Challenge to Creationists: Ichneumon Wasp

[Thief]

Aside from the mountains of evidence for evolution, I often struggle to understand how anyone can believe in an intelligent and benevolent god who designed species when reading about phenomena like this. The Ichneumon wasp is a species of wasp that bores a hole into a caterpillar in order to lay its eggs inside of the caterpillar. The wasp also injects the caterpillar so that it is paralyzed, yet still feels pain. The wasps then hatch inside of the caterpillar and eat it alive from the inside out, while the caterpillar can do nothing. Now, unless God were an evil sadist, there is no way that he would design a process like this. This type of process is simply incompatible with the existence of an intelligent and benevolent designer. Yet, when viewed from a naturalistic perspective, it makes sense. Natural selection produces results that can turn out to be incredibly beautiful and give the illusion of benevolent design, and it can also produce horrible, nasty results like this that give the illusion of a cruel designer. In reality, Natural Selection is blind and mindless, and it all makes sense when we consider this. As Dawkins put it, "Nature is not cruel, only pitilessly indifferent."

Ichneumonidae - Wikipedia

there is just so much chemistry on this planet
and much of it must gel in the body of one organism
that it can be useful in another organism

and here you are

 

[nPeace]

Why not just answer the question now? The video met your criteria, why run away and dig up an old failed argument?

No. I will give you the exact link later, because i have to go.
If you want to believe i am running away, suit yourself. i don't think the world will stop revolving.

Bye now.

 

[ecco]

You just wasted a whole post trying to ... for what?.
All you did was verify the post you responded to.
You did not point out what you claimed in post #373.

Very specifically, yes, I did. Apparently you need to read my post #373 carefully and make note of the periods at the end of sentences. If you do not know what a period is and does, look it up. I'm not here to teach you basic grammar.

Why should I be embarrassed by childish ego tripping?

I have no idea why you would want to continue to embarrass yourself. Perhaps it's part of the whole Christian guilt and sin thing. Self-flagellation is a big thing with some folks:

the action of flogging oneself, especially as a form of religious discipline.​

 

[ecco]

I didn't respond to you, that's the thing.
You didn't want to read it... fine.
You won't have to be bother about it again... rest assured.

However, I did read it. That's what prompted me to write:

However, as soon as I read it, I mentally compared it to your other writings. I realized it probably didn't come from you. I copied a part of it, put it into quotes and pasted it into a Google search. Google quickly showed the book from which you plagiarized the whole paragraph.​

Care to respond as to why you think it's OK to willfully plagiarize.

 

[SkepticThinker]

It is at least a half step in the creodirection,
instead of no start at all.

I'm not sure that it is.
Picking apart evolution doesn't make any other belief/assertion/theory more plausible just by default. Especially one that's severely lacking in the evidence department.

 

[SkepticThinker]

This is what you believe, not I.

That's reality.

You're obviously free to believe whatever you want. But falsifying evolution doesn't do what you think it does.

I want to believe true things. Don't you?

I don't depend on anyone to do my homework for me.
I don't have to prove it either. If you ask me for evidence, I will try my best, as I have been doing.

Nobody has to do anything.
But when one participates on a debate forum/discussion board, others expect some kind of back-and-forth debate or discussion, rather than just assertions without evidence.

We already know that science doesn't prove anything, but i do believe all things will be proven.

Right. Science demonstrates things.

I'm on a debate forum, so that's what I do.
I'm not here to prove anything.

I'm only sorry that some persons on these forums seem to think that persons should not believe anything different to them.
I wonder then, what's the purpose of the forum.

Who has said that "persons should not believe anything different to them?"

If it's a social club where everyone agrees, then I'm outta here.
i'm here to debate, so... I thought that's what would be expected.
Perhaps I am wrong. if so I beg your pardon.

I'm not sure that you've demonstrated that you are here to debate, given your penchant for posting large blocks of cut and pastes while never following up on discussion of said cut and paste blocks when others take the time to address them.

I'm totally ready for a great debate. Let's do it already!

 

[Audie]

I'm not sure that it is.
Picking apart evolution doesn't make any other belief/assertion/theory more plausible just by default. Especially one that's severely lacking in the evidence department.

Hm. You appear to be right Wet noodle thrashing
for me.

 

[Audie]

That's reality.

You're obviously free to believe whatever you want. But falsifying evolution doesn't do what you think it does.


Nobody has to do anything.
But when one participates on a debate forum/discussion board, others expect some kind of back-and-forth debate or discussion, rather than just assertions without evidence.


Right. Science demonstrates things.


Who has said that "persons should not believe anything different to them?"


I'm not sure that you've demonstrated that you are here to debate, given your penchant for posting large blocks of cut and pastes while never following up on discussion of said cut and paste blocks when others take the time to address them.

I'm totally ready for a great debate. Let's do it already!

If you were in his position,would you be able to debate?

 

[SkepticThinker]

If you were in his position,would you be able to debate?

If I felt like I had good evidence for my position, yes, definitely I would be able to debate.

If I felt like I didn't have good evidence for my position, then probably no, I would not be able to debate.

 

[ecco]

Here is an example
of how smart he was though.
If it could be demonstrated that any complex organ existed<snip>
We should be extremely cautious in concluding that an organ could not have been formed by transitional gradations of some kind.

Did you just make another unattributed cut and paste? Yes, you did. Putting it into a slightly different color is not attributing in conformance with the rules of this forum.

Are you quoting Darwin or are you quoting Behe quoting Darwin?

 

[Audie]

If I felt like I had good evidence for my position, yes, definitely I would be able to debate.

If I felt like I didn't have good evidence for my position, then probably no, I would not be able to debate.

Of course, but if you were a creationist?

 

[Audie]

Did you just make another unattributed cut and paste? Yes, you did. Putting it into a slightly different color is not attributing in conformance with the rules of this forum.

Are you quoting Darwin or are you quoting Behe quoting Darwin?

Are there creolurkers who notice this sort of dismal performance?

 

[Subduction Zone]

Did you just make another unattributed cut and paste? Yes, you did. Putting it into a slightly different color is not attributing in conformance with the rules of this forum.

Are you quoting Darwin or are you quoting Behe quoting Darwin?

And the important point is that there is no such organ that could not have evolved by small steps. I posted a video on the eye, but your mention of Behe reminded me of his old "irreducible complexity" canards. His favorite one was the bacterial flagellum but that too has been shown to be possible to evolve that would pass Darwin's test.

Since @nPeace likes videos here is one that explains that (sorry, terrible music with this one):

The video is a simplification of this paper:

Evolution of the bacterial flagellum

It is a rather long one, but then this is a complex subject. And if that is not good enough there are over 200 scientific peer reviewed journal articles in that paper's appendix that it was based upon, most of them linked. Please excuse me for not linking all of those.

 

[SkepticThinker]

Of course, but if you were a creationist?

That's a hard place to put myself into.

I do remember one time when I was a kid, back when I used to consider myself a Christian, and before I knew what atheism was and all that ...
I had a friend who didn't believe in God. And I remember that I just could not figure out why she didn't believe in something so obvious. Of course there is a God! I don't recall presenting any evidence to her (not sure I even knew what evidence was at the time or not), but I do remember that she would not budge from her non-belief. And I was baffled that it wasn't as obvious to her as it was to me. She was the first person I had ever met that didn't believe in the God I believed in. And I just thought everyone believed in God.

So, it looks like maybe the answer would be no. If I were a creationist.

 

[Polymath257]

Thanks.
I believe you are a scientist, so let me ask.
Is there a possibility that what is believed to be known, could be wrong?

It is likely that *some* that is believed to be known is wrong. It is highly unlikely that the age of the current expansion phase for the universe is significantly wrong.

part of the way science works is by acknowledging that we can be wrong and that new evidence might overturn some of our ideas. But that doesn't mean we should find it *likely* this will happen. For example, for us to be wrong about the Earth orbiting the sun would require a spectacular conjunction of coincidences. The same is true for no evolution to have happened or for the universe to be significantly less than 13 billion years old.

But we can certainly be wrong about things like the distribution of dark matter, or on the details of galaxy formation, or on the nature of quantum gravity, or on any number of more specific topics. We also have to allow that any place where we are wrong will still have our current views as a good first approximation where they have been tested. So, the error bars may shrink and show we are wrong in details, but they won't grow to the place that the Earth is only thousands of years old or to where biological evolution doesn't occur.

 

[Jose Fly]

Again, you've demonstrated and flat out stated that you didn't take the time to fully read your links. No mind reading required. What's "sickening" about pointing out that apparent fact?

That's part of the larger ridiculous game @nPeace is playing. He expects us to ignore that 1) he doesn't read his own citations, 2) he is very ignorant of evolutionary biology (apparently thinking flies producing elephants should be experimentally observed), and 3) he is a Jehovah's Witness, which makes him about as biased as a person can be on this subject.

Kinda makes you wonder just what he thinks he's accomplishing here. Does he honestly think he's representing his faith well? Does he seriously think people are seeing all this and thinking to themselves, "Gosh, those Jehovah's Witnesses sure have it all together"?

Weird.

 

[Jose Fly]

What is your definition of a missing link?

If you get @nPeace to answer that question, I'll be stunned. Not too long ago I spent a fair bit of time chasing him around and trying to get him to answer that question, and he never did.

Reminds me of the old saying among lawyers.....The questions you deliberately avoid say more about you and your position than the ones you answer.

 

[Astrophile]

Did you just make another unattributed cut and paste? Yes, you did. Putting it into a slightly different color is not attributing in conformance with the rules of this forum.

Are you quoting Darwin or are you quoting Behe quoting Darwin?

It is a direct quotation from Chapter VI of The Origin of Species; it is the first paragraph of the section entitled 'Modes of transition'.

 

[ecco]

Did you just make another unattributed cut and paste? Yes, you did. Putting it into a slightly different color is not attributing in conformance with the rules of this forum.

Are you quoting Darwin or are you quoting Behe quoting Darwin?

It is a direct quotation from Chapter VI of The Origin of Species; it is the first paragraph of the section entitled 'Modes of transition'.

Yes. And it's also in at least one of Behe's books and it is widely quoted on Creo websites. I was just asking nPeace from where he cut and pasted.

 

[nPeace]

Why not just answer the question now? The video met your criteria, why run away and dig up an old failed argument?

You posted the video here.
My response is here.
I added a bit more here, but I am guessing you read none of it, and probably won't, so I will repeat.

I have even been accused of trying to insult people, by speaking the truth.
A man speculates - since he could do nothing more - throughout an entire video, and I have committed a grave sin - actually to quote "react in some very non-Christian fashions" by comment on it.
Ha Ha Ha I really would like to know if the man wasn't speculating, what he was doing.


I could be wrong, but I believe you may have missed my point.
I said...
Even if one doesn't find something, it can always be demonstrated to be possible - no need for worries.

Which means that even if there is no evidence that something happened, and scientists demonstrate it is possible. As long as that is done, regardless of whether it is known to have happened or not, it is possible.
For example...

If it could be demonstrated that any complex organ existed, which could not possibly have been formed by numerous, successive, slight modifications, my theory would absolutely break down.

The living cell is complex.
A cell assembling itself on its own is not known to have happened, but if it can be demonstrated how the cell is built, automatically it is assumed to have happened - the impossible becomes possible.

Darwin often makes statements like this:

...we must own that we are far too ignorant to argue that no transition of any kind is possible.

But it deserves especial notice that the more important objections relate to questions on which we are
confessedly ignorant; nor do we know how ignorant we are. We do not know all the possible transitional gradations between the simplest and the most perfect organs;

The Theory of Evolution is the god of might and magic.
With evolution, nothing is impossible, and any impossibility is possible.

If I argued that it should be possible for a V-8 engine to assemble itself, they'd put me in a mental institute. Why? "It's not organic."

To say the atoms assembled themelves to form a living cell... "Genius. Noble prize winner."

However, I do agree with him in part - we must own that we are far too ignorant to argue that no transition of any kind is possible being raised to life from the dead is impossible.