

How do you know that animals like gorillas, chimps and dolphins don't think or reason? It's pretty obvious they do, but since their intellect is limited in comparison to ours, they aren't as succesfull as we are. That's why they aren't driving around in cars etc.

As for teaching their offspring, they do do that. I'm not sure about dolphins but great apes do. Obviously they are limited to visual teaching as they don't have a language advanced enough but they do teach and learn from eachother.

Koko the gorilla even tried to teach her kitten sign language (granted, Koko is an exeptionaly intelligent gorilla, but still.)

 

[wfooshee]

Regarding the Cambrian explosion, yes, it was a sudden appearance of species, but "sudden" in the sense of millions of years, rather than billions. It was NOT "overnight."

If I were just sitting around thinking about how such things go, I would assume that once a certain level of complexity was reached, i.e. multicellular organisms rather than single-cell or colonies of single-cell individuals, then it would not be a great reach to specialization of cells. Cells build structures in a multi-cellular organism rather than being the organism.

Of course you're going to see a rapid development when that happens. There's a clean slate. Anything goes! Some of it works, some of it doesn't. Sensitivity to light eventually becomes vision, sensitivity to vibration eventually becomes hearing, and with hearing, the ability to make sounds becomes useful.

In other words, once a certain threshhold is reached, there will be an "explosion" of forms, inevitably. but the "explosion" still took millions and millions of years. Something like a T-Rex is closer to our time (MUCH closer!!!!) than the beginning of the Cambrian explosion.

Once again, a fundamental inability to comrehend the time scale involved leads someone to say, "But it could never happen like that!"

 

[BrutherSuperior]

How do you know that animals like gorillas, chimps and dolphins don't think or reason? It's pretty obvious they do, but since their intellect is limited in comparison to ours, they aren't as succesfull as we are. That's why they aren't driving around in cars etc.

What I'm talking about is thinking in the abstract; perceiving things that are intangible such as time.

A great example of this, ironically, is religion and/or faith. There's evidence of Man believing in a higher power going way back in time...or at least having rituals that may be evidence of such. Whether it's burying your dead with trinkets, scratching things on your cave's wall, etc it seems man has always understood, to a certain degree, that there is some higher power.

I'm unaware of any animal openly worshiping. Furthermore, is there an evolutionary purpose for such act?

Is this coincidence?

 

[homeforsummer]

it seems man has always understood, to a certain degree, that there is some higher power.

"Understood"? Or perhaps "assumed", to satiate both lack of evidence to the contrary and to seek some comfort in our own mortality?

 

[Sach]

it seems man has always understood, to a certain degree, that there is some higher power.

It seems that the bible agrees with your theory...

(NIV) Rom. 1:20 - "For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities--his eternal power and divine nature--have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse."

...in case you hadn't read that previously.

 

[huskeR32]

"Understood"? Or perhaps "assumed", to satiate both lack of evidence to the contrary and to seek some comfort in our own mortality?

At the very least, anybody would have to admit that this is at least an equal possibility to the existence of god. To discount this out of hand would be very closed-minded.

 

[Zoom!Zoom!]

Cells replicate but never replicate perfectly. After about only 20 years old this constant imperfect replication means that the body ages.

There's no evolutionary benefit to not aging - if there was no aging, then there'd be no reason to reproduce to pass on genes, and without reproduction then accidents or disease could end an entire line of genes.

Where did you read this? One reason you aged is your cells has an internal clock (telomeres) it goes by. ( IIRC sea turtles cells stop aging after adulthood) Scientist have recently discovered the method some cancer used to reverse this process which speeds up the rate the cancer cells divide.
It seems cells are programed to age and scientist is learning more how to reprogram cells to act young again. Scientist have already been successful in reversing skin cells.

 

[dylansan]

Where did you read this? One reason you aged is your cells has an internal clock (telomeres) it goes by.

That's exactly what he said, but more accurately. Individual cells don't have an internal clock. Cells don't live as long as you do, they constantly reproduce and die. The only time the telomeres "count down" are when the cells reproduce. Which is exactly what homeforfummer said.

Using soundbite words like "internal clock" without acknowledging the actual processes going on is misconstruing scientific principles inaccurately. Many times in this thread you've claimed to understand a scientific theory, but only known some of the basics, so I think you'd really do well to look into these things in a bit more detail and try to understand them better before using them to argue that evolution is impossible. And backing up these claims with links to research would help to. The link you included above is nice, but it doesn't prove anything about evolution (though I don't think that was your intention anyway).

 

[Lain]

What I'm talking about is thinking in the abstract; perceiving things that are intangible such as time.

A great example of this, ironically, is religion and/or faith. There's evidence of Man believing in a higher power going way back in time...or at least having rituals that may be evidence of such. Whether it's burying your dead with trinkets, scratching things on your cave's wall, etc it seems man has always understood, to a certain degree, that there is some higher power.

I'm unaware of any animal openly worshiping. Furthermore, is there an evolutionary purpose for such act?

Is this coincidence?

Evolutionary purpose? How about a way to explain (albeit imaginary) and deal with all the crappy things that can happen in life so people can have the will to keep on living?

Essentially, I think it's evolutionary purpose was to keep our advanced emotional capabilities from causing us to self-destruct. Another possible purpose is to provide a general structure for laying out basic guidelines for how to live. Religious ideas might've even helped form the basis for language as we know it.

Then eventually, it becomes a formidable tool for controlling large populations of people, once it gets so ingrained in society that many genuinely and strongly believe the fictitious side of it to be true due to the unfathomable breadth of circular logic that's been invented over the centuries to validate and support it.

But I think science will, over time, assume the evolutionary roles that religion once played. For some, myself included, it already has.

It provides testably true explanations for why things work the way they do, can provide spirituality with the right mindset, and the most important thing: It provides a real tangible way of improving our lives here on Earth, instead of leaving it up to prayer... and ultimately the fantasy of reaching a wondeful place called "heaven" after we die, because prayer doesn't actually work.

 

[Zoom!Zoom!]

That's exactly what he said, but more accurately. Individual cells don't have an internal clock. Cells don't live as long as you do, they constantly reproduce and die. The only time the telomeres "count down" are when the cells reproduce. Which is exactly what homeforfummer said.

Using soundbite words like "internal clock" without acknowledging the actual processes going on is misconstruing scientific principles inaccurately. Many times in this thread you've claimed to understand a scientific theory, but only known some of the basics, so I think you'd really do well to look into these things in a bit more detail and try to understand them better before using them to argue that evolution is impossible. And backing up these claims with links to research would help to. The link you included above is nice, but it doesn't prove anything about evolution (though I don't think that was your intention anyway).

Splitting hairs are we?
"Thus, telomeres work like a cellular clock that keeps an eye on the number of cell divisions."
Also there the 24 hour clock:
"An internal clock generates these rhythms, which help regulate health and fitness for each species."
It has nothing to do with cells can't "replicate perfectly". There is a disease where it speeds up this clock that cause children age rapidly . They dies at a very young age with the same health problems as a old person.

 

[Encyclopedia]

What I'm talking about is thinking in the abstract; perceiving things that are intangible such as time.

A great example of this, ironically, is religion and/or faith. There's evidence of Man believing in a higher power going way back in time...or at least having rituals that may be evidence of such. Whether it's burying your dead with trinkets, scratching things on your cave's wall, etc it seems man has always understood, to a certain degree, that there is some higher power.

I'm unaware of any animal openly worshiping. Furthermore, is there an evolutionary purpose for such act?

Is this coincidence?

Well there is the example of elephants all lining up to say goodbye to a dead friend. Lying their trunk upon the dead as a final goodbye.

But I was replying to your post stating that animals don't think about thing or teach their young, not wether or not they have religious feelings. Which you didn't write in the post I was replying to.

 

[homeforsummer]

Where did you read this? One reason you aged is your cells has an internal clock (telomeres) it goes by. ( IIRC sea turtles cells stop aging after adulthood) Scientist have recently discovered the method some cancer used to reverse this process which speeds up the rate the cancer cells divide.

Robert Matthews, Professor in science at Aston University, in BBC Focus magazine:

The cells in our bodies live for anything from a few hours, in the case of certain types of white blood cells, to a few weeks, for skin cells, to many decades, in the case of most brain cells. But while most cells are regenerated, the processes involved become progressively unreliable over time. In particular, the DNA carrying the instructions for cell processes becomes damaged, eventually preventing any more cell division. The result is the increasing level of decrepitude we call ageing.

As I said: Cell replication is never completely accurate and over time this inaccuracy builds up and we age.

My favourite analogy for it is the photocopier analogy.

Use a photocopier to repeatedly copy the same document, and you'll get the same quality each time. Make photocopies of the photocopy, and photocopy that copy, and copy that copy, and the quality degrades each time.

That's essentially what cells do - make copies of copies, and these copies become less accurate to the original each time. Different cells replicate at different rates though, which is why ageing isn't identical between individual people, and why the effects of ageing aren't consistent throughout the body.

 

[BobK]

Furthermore, is there an evolutionary purpose for such act?

Evolutionary purpose? How about a way to explain (albeit imaginary) and deal with all the crappy things that can happen in life so people can have the will to keep on living?

There is no such thing as "evolutionary purpose". Evolution is essentially a blind process. Any changes that increase an organism's suitability for its environment increase its chances for survival, and those which decrease suitability decrease chances of survival (or at least reproduction). Saying a species evolved "in order to" is very much putting the cart before the horse, although it may appear that way in retrospect.

Robert Matthews, Professor in science at Aston University, in BBC Focus magazine:



As I said: Cell replication is never completely accurate and over time this inaccuracy builds up and we age.

My favourite analogy for it is the photocopier analogy.

Use a photocopier to repeatedly copy the same document, and you'll get the same quality each time. Make photocopies of the photocopy, and photocopy that copy, and copy that copy, and the quality degrades each time.

That's essentially what cells do - make copies of copies, and these copies become less accurate to the original each time. Different cells replicate at different rates though, which is why ageing isn't identical between individual people, and why the effects of ageing aren't consistent throughout the body.

I've always been dissatisfied with the copier analogy. Consider that I can make a digital image of the same original document (which admittedly is less than perfect), then make a copy of the digital image. I can then copy the copy, and make a copy of the copy of the copy and so on ad nauseum, and still end up with a file identical to the original digital image. So after 100 or 1000 generations of making copies of copies, the last copy is still identical to the first copy.

Now I'm not saying that cell reproduction is perfect by any means. I'm just saying the copier analogy doesn't hold up well in my opinion.

 

[homeforsummer]

I've always been dissatisfied with the copier analogy. Consider that I can make a digital image of the same original document (which admittedly is less than perfect), then make a copy of the digital image. I can then copy the copy, and make a copy of the copy of the copy and so on ad nauseum, and still end up with a file identical to the original digital image. So after 100 or 1000 generations of making copies of copies, the last copy is still identical to the first copy.

Now I'm not saying that cell reproduction is perfect by any means. I'm just saying the copier analogy doesn't hold up well in my opinion.

That's because your own analogy is inaccurate.

The cells don't make reproductions of the "perfect" very first cell that did that job, they're a copy of the cell preceding them, which was already imperfect, and the one preceding that was imperfect too, and on, and on. And it's very much not digital. Each new cell is a slightly poor reproduction of the one that preceded it.

In that respect, it's exactly like the photocopier analogy, which is why I brought it up...

 

[Dravonic]

Digital image replication = perfect method of replication. Copy is exactly like the original. There is no loss of information. Making a copy of a copy is analogous to making a copy of the original. Not what happens with a cell.

Photocopy replication = imperfect method of replication. Copy is similar to the original. There is loss of information. Making a copy of a copy will create progressively different results. What happens with a cell.

 

[Zoom!Zoom!]

Robert Matthews, Professor in science at Aston University, in BBC Focus magazine:



As I said: Cell replication is never completely accurate and over time this inaccuracy builds up and we age. ....

I do remember reading something years ago about a study where they beef up the rats DNA repair genes. While it did have less DNA damage/errors (lower the chance of cancer) it had no effect on aging. Thus it questioned if DNA damage was the cause or an effect of aging.
There is no doubt DNA damage can result in cancer.

 

[niky]

DNA damage is DNA damage, and it occurs in all cells of the body naturally, over time. This is part of why late pregnancy is fraught with peril, as the chances of having a baby with genetic abnormalities (such as Down's Syndrome) increases over time.

Some of the effects of aging are due to cells which have reached the end of their life and have started to malfunction, releasing toxins into our system. Our immune system is supposed to clean these up, and it does... Until it starts breaking down, too.

Your link merely shows that cancer is the unplanned duplication of some of these damaged cells. In actuality, while many "adult" cells stop reproducing, we still have the capacity to regenerate damaged tissue. The "clock" cited merely prevents wanton duplication and unregulated growth.

 

[Sach]

If I were just sitting around thinking about how such things go, I would assume that once a certain level of complexity was reached, i.e. multicellular organisms rather than single-cell or colonies of single-cell individuals, then it would not be a great reach to specialization of cells. Cells build structures in a multi-cellular organism rather than being the organism.

Of course you're going to see a rapid development when that happens. There's a clean slate. Anything goes! Some of it works, some of it doesn't. Sensitivity to light eventually becomes vision, sensitivity to vibration eventually becomes hearing, and with hearing, the ability to make sounds becomes useful.

There is a particular approach to the understanding of evolution that I find entertaining within some of peoples' own personal theories, especially in threads with such titles as "Creation vs. Evolution"... .


There are creationists out there who approach this debate scientifically (believe it or not), and from what I gather, their argument is that certain complexities found in messenger RNA and the various machines performing the multitudes of cellular activity/'jobs' could not have come about simply through any amount time and species dying off, etc. I'm not going to claim to be on top of their research or the debates against it, and the specifics of their studies are not my intention in this debate. However, I understand their position to be one that says that an intelligence (i.e. "Intelligent Design") formed the things we see today, and they look for scientific evidences that cannot be disproved which support their theories, much like any normal scientist would.


On the other hand you have equally zealous skeptics (not claiming the quoted poster to be as such) saying that no intelligence is required for the process of evolution to bring us to the place we find humans and other species today, within the hierarchy of observable biological life. However, you walk a thin line when doing so, especially when proposing theories concerning the acquiring of "useful" characteristics among species.

Sensitivity to vibration eventually becomes hearing, and with hearing, the ability to make sounds becomes useful.

You are talking about organisms that are yet to possess a conscience. They do not have an intelligence. They have no understanding of the term "useful", and more importantly... neither would an evolutionary mechanism that is completely random and without guidance, actively changing everything about existence, yet the perfect neutral bystander.



It is important to note that 'definitions' (eg. "useful") are merely portions of written language or other inscribings/phonetics, which serve the purpose of creating a familiarity among a species which is able to communicate, and that the conceptual identity of what they are communicating is always something that is beyond that... it is an idea or an understanding.



It is contradictory to suggest that evolution is a passively-acting and random mechanism that produces things of any kind of logic or intellectual complexity while also having no intellect to set those things in motion. It's interesting how many people don't realize that they are making statements under the veil of proclamations that suggest "Evolutionary processes logically knew to do certain things...".

 

[niky]

Nobody who studies it claims it is logical or rational. It simply is.

Just as water simply flows downhill, causing the formation of rivers, canyons, lakes and other bodies of water... species that survive pass on their traits. It's that simple. As with water, it doesn't matter if the source of the water is rain from clouds, underground springs or frozen ground water melting and flowing (or whatever the mechanism is on Mars)... What happens to the water and the forms it generates going downhill are the same.

So it is with Evolution. It doesn't matter whether cellular life evolved here, was seeded here from comets or extra-solar asteroids or placed in the soup by the finger of God... The path of development is the same.

The Creationist point of view seeks to disprove it by stating that life is too complex to develop, without offering an alternative explanation that covers the totality of evidence or showing evidence of divine intervention in the process.

 

[Sach]

Nobody who studies it claims it is logical or rational. It simply is.

That's not what I discussed. You really have a bad habit of twisting my words and selecting things out of context to respond to.

Just as water simply flows downhill, causing the formation of rivers, canyons, lakes and other bodies of water... species that survive pass on their traits. It's that simple. As with water, it doesn't matter if the source of the water is rain from clouds, underground springs or frozen ground water melting and flowing (or whatever the mechanism is on Mars)... What happens to the water and the forms it generates going downhill are the same.

Yes, this is quite obvious what you are stating. But water does not turn to wine when the source only consists of water, without a miracle or bending of the laws of reality. And likewise, if evolution is not an intelligent, rational-thinking entity, then NO organism will suddenly develop the logic to form a new appendage or any other survival mechanism within it's limitations.

So it is with Evolution. It doesn't matter whether cellular life evolved here, was seeded here from comets or extra-solar asteroids or placed in the soup by the finger of God... The path of development is the same.

Yes, exactly, and so it is with evolution... Monkeys do not become birds because it is 'logical' to form wings for survival. Evolution is not a living, breathing, or comprehending entity. It doesn't do things because they are logical to do so. Logic is an observable intellectual assement only made by creatures with intelligence. Evolution as a mechanism does not possess the capacity to reason or make any judgments, be they logical or otherwise.

The Creationist point of view seeks to disprove it by stating that life is too complex to develop, without offering an alternative explanation that covers the totality of evidence or showing evidence of divine intervention in the process.

You also come across as a person who has only done their homework on the black side, while completely ignoring the white side, or vice versa.

As I stated, and which you unsurprisingly ignored: Proponents of Intelligent Design argue against science with... science. I would encourage you to investigate the work of Steve Fuller, as a reference point. Like I said, I have my own opinions and am only aware that he is doing what he is doing. I have not investigated his studies to any depth as to argue for them, nor do I claim to subscribe to them.

 

[homeforsummer]

You are talking about organisms that are yet to possess a conscience. They do not have an intelligence. They have no understanding of the term "useful", and more importantly... neither would an evolutionary mechanism that is completely random and without guidance, actively changing everything about existence, yet the perfect neutral bystander.

A creature doesn't have to have a conscience or intelligence in order to make use of a "useful" attribute. Sensitivity to vibration, as the ear probably started out, may have been an attribute "useful" enough for a pretty basic life-form to flee when a predator was near. The light/dark receptors that eyes likely originated from would have been "useful" enough to signal that daylight would allow them to metabolise energy.

Please don't make the mistake others have made in this thread of assuming that evolution is a uniform process geared towards making things better, rather than a product of mutations giving some organisms a higher chance of survival than others.

Though with comments like this:

And likewise, if evolution is not an intelligent, rational-thinking entity, then NO organism will suddenly develop the logic to form a new appendage or any other survival mechanism within it's limitations.

...I suspect you are making that mistake.

Evolution does not "decide" to make improvements to further a species. Evolving creatures do not need the "logic" to form new limbs or new ways of surviving disease, these traits develop over thousands, hundreds of thousands, millions of years as a result of some mutations being more effective to the creature in question than others.

You're making absolutely fundamental misunderstandings about the nature of evolution.

 

[Famine]

Some of the recent contributions to this thread would be enough to make a molecular biologist put his face in his hands and weep.

Famine; BSc. (Hons) Molecular Biology & Genetics; MSc. Human Genetics & Disease

Proponents of Intelligent Design argue against science with... science.

No. No, they don't.

It isn't science if you start off with the answer and then try to work towards that answer. Intelligent Design is pseudoscience.

 

[Sach]

A creature doesn't have to have a conscience or intelligence in order to make use of a "useful" attribute. Sensitivity to vibration, as the ear probably started out, may have been an attribute "useful" enough for a pretty basic life-form to flee when a predator was near. The light/dark receptors that eyes likely originated from would have been "useful" enough to signal that daylight would allow them to metabolise energy.

You are 100% wrong. "Useful" can only be determined through an intelligence capable of deeming something to be useful. And I also talked about forming new attributes, such as the ability to speak as described in the statement I quoted.


Speech is a HIGHLY complex thing! How can an organism with no brain, no conscience, and no intelligence whatsoever, make this decision? How can they decide that speech is useful and then logically develop such a complex thing that requires a nearly full nervous system??? Are you going to tell me that speech is a mutation???

Please don't make the mistake others have made in this thread of assuming that evolution is a uniform process geared towards making things better, rather than a product of mutations giving some organisms a higher chance of survival than others.

Right, and this is no different than religious individuals leaving a door for God to work in. Your door leaves a space for 'mutations' to have a say in, yet those 'mutations' somehow are ALWAYS the most logical thing thing to both ensure the survival of said species, AND form new useful appendages or abilities, etc. Give me a break.

Evolution does not "decide" to make improvements to further a species. Evolving creatures do not need the "logic" to form new limbs or new ways of surviving disease, these traits develop over thousands, hundreds of thousands, millions of years as a result of some mutations being more effective to the creature in question than others.

ANY organism that does not see the need to form a new appendage for survival WILL NOT do so, I don't care the number of years or so-called 'random' mutations that are required. That is a strategic development, and strategy requires an intelligence.

You're making absolutely fundamental misunderstandings about the nature of evolution.

Ok.

 

[homeforsummer]

You are 100% wrong. "Useful" can only be determined through an intelligence capable of deeming something to be useful. And I also talked about forming new attributes, such as the ability to speak as described in the statement I quoted.

What a load of tosh.

If an attribute helps a creature survive, then it has a use. It is therefore "useful".

Speech is a HIGHLY complex thing! How can an organism with no brain, no conscience, and no intelligence whatsoever, make this decision? How can they decide that speech is useful? Are you going to tell me that speech is a mutation???

Originally, the ability to form sounds - that became speech, eventually - would have been a mutation.

Right, and this is no different than religious individuals leaving a door for God to work in. Your door leaves a space for 'mutations' to have a say in, yet those 'mutations' somehow are ALWAYS the most logical thing thing to both ensure the survival of said species, AND form new useful appendages or abilities, etc. Give me a break.

Stop using the word "logical". Evolution doesn't have to be logical. For every one mutation that results in an attribute that helps a species survive, tens of others won't have had the same effect and that line will die out. If evolution was "logical" (and it's only you using this term here - you seem to have picked it out of the blue) then every mutation would result in a useful attribute.

ANY organism that does not see the need to form a new appendage for survival WILL NOT do so, I don't care the number of years or so-called 'random' mutations that are required. That is a strategic development, and strategy requires an intelligence.

Again: Fundamental misunderstanding. A primitive bird with no wings doesn't think "you know what I need? Wings. Then I'd be able to fly down from this cliffside". Mutations developed over millions of years will result in little stumps, or perhaps developments of already-existing limbs, that allow the bird to fall at a slower pace, then glide, and eventually, millions of years later, fly.

If you think that evolution requires a strategy, then you have zero clue of what evolution entails.

I agree, the truth is hilarious to me too.

Oh, and nice ninja edit. Either way, my point still stands.

 

[Sach]

Here's a question: I start a lemonade stand... because I am in the business of selling lemonade do I suddenly go from cardboard advertisement to being the Minute Maid corporation? Do I suddenly go from a cardboard advertisement to a plastic one? Do I even have any concept of what an advertisement is until I see it elsewhere?


Being a full-fledged human being is not even what I'm calling the "corporation" in that example. Many people underestimate the complexities required to even form a thing such as walking. Yet they will say that we had hearing before walking, which may be an even MORE complex thing to acquire. Now, multiply that by the likelihood that these mutations would be beneficial for the future existence of said species. What do those odds look like? Believe it or not, there are some things that even an infinite number of years cannot change.


'Mutations' are completely neutral, they have no desires. They do not care whether a human being wants to live to promote its species or not. The chances of the amount of so-called 'mutations' occurring to get us to the level of the human species that you see today is beyond belief. It is as unlikely as anything you could imagine that time itself would produce the number of mutations that this would require.

Even the principle that organisms 'want' to survive is completely flawed. A single-celled organism does not know if it wants to survive without some level of pre-programming, because it does not have the capacity to rationalize life's value on that level. Yet this fact is blown off all the time while foolish people claim it as a given. I'm sorry, but no. If we came from an 'ooze', there is NO possibility of ANY logical decisions or developments being made toward survival, much less the creation of any BRAND NEW organism, and much less the series of such developments required to bring us to where we are today.


Explain to me why a mutation would have any chance of being beneficial, if there is no derivative source material in the first place?

Explain to me how these 'mutations' keep seemingly piling on top of each other. How does an ooze mutate into even a single-celled organism without an intelligence behind it? And if you claim to know this answer, I challenge you to explain in detail the complexities required for even a single-celled organism to live and reproduce, because those things are absolutely intrinsic to the theory of evolution.

Mutations often kill off an organism, if anything. Explain to me how an organism might develop a mutation, which at first is nothing, and then pass that trait onto its offspring... fine... and then that offspring continues to mutate into something so intelligently useful such as feeling, a heart, ANY inkling of a nervous system, etc., etc.

What a load of tosh.

If an attribute helps a creature survive, then it has a use. It is therefore "useful".

A load of tosh indeed. A creature, or process, with absolutely no capacity for intellectual thought, will never develop a series of mutations that lead to a complex organism able to survive in any environment.

Stop using the word "logical". Evolution doesn't have to be logical. For every one mutation that results in an attribute that helps a species survive, tens of others won't have had the same effect and that line will die out. If evolution was "logical" (and it's only you using this term here - you seem to have picked it out of the blue) then every mutation would result in a useful attribute.

My point is that evolutionists are implying the use of logic by evolutionary processes, but denying it. See previous comment.

Again: Fundamental misunderstanding. A primitive bird with no wings doesn't think "you know what I need? Wings. Then I'd be able to fly down from this cliffside". Mutations developed over millions of years will result in little stumps, or perhaps developments of already-existing limbs, that allow the bird to fall at a slower pace, then glide, and eventually, millions of years later, fly.

I said very directly that the bird knows nothing, but evolutionists suggest that it does, not myself.


Do you realize how many beneficial 'mutations' you are giving the passage of time credit for? That is one of the most absurd things that I can imagine. Wings contain so many types of cells, DNA requirements, RNA requirements. They don't just happen through mutations. It is utterly false.


I would suggest that you research the concept of irreducible complexity.

Because you have a gear, do you have an F1 car? No, because an F1 car (a bird's wing) requires a multitude of individual parts that are completely useless on in their own right, to be working simultaneously together to form itself. An F1 car will never develop simply from metals, as those metals are useless unless they are formed. Likewise a tire is useless without the car, so none of these things can possibly be carried over in a GRADUAL process that eliminates useless characteristics over time and retains useful ones. A brain without a body is useless. Unless you have the incredibly complex multitude of systems making up that body, there will be no brain.

If you think that evolution requires a strategy, then you have zero clue of what evolution entails.

You don't realize that the things you are suggesting require a strategy. I am sorry that you cannot see it. I believe that you should read up on the subject more.

 

[Grand Prix]

You are 100% wrong. "Useful" can only be determined through an intelligence capable of deeming something to be useful. And I talked about forming a new attribute, such as the ability to speak as described in the statement I quoted.


Speech is a HIGHLY complex thing! How can an organism with no brain, no conscience, and no intelligence whatsoever, make this decision?

Short answer: They don't. There is no ulterior motive to how life evolves. If there was, it would be a pretty strange world, don't you think?

Remember what I said earlier about conifers. They are plants, so naturally, they have no brains - they operate just from chemical reactions. Even the Venus Fly Trap operates on chemical reactions to release the leaves and trap whatever insect was inside to trigger it. The plant doesn't actually know it is doing this. In fact it doesn't know anything. (that we know of, at least)

Plants evolved on this planet just as naturally as rivers flow. Rivers don't have a ulterior motive that tells them to carve out paths in the rock, that's just the end result of the erosion from water. Of course you knew that already. But I'd thought I'd mention it to help you understand just how mindless the process of life actually is.

DNA replicates because that is how it was formed. If DNA didn't replicate it wouldn't exist. That doesn't mean it has an ulterior motive to exist. It's like a river, it flows because that is what natural forces allow to happen.

Maybe you can make the argument that a God or extra-dimensional beings created the forces that allow the universe and life to exist, and I can't argue with that. Mostly because I can't disprove it. But as far as I am concerned, as a being in this universe, I don't need to worry about why I'm here. But it's still fun to ponder.

 

[homeforsummer]

Explain to me why a mutation would have any chance of being beneficial, if there is no derivative source material in the first place?

Explain to me how these 'mutations' keep seemingly piling on top of each other. How does an ooze mutate into even a single-celled organism without an intelligence behind it? And if you claim to know this answer, I challenge you to explain in detail the complexities required for even a single-celled organism to live and reproduce, because those things are absolutely intrinsic to the theory of evolution.

Mutations often kill off an organism, if anything. Explain to me how an organism might develop a mutation, which at first is nothing, and then pass that trait onto its offspring... fine... and then that offspring continues to mutate into something so intelligently useful such as feeling, a heart, ANY inkling of a nervous system, etc., etc.

All that can be explained quite simply.

Firstly, you're making the assumption that all mutations are immediately beneficial.

Secondly, you're making the mistake of assuming that the tiniest of genetic mutations will immediately have a measurable effect.

Thirdly, an "ooze" "mutating" into a single-celled organism misunderstands the process of how we got from elements to proteins to DNA to cells. I'm not the microbiologist here (Famine is) so I'm not going to insult anyone by pretending I know the exact process by which life came about, but suffice to say you're almost certainly underestimating the massive timescales involved.

Fourthly, your assumption that "mutations often kill an organism" is complete conjecture. Mutation is simply another word for "change". Yes, many can be harmful, and many can be useless (refer to my "firstly" point - not all mutations are immediately beneficial, some may not be at all), but some eventually will be.

Fifthly, you're implying that mutations are some massive genetic change, like suddenly growing eyes or sprouting legs, instead of a compound effect of occasionally beneficial tiny changes in all sorts of different areas of the body that result in one species getting the jump on another.

Please, stop assuming that a mutation is the result of a creature deciding it needs to get the jump on its competitors. Evolution is non-random survival, not pre-meditated survival.

A load of tosh indeed. A creature, or process, with absolutely no capacity for intellectual thought, will never develop a series of mutations that lead to a complex organism able to survive in any environment.

That's because mutation isn't led by a thought process. It just happens.

My point is that evolutionists are implying the use of logic by evolutionary processes, but denying it. See previous comment.

No they aren't. You'd pulled it out of your backside in order to illustrate a point that doesn't exist. There is no logic to evolution.

I said very directly that the bird knows nothing, but evolutionists suggest that it does, not myself.

No, they don't. No evolutionist has ever said that a bird decides to grow wings in order to survive.

Do you realize how many beneficial 'mutations' you are giving the passage of time credit for? That is one of the most absurd things that I can imagine. Wings contain so many types of cells, DNA requirements, RNA requirements. They don't just happen through mutations. It is utterly false.

No, it isn't. Do you realise how many non-beneficial mutations you're writing off in order to assume that every mutation has benefit for a creature? And do you actually realise what a massively long time-frame we're talking about?

Because you have a gear, do you have an F1 car? No, because an F1 car (a bird's wing) requires a multitude of individual parts that are completely useless on in their own right, to be working simultaneously together to form itself. An F1 car will never develop simply from metals, as those metals are useless unless they are formed. Likewise a tire is useless without the car, so none of these things can possibly be carried over in a GRADUAL process that eliminates useless characteristics over time and retains useful ones. A brain without a body is useless. Unless you have the incredibly complex multitude of systems making up that body, there will be no brain.

Surprise surprise, someone attempting to tie two completely un-related concepts together. The process by which humans create machines is hugely different to how nature works. Even the process by which humans refine and improve machines is different, because although it can be considered an "evolution" as such, it relies on problems needing to be first found in order to create solutions, rather than a natural process of tiny changes influenced by outside factors that may or may not work.

You don't realize that the things you are suggesting require a strategy. I am sorry that you cannot see it. I believe that you should read up on the subject more.

They don't require a strategy.

Again: Fundamental misunderstanding. Until you realise that your whole argument is based on completely misunderstanding the entire subject, we can't go any further with this.