Expert
Joined: Oct 2003
Posts: 4,131
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Matt, or Blatt, I want to see your responses to my lengthy post back there (also JCL and Marco, too). We need to quit running off on these wild goose chases of how important the tilt is. My post is in page 7 of this thread. Check it out.
That post is a just a long blathering of mumbo jumbo I'm not going to waste my time with beyond a few things. It's full of straw men, wrong conclusions, and frankly, complete misunderstanding of science. All of those arguments have been easily refuted.
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Claim 1) This experiment, the Urey-miller experiment, is very old. In any case it did show that amino acids could form naturally under certain conditions. You take what is obviously evidence for the formation of life by natural means and twist it to be proof against it. Really smart, except you forgot that we aren't morons.
The fact is, we dont know exactly under what conditions life formed, there may have been oxygen, or something else in the atmosphere. Also, water can shield ultraviolet radiation far better than oxygen, so if we suppose that the life formed in water, we dont have any problems.
but if you dont believe any of that I'll make it just this: just because we dont know how life developed doesnt mean it didnt, and this certainly has nothing to do with Darwinian evolution, which deals with species, not the original formation of life.
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Claim 3) "Every species on earth today (or in the past) evolved from one original self replicating cell. "
This is a straw man, because most scientists dont claim this. The current thinking is that cells became more and more complex, based on the assimilation of smaller forms.. such as the mitochondria, which may have been simpler organisms that lived symbiotically with a larger organism.
Vestigial organs dont show "devolutions", because in science there is no such thing. The loss of function is just evolution, like anything else. Furthermore, you cant just just say that, all "vestigial organs have now been shown to have a purpose". This is clearly not true(vestigial legs in snakes have no function), nor does it really explain anything, because it's known that the functions of organs can CHANGE over time.
Your section on speciation really makes no sense to me. You argue that speciation occurs, but this somehow proves that evolution doesnt occur? I think you dont understand Darwin.
Darwin concludes that the modern Galapagos finches evolved from an ancestor form themainland, that speciation can occur, and is directed by natural selection. The more favorable forms are "selected" because they allow the animal to live longer, to reproduce more succesfully, etc. Only a truly perverse mind can see this as an argument AGAINST evolution.
Your section on mutations is also deeply flawed. First, you have this idea that a beetle species that loses its wings is somehow "less than what is was originally". Nonsense: as said before, it is just different, not less or more. No organism is more or less than any other, they are all just different, and are adapted to live in whatever conditions they happen to be in.
In any case, mutation is a known, observeable fact. It occurs in all organisms that have genetic material, at the most basic level whenever a cell divides. There must be billions of mutations in a single organism's life cycle. Most mutations are indeed harmful or meaningless, and offer no selective benefit. But some must be favorable.
For instance, you bring up the sickle cell anemia trait, but you are wrong in your conclusion that this is a bad mutation. Obviously, it developed only in areas which had a risk of malaria, and since malaria is greater risk to life than sickle cell, it was a beneficial adaptation and was selected by later generations. However, when someone moves to an area where there is no malaria, then the adaptation is not beneficial, and probably will eventually dissappear in those populations that have moved. Again you twist an excellent example of evolutionary adaptation to be proof that against it. Even a child could see through this.
The point about the algae adapting to the dark, I dont see what your problem with this, excep that you seem to be using this as another straw man, becasue you state that "Why this is used as proof of materialist evolution? I’ll never know." I'm not sure that this IS used as any such proof. It does however, offer good evidence for the mechanism of mutation in evolution.
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Don’t these adaptations that show how slight variations within bounds can cause a species branch (or evolution within a kind) really prove that animals were created by an optimal designer
NO, they show no such thing. That conclusion is totally baseless, and indeed, you once again use evidence for evolution as evidence against it. Do you really think that people are that dumb? Or maybe you dont even understand your own argument..Unless this isn't your own arguement, and you just copy-and-pasted it from some retarded creationist website...
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Claim 3) "Evolution takes millions of years."
Another bogus claim used as a straw man, or maybe it's based on total ignorance of both language and science. Evolution is a process that is ongoing--it takes niether millions of years nor any set length of time. Evolution is happening, in a small way, with evey generation.
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Claim 4) "The fossil record proves evolution."
*Sigh*, again with the bad premise. No scientist says that fossil record "proves" evolution. Nothing proves evolution. The fossil record does give us evidence for evolution, because it shows many cases of species that resemble other species but have differnt traits, and show some intereesting gradsations between more established forms. For instance, the dinosaur to bird progression, is quite distinct and is very compelling. In fact, so compelling that it has prompted some scientists to say there is no clear line bewteen Aves and Archosauria, and that all Aves should also be considered archosaurs.
Also of great value are the many fossils of early tetrapods, including some that may not have been able to really live on land, but still lived alsmot as fishes.
I have said that fossils dont "prove" evolutions, and this is so. However, they do give us an extremely good picture of how evolution happened over the ages. And frankly, I find it far more interesting than your stupid arguements, and apparently so do many, many other poeple, witness the huge popularity of dinosaurs and paleontology.
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