A Challenge To All Creationists

[viole]

It is amusing that the Darwinites can only mention one scientist as if he is typical. I bet education wise, he is more qualified than you are. Instead of attacking him, why not prove what he says is wrong? Please provide the proven science that says he is.

Omega, debating YEC is like debating someone who believes the distance between LA and NY is a few yards. Anyone believing that is, in my opinion, immune from any evidence that can be presented. And I include my past self in that set.

But if you want to find out what other Christians think of what Mr. Ham believes, check out super mega dooper Christian philosopher and apologist WL Craig. He states quite clearly that YEC is a disgrace for Christianity (and common sense, I would add).

And if you do not even manage to reach agreement within your own ranks about something so basic, something that involves a discrepancy of several orders of magnitude, not to speak of major disagreements between different religions, then it is obvious that skeptics cannot take you too seriously and science (successfully) proceeds as if religion did not exist.

Ciao

- viole

 

[Ganondorf]

There can be no scientific support for putting apes and man in the same category.
It is a classification of necessity to give the faithful hope they have not put their faith in the wrong person.

Here is a non-exhaustive set of traits that is unique to great apes:
- forward-facing eyes
- close, downward-facing nostrils
- same dental formula
- digits with flattened nails
- lack of tail
- high cognitive abilities (self-recognition, abstract thinking,...) [1][2]
- complex social behaviors

(see ADW: Hominidae: INFORMATION)

That's not what i would call a baseless classification...


BTW, Carolus Linnaeus who is known as the father of taxonomy used to be believe that species had been created separatedly... and yet, he put humans in the same group as apes, a group he called "primates"[3]. So, claiming such a classification is a make-believe for evolutionists is clearly flawed.

Man's ability to speak makes him unique and he should not be classified with any group that can't speak.

Unique traits don't automatically exclude something from a group, you have to compare as many traits as possible with those of other species and see who closest to whom.

It is not the similarities that are important, it is the differences. All human DNA will identify the subject as homo sapian. It will never identify the subject as an ape.

What's significant on a genetical level is not just our 90ish % similarity with chimps, it's also the fact chimps are closer to humans than to any other apes and that both chimps and humans are equally distant from gorillas! [4]
if you look for phylogenies of hominid, you'll see that humans are well-embedded in great apes and form a clade with chimps (the hominini tribe)
Hence, if you exclude humans from apes, then you'll have to exclude chimps as well.





[1] journals.plos.org/plosbiology/article?id=10.1371/journal.pbio.1001024
[2] anthropology.utoronto.ca/Faculty/Begun/evol%20origins%20g%20ape%20intell.pdf
[3] evolution.berkeley.edu/evolibrary/article/history_05
[4] humanorigins.si.edu/evidence/genetics

 

[Reggie Miller]

Then stop deflecting. Please answer the question or admit your double standards and unreasonable expectation.

You answer mine first.

 

[Ouroboros]

No, but plenty of people can. No animal can. What's your point?

It wouldn't really point to a clear difference. There are people who can't understand Calculus, but they're still human. The difference isn't based on the ability of few, but by common traits shared by all. We have computers that can do advanced Calculus. In fact I have a calculator that can. Does it make it human?

Besides, I was hoping you did understand Calculus. The micro-macro problem for you would be solved if you just meditated on Rheimann's sum a little.

 

[ADigitalArtist]

You answer mine first.

I am answering. Answering with a question is part and parcel of debate. If you cannot prove that you hold other scientific theories to the lofty standards you hold abiogenesis and evolution to, then you're demonstrating a cognitive bias and double standard.
Do you need to see a tectonic plate move a thousand miles before accepting the inference that it has, or do you accept the reasonable deduction from evidence?

 

[Reggie Miller]

I am answering. Answering with a question is part and parcel of debate. If you cannot prove that you hold other scientific theories to the lofty standards you hold abiogenesis and evolution to, then you're demonstrating a cognitive bias and double standard.
Do you need to see a tectonic plate move a thousand miles before accepting the inference that it has, or do you accept the reasonable deduction from evidence?

I expect that it may have happened as theorized, not that it definitely did.

 

[Reggie Miller]

It wouldn't really point to a clear difference. There are people who can't understand Calculus, but they're still human. The difference isn't based on the ability of few, but by common traits shared by all. We have computers that can do advanced Calculus. In fact I have a calculator that can. Does it make it human?

Besides, I was hoping you did understand Calculus. The micro-macro problem for you would be solved if you just meditated on Rheimann's sum a little.

Look, the point is human intelligence is much > animal intelligence. That's common sense and there is no need to debate it.

 

[Ouroboros]

Omega, debating YEC is like debating someone who believes the distance between LA and NY is a few yards. Anyone believing that is, in my opinion, immune from any evidence that can be presented. And I include my past self in that set.

A creationist would never be able to take a trip between LA and NY, because they don't believe that each feet traveled can sum up to a mile.

 

[Ganondorf]

Look, the point is human intelligence is much > animal intelligence. That's common sense and there is no need to debate it.

Yes, but the gap between human intelligence and animal intelligence is not as unbridgeable as you might think.
Contrary to your earlier comment, non-human apes aren't as stupid as all other animals. To stay with chimps, they capable of self-recognition, problem solving, basic symbolic thinking and have a theory of mind (but a perception-goal one, instead of the belief-desire one of human).

See:
anthropology.utoronto.ca/Faculty/Begun/evol%20origins%20g%20ape%20intell.pdf
eva.mpg.de/documents/Elsevier/Call_Does_TrendsCogSci_2008_1554401.pdf

 

[metis]

Look, the point is human intelligence is much > animal intelligence. That's common sense and there is no need to debate it.

It's all relative. If humans didn't exist, then chimps and bonobos would be geniuses.

 

[SkepticThinker]

Well, you can start with the New Testament. Eye witnesses who were there. But hey, who believes a bunch of guys that would rather suffer horrible deaths than recant their testimony?

There are no eyewitness accounts.

 

[SkepticThinker]

God spoke is one assumption. That was YOUR QUESTION. You don't get to embellish it.

Could you address what I actually said? It appears you have ignored most of it.

 

[SkepticThinker]

If the definition for speciation includes producing a new species and it doesn't, the definition is wrong, therefore not THE definition.

Or your understanding of it is wrong. As it clearly is.

 

[SkepticThinker]

There can be no scientific support for putting apes and man in the same category. It is a classification of necessity to give the faithful hope they have not put their faith in the wrong person.

Man's ability to speak makes him unique and he should not be classified with any group that can't speak.

Where do people come up with this stuff?? What does that even mean?

 

[savagewind]

Where do people come up with this stuff?? What does that even mean?

I was wondering that too, but........nevermind

 

[Reggie Miller]

There are no eyewitness accounts.

Matthew, John, Jude and Peter were all there.

 

[Jose Fly]

I have to seriously question the mentality of a person who honestly believes men developed from same the creature as apes and monkeys. What went wrong with them, they're as stupid as all of the other animals while we are so much smarter? Doesn't make any sense.

Macro-evolutionists have to successfully explain how and why this happened but they can't. Yet they still believe it did. Why? Bias, that's why.

It's simply because that's where the evidence leads. That you refuse to accept this reality does not overturn it.

 

[Ouroboros]

Look, the point is human intelligence is much > animal intelligence. That's common sense and there is no need to debate it.

I was just hoping that you did understand calculus. I would just ask you to think about Riemann's sum, in particular in the view of how the sum of small things (micro level) can produce large outcomes (macro level). I think it was quite an eye-opener when I learned about the basics of integration. Macro from micro. Not a mystery after all.

 

[savagewind]

I was just hoping that you did understand calculus. I would just ask you to think about Riemann's sum, in particular in the view of how the sum of small things (micro level) can produce large outcomes (macro level)..

I think anyone who grocery shops knows about that.

 

[ADigitalArtist]

I expect that it may have happened as theorized, not that it definitely did.

So, in other words, you accept the best explanation without direct evidence because it is the most reasonable conclusion deducted from the evidence. Congratulations, the same is true of me and abiogenesis and evolution.