Atheists believe in miracles more than believers

[Valjean]

So you are saying that individual organisms, such as fish, mutate spontaneously and over a loonngg period of time mutate to the point that caused fish to be a land dwelling animal. Right?

Mostly reproductive variation, not mutation.

 

[Subduction Zone]

Ohhh, you don't want to answer. Got it. (That's ok, I know you don't like being boxed in...) But thanks for helping, you did a great job of answering my questions in the loonnnggg run. No insult intended, just facts, as the saying goes.

No, I would like to answer, but if you cannot own up to the fact that you have no understanding of the theory of evolution at all there is no point iin trying to help you. You have a false understanding of evolution that you will not let go of. It is totally irrational so I cannot even say exactly what you think that you know, but you keep confirming that you have no understanding of the topic because these are fundamental concepts of evolution. If you understood evolution at all you would not need to ask these questions.

 

[cladking]

Intuition is not a thing to be discarded.

I believe it can be honed and polished.

I used to be able to plow my way through most logic to arrive at an answer even were it complex. But most of these things were brain teasers so of relatively little importance in real life. Anytime real life questions came up there were no equations and where they existed most of the variables were unquantifiable. As often as not now I can just guess the answer immediately and be correct. It's easier and much faster. But if the right answer ever really matters I might be in trouble since I doubt I can plow through them any longer. It's unlikely such a thing will ever matter to me since my world has come to reflect my beliefs just like everyone else's does in time.

I wasn't born with a lot of intuition. It was acquired.

Just to be clear I would not necessarily recommend generalism and intuition to anyone at all. I'm sure it's good for some individuals. And I'm sure our specialization is killing us but specialists need cold hard logic except when they invent hypothesis and devise experiment. It is here and in recognizing anomalies that generalism is effective.

Einstein said imagination is more important than intelligence and I'd say intuition is oftentimes as important as imagination.

 

[YoursTrue]

Mostly reproductive variation, not mutation.

OK, thank you for your reply. I think I understand this in more or less simple terms--a child does not look exactly like either parent since it's a mixture. On the other hand, some diseases can be passed on. Following this, mutations have various outcomes, some neutral, some not beneficial to the organism, such as certain inherited ones like cystic fibrosis, hemophilia, and sickle cell disease.

 

[Valjean]

OK, thank you for your reply. I think I understand this in more or less simple terms--a child does not look exactly like either parent since it's a mixture. On the other hand, some diseases can be passed on. Following this, mutations have various outcomes, some neutral, some not beneficial to the organism, such as certain inherited ones like cystic fibrosis, hemophilia, and sickle cell disease.

A wolf has puppies. They all differ: different color, size, fur density, leg length, &c, all from reproductive variation, not mutation.
Different environments will favor some of the differences over others, and these individuals will be more reproductively successful. The percentage of these locally advantageous traits will slowly increase in the population, over many generations.
That's natural selection in a nutshell. No mutation needed, just genetic shuffling of two separate genomes to produce the variation for selection to work with.

 

[ratiocinator]

This paper argues for simultaneous causation, (cause and effect happening without time between each other)

The point is not that paper is right and you are wrong (who knows) the point is that your statement of “causation requires time” is far from uncontrovertibly true, and I need more than “it’s true because I say so”

"We propose that all actual causes are simultaneous with their direct effects, as illustrated by both everyday examples and the laws of physics. We contrast this view with the sequential conception of causation, according to which causes must occur prior to their effects. We find that the key difference between the two views of causation lies in differing assumptions about the mathematical structure of time. "
https://philpapers.org/archive/HUEC...of causation,with temporally extended cause C.

Preserve us from philosophers trying to do science without learning enough about it. He comes up with some examples and then gives the reasons from special relativity as to why they're wrong. Undeterred, he then goes off into pre-relativity classical physics.

Also, worth noting that the discussion is within the context of time. 'Simultaneous' doesn't mean anything without time. It's also relative within space-time: Relativity of simultaneity.

This would only apply to objects that are constrained by relativity……… why would a cause of the natural law (God) be constrained by the laws of physics?.................

The problem you have is that causality means something within space-time and physics. If you're going to try and use it outside that context, you'll have to actually define what you mean by it when it's stripped of all the temporal implications.

Sure, my answer to that question is “because it was caused by a nonphysical cause, ……………..what alternative do you suggest? And why is that alternative better?

For all the reasons I've given about causation, I find your answer to be meaningless. I literally have no idea what 'was caused by' (especially in the past tense) means, without time and applied to the whole space-time.

I have no idea why physical reality exists, but making up some "non-physical" reason for it doesn't help because we then have two realms of reality to ask the same question about.

It's a giant leap in the wrong direction.

 

[ratiocinator]

these are all examples of things that would not be restricted by “relativity”………

Entanglement does not violate relativity because you can't transfer 'classical' information using it. Singularities are a prediction of relativity. Numbers aren't physical. Ideas of other universes are extrapolated from our current scientific understanding. There is no evidence that 'supernatural entities' are real.

 

[cladking]

A wolf has puppies. They all differ: different color, size, fur density, leg length, &c, all from reproductive variation, not mutation.
Different environments will favor some of the differences over others, and these individuals will be more reproductively successful. The percentage of these locally advantageous traits will slowly increase in the population, over many generations.
That's natural selection in a nutshell. No mutation needed, just genetic shuffling of two separate genomes to produce the variation for selection to work with.

Yet it's impossible to predict in advance or even to explain after the fact which of these characteristics will or have created success. Rather those that survive are simply pronounced to be more fit, more adapted, and more naturally selected. The miracle is that this isn't a circular argument because nature selects only the finest.

 

[YoursTrue]

A wolf has puppies. They all differ: different color, size, fur density, leg length, &c, all from reproductive variation, not mutation.
Different environments will favor some of the differences over others, and these individuals will be more reproductively successful. The percentage of these locally advantageous traits will slowly increase in the population, over many generations.
That's natural selection in a nutshell. No mutation needed, just genetic shuffling of two separate genomes to produce the variation for selection to work with.

It's true that offspring differ in size, color, etc. But this does not equate to evolution, for instance, fish evolving to apes in the long run.

 

[Pogo]

A wolf has puppies. They all differ: different color, size, fur density, leg length, &c, all from reproductive variation, not mutation.
Different environments will favor some of the differences over others, and these individuals will be more reproductively successful. The percentage of these locally advantageous traits will slowly increase in the population, over many generations.
That's natural selection in a nutshell. No mutation needed, just genetic shuffling of two separate genomes to produce the variation for selection to work with.

Minor clearification, wolves and rats etc have pups, only dogs have puppies.
And for @YoursTrue , selection works on the alleles or traits that are recombined as stated, not mutations directly, however, mutations in the germline that are not already in the population can create new alleles to be selected which is where alleles came from in the first place.
This is the addition you need to complete the chain.

 

[cladking]

It's true that offspring differ in size, color, etc. But this does not equate to evolution, for instance, fish evolving to apes in the long run.

While I don't necessarily agree, it's certainly true that there is no evidence to support the notion that species change gradually as a result of survival of the fittest. It certainly seems apparent that species change and hardly impossible that there are not many limitations to the type and degree of this change but if it were possible to witness such changes in real time we would not see fish turning into humans. I believe we would instead see sudden changes that in the long run can create virtually anything living to capitalize on every single possible niche in the environment. Species cooperate to create the largest possible diversity. "Competition" is for food and resources in the here and now. Nature doesn't care which species gets the meal and doesn't care which is more fit. Individuals are where the real and important differences lie and they are equally fit because nature doesn't waste resources making individuals for food.

Fish don't evolve into apes but it is entirely possible that apes have fish-like ancestors in their past. A fish is a fish is a fish but change in species is very highly complex, far more complex than we can imagine.

At one time there were no land animals and now there are.

 

[YoursTrue]

Minor clearification, wolves and rats etc have pups, only dogs have puppies.
And for @YoursTrue , selection works on the alleles or traits that are recombined as stated, not mutations directly, however, mutations in the germline that are not already in the population can create new alleles to be selected which is where alleles came from in the first place.
This is the addition you need to complete the chain.

How would you explain selection? You said selection works on the alleles or traits. How would you say the selection process is understood by scientists to occur?

 

[ratiocinator]

How would you explain selection? You said selection works on the alleles or traits. How would you say the selection process is understood by scientists to occur?

It's jaw-dropping that somebody who has been posting on this subject here for so long can ask this sort of basic question. It must have been explained here hundreds of times, and a quick online search would have got you to an answer you could have started reading in the time it took you to type and post this here. Just type "how does natural selection work" into your favourite search engine.

 

[Pogo]

How would you explain selection? You said selection works on the alleles or traits. How would you say the selection process is understood by scientists to occur?

@Valjean's explanation is fine, I was only commenting on the source of the alleles.

"Different environments will favor some of the differences over others, and these individuals will be more reproductively successful. The percentage of these locally advantageous traits will slowly increase in the population, over many generations.
That's natural selection in a nutshell"

 

[YoursTrue]

Yet it's impossible to predict in advance or even to explain after the fact which of these characteristics will or have created success. Rather those that survive are simply pronounced to be more fit, more adapted, and more naturally selected. The miracle is that this isn't a circular argument because nature selects only the finest.

Right now within species, humans remain humans, don't they? (Birds remain birds, etc.)

Fish don't evolve into apes but it is entirely possible that apes have fish-like ancestors in their past. A fish is a fish is a fish but change in species is very highly complex, far more complex than we can imagine.

At one time there were no land animals and now there are.

It would be hard to impossible I suppose to track fish or mudskippers to see if they might evolve to a different form. Here is a question, though: how do you think the Bible writers knew that there were no fish or land animals at a certain point?

 

[YoursTrue]

@Valjean's explanation is fine, I was only commenting on the source of the alleles.

"Different environments will favor some of the differences over others, and these individuals will be more reproductively successful. T

Such as ?

 

[It Aint Necessarily So]

mutations don't happen to individuals?

Yes, they do, but each mutation affects only cell it occurs in if that. The organism doesn't change unless the mutation causes a malignancy, in which case a cancer will begin to grow. Otherwise, it has no discernible effect on the organism even if it causes that single cell to die. The mutated DNA in that cell must become part of the instruction set in every cell of another organism to affect it phenotype (structure and function), and that means that that cell must be a gamete (spermatozoan or oocyte).

Don't certain individuals eventually, as they procreate. evolve?

Yes, but it's not the same evolution as that which occurs across populations over generations. In the broadest sense, evolution just means change, and we all evolve from zygotes to infants to adults unless death occurs prematurely. Growth and development are biological changes in an individual. Learning is psychological evolution in an individual. The equivalent of populations evolving psychologically over generations is cultural evolution, as with the evolution of languages or religions.

It's true that offspring differ in size, color, etc. But this does not equate to evolution, for instance, fish evolving to apes in the long run.

Yes, it does. That's the mechanism. Offspring vary from their parents, and nature plays favorites among them, choosing those best able to reproduce. Over geological time, fish ancestors have produced ape descendants in multiple small steps.

some diseases can be passed on.

Yes. You probably mean genetic diseases like cystic fibrosis and Huntington's chorea, but also infectious diseases like HIV can be passed from mother to fetus. And then there's the ones passed culturally, as when victims of parental abuse become abusers of their children themselves.

those that survive are simply pronounced to be more fit, more adapted, and more naturally selected. The miracle is that this isn't a circular argument because nature selects only the finest.

It's not an argument. It's a definition of an observation. The organism selected by nature are called selected and the process is called natural selection. The argument is that evidence compelling suggests that this combined with genetic variation across generations leads to the tree of life that we see today evolving (Darwinian sense: descent with change) from a single unicellular aquatic ancestral population.

No. I believe this is a fact.

You: "I avoid all belief."
Me: "Except the belief that you avoid all belief, right?"
You: "No. I believe this is a fact."

it's certainly true that there is no evidence to support the notion that species change gradually as a result of survival of the fittest.

That's incorrect. What you are saying is that you can't properly interpret the evidence that millions of others find compelling.

This paper argues for simultaneous causation, (cause and effect happening without time between each other)

It's already been pointed out to you that simultaneous means occurring at the same point in time, which is incoherent (self-contradictory) if one is positing a timeless reality.

But it's also the case that cause must precede effect. It's implied in the meanings of the two words.: "Cause and effect is the relationship between two events or situations, where one of the two is the cause of the other. The cause is the initiating event or situation, and the effect is the result of the cause."

Sure if you want to label everything , as natural then gods and angels and ghosts would be natural……then what?

I don't know about you, but I stop thinking and talking about the supernatural. The word was coined to justify belief in the nonexistent and explain why we can't find them. It basically means that the believer can claim that none of the rules of reason apply to these putative creatures and spaces.

the only way to reject religion is to prove it unreliability with logic

The atheist justifiably rejects all religions and god claims that can't be demonstrated correct, which is all of them. He doesn't need them disconfirmed, although some have been.

Are you a Christian creationist? If so, are you aware that the world was not made in six days and that there were no first humans? It's been "proven." The scientifically literate are aware of that, and it is on that basis that they reject contradictory mythologies.

I also reject Christianity based in its moral code, which is inadequate and dated by humanist standards. How reliable (your word) should I consider a moral source that calls atheists and LGBTQ+ abominations giving no better reason than that they allegedly offend their creator which, despite being all-powerful and all-loving, can't stand to be with the kinds of people we all interact with every day and often love? That's also a moral defect in my book and is not as fine a love as human love, which can tolerate imperfections in others and even love such people.

it's rather sad that atheists cannot make up their minds where they stand.

It's sad that some theists can't understand atheists when they explain themselves. Here's where we stand: we don't believe in gods. One can add modifiers according to the individual (explicit vs implicit, gnostic vs agnostic, apatheist, ignostic).

In my case, I'm an agnostic atheist who explicitly denies a god belief, and also an apatheist for noninterventionist gods (gods that don't affect reality today such as the deist god) as well as an ignostic: "Ignosticism or igtheism is the idea that the question of the existence of God is meaningless because the word "God" has no coherent and unambiguous definition."

Neither does supernatural. Neither does existing outside of time, as existence is defined in part by occupying a series of consecutive instants.

they finally say one person cannot represent all atheists because of various views that's we cant take you guys seriously.

That's not a problem for the atheist. Creationists don't take biologists seriously. Anti-vaxxers don't take infectious disease experts seriously. Climate deniers don't take climate scientists seriously. And flat earthers don't take geoscientists seriously. Yet the world goes on.

sadly, skeptical people like you never enter a laboratory to examine the medications you are served at the pharmacy to verify the contents written on them before use.

I tried that, but they looked the same in the manufacturing facility as they did in the pharmacy.

before you claim it a myth you should give me evidence that suggests it is

Which myth do you mean? The creation story? The flood story? The Exodus story? The virgin birth and resurrection stories? Feel free to Google any of these to discover the evidence against each yourself. I've already seen it and am not inclined to go fetch it for somebody unprepared to benefit from it. There's no burden of proof unless is making an existential claim that he wants believed to somebody willing and able to critically evaluate an argument for soundness and be convinced by a compelling one. If you can't do that, you can't be taught. Once a believer has been fitted with a faith-based confirmation bias, he can't do that. He sees only what his beliefs allow him to see.

 

[Pogo]

Such as ?

Natural Selection

evolution.berkeley.edu

 

[cladking]

It's not an argument. It's a definition of an observation. The organism selected by nature are called selected and the process is called natural selection. The argument is that evidence compelling suggests that this combined with genetic variation across generations leads to the tree of life that we see today evolving (Darwinian sense: descent with change) from a single unicellular aquatic ancestral population.

Yet this "compelling evidence" is based on the assumption that the fit are more likely to survive. Without ever defining a single characteristic of a single individual who ever lived its fitness is simply assumed to be correlated to the amount of its genes in the pool. This isn't science. It could become science by merely demonstrating an ability to predict which individuals will survive leading to a gradual change. In the meantime it remains the most popular facile explanation for change in species despite the fact that species don't become any more fit despite this ongoing force to produce fitness.

History shows again and again that popular beliefs fall by the wayside when real science steps in.

It's not an argument. It's a definition of an observation.

Just as you earlier defined religion as superstition and science as reason you now define change in species as survival of the fittest based not on empirical data nor experiment but on definition and observation.

 

[ratiocinator]

Yet this "compelling evidence" is based on the assumption that the fit are more likely to survive.

It's not an assumption, it's a definition. That's what 'fitness' means in evolution.

Without ever defining a single characteristic of a single individual who ever lived its fitness is simply assumed to be correlated to the amount of its genes in the pool.

Eh? Did this mean something in your head before you started typing?

It could become science by merely demonstrating an ability to predict which individuals will survive leading to a gradual change.

It depends entirely on the environment.

In the meantime it remains the most popular facile explanation for change in species despite the fact that species don't become any more fit despite this ongoing force to produce fitness.

Except that they do. Populations adapt to their environments, which is what 'more fit' means. A better 'fit' to the environment.