Evolution: Do you see the resemblence

[ericmurphy]

How so?


Let's say what we assess is a fact. Then isn't our assessing of facts untrustworthy because our assessment of facts may change? How can we know which facts we assess are the "right" facts and which ones are untrustworthy, if they are all assessed as facts?

I guess what I'm trying to say is you're speaking nonsense.

I'm not. Of course, at bottom, even mathematical proofs rest on axioms, which are not themselves proven but are nevertheless believed inductively to be true. At some point, the ability to "prove" something to be true runs out of steam, and you get to the whole "brain in a vat" problem.

Nevertheless, something is either a fact or not, independent of whether humans believe it to be a fact. I can't deny that at some point we may discover that life has never changed, and is exactly the same now as it was three billion years ago, and our observations to the contrary are illusory. But I hope you'll agree that's extraordinarily unlikely. If it nevertheless turns out to be the case, I would concede evolution is not factual. I'm confident I will never have to.

I did, in the item that this is a reply to. It's all relative.

Just so I don't misunderstand you, your claim is now that life has not changed at all? Ever? If that is indeed your position, I'm afraid we're just going to have to disagree, and I'm not sure taking this discussion further is fruitful.

But have you considered that the reason you can trust them is because they're factual? They are built on factual observation, facts of prior theories, and they present us with data and results that we consider factual (such as how hard you will hit the ground after you catapult) on which to build future theories.

No. I trust them because they appear to be accurate descriptions of reality, and so far have withstood all tests. That does not make them "facts," in and of themselves. A theory simply is not a fact. We don't call it the General Fact of Relativity.

All true! Did you know it's still a fact that the sun revolves around the earth? I can even see it every day, as I look up at the sky. So what if we discover the 93rd naturally occuring element: is the fact that there are 92 naturally occuring elements still true? (hint: yes) It's all a matter of context.

Are you under the misapprehension that I don't think facts are true?

As to the last, I should clarify. It's a fact that there are only 92 naturally-occurring elements on earth. If we should find a 93rd naturally-occurring element on earth, the statement that there are only 92 naturally-occurring elements on earth would not be factual. It would never have been factual. That there are 93 naturally-occurring elements would be factual, and would always have been factual.

No; I'm a big fan of both evolution (the process of development) and the Theory of Evolution that sets it in stone. Both are true, factual and informative --and how can we not appreciate the things that inform us? We'd be nothing without them.

Then why have you been disputing my assertion that evolution (in either sense of the term) is a fact? I still dispute (and virtually every life scientist would agree with me) that the theory of evolution is not a "fact," as that term is used in the sciences. It is a theory. That doesn't make it somehow "less" than a fact. It makes it different from a fact.

 

[ericmurphy]

The document exists; that it exists is evidenced by our senses; our senses are the evidence of the document, not the document itself.

So you do not believe in an external reality, independent of human observation? If no one sees the document, it doesn't exist?

I don't.

I don't know where you got that from.

I got it from the fact that you've been disputing my claim for some time now that evolution is a fact. That isn't what you've been doing? Then what, exactly, is it that we've been arguing about this whole time? Anything?

 

[Willamena]

I'm not. Of course, at bottom, even mathematical proofs rest on axioms, which are not themselves proven but are nevertheless believed inductively to be true. At some point, the ability to "prove" something to be true runs out of steam, and you get to the whole "brain in a vat" problem.

Nevertheless, something is either a fact or not, independent of whether humans believe it to be a fact. I can't deny that at some point we may discover that life has never changed, and is exactly the same now as it was three billion years ago, and our observations to the contrary are illusory. But I hope you'll agree that's extraordinarily unlikely. If it nevertheless turns out to be the case, I would concede evolution is not factual. I'm confident I will never have to.

Just so I don't misunderstand you, your claim is now that life has not changed at all? Ever? If that is indeed your position, I'm afraid we're just going to have to disagree, and I'm not sure taking this discussion further is fruitful.

From some perspectives life-forms have changed; from others --from the perspective of life itself --they have not.

No. I trust them because they appear to be accurate descriptions of reality

Eric, meet Fact... Fact, Eric.

...and so far have withstood all tests. That does not make them "facts," in and of themselves. A theory simply is not a fact.

Are you under the misapprehension that I don't think facts are true?

Not at all; I think you recognize that facts are truthful bits of information, but "the truth" you would have them describe is a different beast.

As to the last, I should clarify. It's a fact that there are only 92 naturally-occurring elements on earth. If we should find a 93rd naturally-occurring element on earth, the statement that there are only 92 naturally-occurring elements on earth would not be factual. It would never have been factual. That there are 93 naturally-occurring elements would be factual, and would always have been factual.

That there are 92 elements would still be factual in its context. For example, the statement "the fact that there are 92 known naturally occuring elements on earth in the year 2007" would still be true. Facts retain truth if kept in context; nothing can retain truth if taken out of context.

Another example, it is a fact that from the perspective of a person standing on the earth the sun appears to revolve around the earth. From a perspective outside the ecliptic plane, it can be seen that the earth revolves around the sun. Both are facts; both are true. Context is important.

Then why have you been disputing my assertion that evolution (in either sense of the term) is a fact?

I didn't. I argued that you had not provided evidence of evolution with your example of bugs and bunnies.

I still dispute (and virtually every life scientist would agree with me) that the theory of evolution is not a "fact," as that term is used in the sciences. It is a theory. That doesn't make it somehow "less" than a fact. It makes it different from a fact.

I've heard otherwise.

If the theory is not factual (that is, if it contains no facts), then what does that say about its truthfulness or usefulness?

So you do not believe in an external reality, independent of human observation? If no one sees the document, it doesn't exist?

I believe in reality; "external or internal" is a false dichotomy. If one or the other is deemed "not real" then it is not a part of reality; so it exists apart from reality, and I don't buy that. I know the document exists when it is evidenced through the faculty of senses; before knowledge, its existence is effectively nil to me.

I got it from the fact that you've been disputing my claim for some time now that evolution is a fact. That isn't what you've been doing? Then what, exactly, is it that we've been arguing about this whole time? Anything?

But I never once did that. We discussed the inadequacy of your bugs and bunnies example, and I tried to support the idea that scientific theories are factual. Those were the salient points.

 

[Jayhawker Soule]

He's not alleging that bunnies evolved from trilobites, and I don't know that they did. He's alleging that species change over time--that some go extinct, and new ones come into being, that's all. ToE explains how.

Nonsense. He's alleging ...

There were trilobites 300 million years ago, and there are no trilobites today. There are rabbits today, but there were no rabbits 300 million years ago. Those two observations, all by themselves, without reference to any additional observations, are more than sufficient to establish the factual nature of evolution.

... which is simply preposterous. I am frankly surprised that you would think otherwise.

But please feel free to take up the challenge posed by ericmurphy's bunnies.

 

[ericmurphy]

Nonsense. He's alleging ...... which is simply preposterous. I am frankly surprised that you would think otherwise.

But please feel free to take up the challenge posed by ericmurphy's bunnies.

Autodidact is correct. There's no difference between the two. You're misinterpretating what I'm saying. I am not saying rabbits evolved from trilobites. In fact, rabbits most certainly did not evolve from trilobites.

What I am saying is that organisms exist today which did not exist in the past, and vice versa. That observation is sufficient to demonstrate that evolution has happened. I thought I'd made that abundantly clear over the past ten pages.

 

[Willamena]

What I am saying is that organisms exist today which did not exist in the past, and vice versa. That observation is sufficient to demonstrate that evolution has happened.

But it's not sufficient, that's the thing; it's not sufficient to demonstrate evolution, which is changes over time. The extinction of a species, for instance, due to a meteor hitting the earth is not evolution. The existence of a species today for which there is no evidence of existence in the past is not sufficient, either, because no evidence is not evidence of lack --it's not evidence at all (i.e. no evidence).

I'm sorry we harped on this. I'll stop now.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

Did you know that there was sufficient evidence to hang a man in one of the last hangings in England only to find out he was innocent.

Are you trying to make a case against certainty in conclusions generally? I'm not sure what specific case you're referring to, but I'm confident in saying that evolution has more evidence for it than has ever been presented in any criminal case.

I do understand where you are comming from but for example there was evidence to suggest we would not invade the Normandy beaches but we did.

If you're talking about the "evidence" that led the Germans to believe that the landings would be at the Pas de Calais and that Normandy was just a diversion, then you're talking about a deliberate program of fakery and misinformation: to accomplish the deception, the allies placed fake aircraft and tanks for German aircraft to spot, and generated huge volumes of false radio traffic (which described whole fictitious armies) to create the illusion. Just to be clear: are you trying to imply that the theory of evolution is based on falsified evidence or some sort of deliberate deception?

If it is so cut and dried why is'nt it told that way,it is'nt is short answer and it is not fact.

When the theory of evolution was described to you in the most accurate way possible, you asked for it in simpler terms. When you got it in simpler terms, you claimed that it wasn't as accurate as it should be. I feel like you're playing a game here.

For example only ,how many people believed the da vinci code(hapless fools)the evidence was presented allbeit in a fictional movie yet people still believed it.

Seeing how there's a statement at the beginning of the book declaring it and its details to be fiction, I think that it's rather silly that people believe it to be factual... and I don't think it's analogous to evolution at all. Do you think that more than a century worth of science has been based on generations of scientists not noticing Darwin's "Just kidding! I made it all up!" disclaimer in On the Origin of Species or something?

The theory of relativity was spoken in the same vein as toe but half of japan was blown up to support it,need i go on

The rationale for dropping the atomic bombs on Japan was complex and is still disputed, but I feel safe in saying that "supporting the theory of relativity" is not one of the reasons anyone seriously considers.

Contrary to all the strawman you've put up so far, both Intelligent Design and Creationism do meet those requirements, hence they can rightly be called "scientific".* That you are intellectually prejudiced to implications of the supernatural is your personal problem not science's.* So let's apply your criteria for science.

A) Verification of a designer

If creation has been designed, how can we know or verify that? Answer: By looking at instances of known design, and seek for the same instances in biology.* And the qualities of known design are things like specified complexity and irreducible complexity, things which nature cannot create by chance.* And as it turns out, we do find lots of those qualities in biological systems, such as the DNA code (specified complexity) and the rotary motors in a bacterium's flagella (irreducible complexity) to name but a few.

B) Falsification of a designer

A designer can be easily falsified if it can be shown that such examples of specified complexity and irreducible complexity can arise naturally and incrementally.


So as you can see you cannot simply dismiss ID and Creationism as non-scientific for it meets your own criteria of science.

"Specified complexity" and "irreducible complexity" are not themselves verifiable or falsifiable. If ID and Creationism require these to be verified or falsified, then they are not scientific.

One of the strawman often brought up against ID and Creationism is that it stifles scientific inquiry, that God will simply invoked when a road block is met.* But in reality it is the naturalistic evolutionary science that stifles scientific inquiry, for if it is true that the universe and life were designed then Evolution has no way of detecting it because of its pre-commitment to naturalistic methodologies.* Whereas ID and Creationism is OPEN to both possibilities.

This statement itself is a strawman argument. The Theory of Evolution has no "pre-commitment" to anything.

A) Verification of macro-evolution


Despite all the conjectures in your previous posts, you have yet to give us ANY verifiable evidence for MACRO-evolution.*

Plenty of evidence has been posted here. For starters, there's the fossil record. I don't really feel like re-hashing everything that others have already done several times here.

B) Falsification of macro-evolution

Because many, if not most, evolutionary scientists view their theory as "fact" it has become virtually impossible to falsify macro-evolution.

Incorrect. There are plenty of ways to falsify the theory of evolution. For example, if you were to find a single mammal fossil that predated the Permian period, this would falsify evolution. If you were to discover some other mechanism that was responsible for the variety and complexity of life, this would falsify evolution. If you were to discover that the Earth was too young to allow enough time for evolution to produce the life we see around us, this would disprove evolution.

You're trying to confuse "very well supported by evidence" with "unfalsifiable". They're not the same thing: one is a good reason to accept a hypothesis as true, the other is a good reason to reject a hypothesis as unscientific.[/FONT]

 

[ericmurphy]

But it's not sufficient, that's the thing; it's not sufficient to demonstrate evolution, which is changes over time.

Yes it is. If different organisms exist now than did in the past, change has happened. There's no way different species can exist at different times without change happening. This is such an elementary concept I don't get why you're having such a hard time with it.

The extinction of a species, for instance, due to a meteor hitting the earth is not evolution. The existence of a species today for which there is no evidence of existence in the past is not sufficient, either, because no evidence is not evidence of lack --it's not evidence at all (i.e. no evidence).

If I were saying species once existed which no longer do, that would be one thing. I'm also saying species exist today which once did not. Unless you believe it's true that those species have actually, as a matter of fact, existed from the beginning of life on this planet, then the the fact that they did not exist in the past is all the evidence that is necessary that evolution has happened.

The only way to deny evolution is to deny that the organisms alive today are any different from the organisms that lived at any time in the past. I do not believe it is possible to deny that.

I'm sorry we harped on this. I'll stop now.

Believe me, I'm long past enjoying discussing this to death. And it seems that you are once more back to denying the factual nature of evolution.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

The change of life over time is factual. I don't see how it can be denied. But that is all I am saying, when I say evolution is a fact. And if you disagree with me, I don't see how you can do so without claiming that life is the same today as it has been for the entire time it has existed on earth. If there's a third possibility, I'm happy to hear what it is, but no one has proposed such a third possibility yet.

The third possibility is that evolution is a fact, but not for the reasons you've given.

Willamena:

There are bunnies now. There weren't bunnies before. That's a change. There were trilobites before. There aren't now. That's a change. That the simple fact of evolution. It may seem self-evident, but then so is the fact that things fall. The ToE explains how they change. Theory explains self-evident fact.

The "self-evident facts" you mention can be explained any number of ways. Evolution does have support, but that support isn't just "Look! All the trilobites are gone! And look! We have bunnies!"

 

[Willamena]

And it seems that you are once more back to denying the factual nature of evolution.

I'm not; and I don't see how you get that from this.

 

[ericmurphy]

The third possibility is that evolution is a fact, but not for the reasons you've given.

I haven't given a reason. I'm not even there yet. All I'm saying is that evolution has happened. I haven't even proposed a reason why or how it happened. Everyone keeps assuming I have, but I have not.

The "self-evident facts" you mention can be explained any number of ways. Evolution does have support, but that support isn't just "Look! All the trilobites are gone! And look! We have bunnies!"

I'm not even talking about explanations! I haven't even gotten there yet. What I am saying, which no one seems to have apprehended yet, is that there is a phenomenon which needs explanation in the first place: that life has changed, i.e., evolved, over time. I even seem to be getting argument that life has changed over time, which I find astounding.

 

[crystalonyx]

It's certainly true that there is plenty of evidence that trilobites evolved (changed thru time), and in general there is as much evidence supporting the current theories of evolution as there is evidence supporting the current theories in the "hard" sciences such as physics or chemistry(probably more). The main debates are in the details of just how evolution works.

 

[ericmurphy]

Then why do you keep arguing with me the factual nature of evolution? I've given you reasons why I believe evolution is a fact. You keep denying those reasons are valid. Since you believe evolution is a fact, then there must be a reason why. What is (or are) those reasons?

 

[ericmurphy]

It's certainly true that there is plenty of evidence that trilobites evolved (changed thru time), and in general there is as much evidence supporting the current theories of evolution as there is evidence supporting the current theories in the "hard" sciences such as physics or chemistry(probably more). The main debates are in the details of just how evolution works.

That's what I've been trying (and failing) to do for ten pages now. I've been trying to make the distinction between the observed fact of evolution, and attempts to explain that evolution. I can't seem to get anyone else to see that there's even a distinction between the two.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

The only way to deny evolution is to deny that the organisms alive today are any different from the organisms that lived at any time in the past. I do not believe it is possible to deny that.

Incorrect. The theory of evolution says that the mechanism of inheritability, random mutation and natural selection working together is responsible for the change we see in the history of life. For someone to say that some other mechanism is responsible for this change is definitely not the same thing as saying that no change occurred.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

That's what I've been trying (and failing) to do for ten pages now. I've been trying to make the distinction between the observed fact of evolution, and attempts to explain that evolution. I can't seem to get anyone else to see that there's even a distinction between the two.

I think I see the problem. You're treating "evolution" as a synonym for "change". It's not.

 

[ericmurphy]

I think I see the problem. You're treating "evolution" as a synonym for "change". It's not.

It is. In the context I'm using it, it is. You're treating "evolution" as a synonym for "evolutionary theory." They are absolutely not the same thing.

That is the problem.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

It is. In the context I'm using it, it is. You're treating "evolution" as a synonym for "evolutionary theory." They are absolutely not the same thing.

No, "evolutionary theory" is a human explanation of evolution. "Evolution" is the process itself.

In the biological context, i.e. the context of this discussion, evolution is (quoting the American Heritage Dictionary):

1. Change in the genetic composition of a population during successive generations, as a result of natural selection acting on the genetic variation among individuals, and resulting in the development of new species.
2. The historical development of a related group of organisms; phylogeny.

That is the problem.

No, I think the problem is that a good number of pages of this thread have been spent on what's turned out to be a semantic disagreement.

 

[ericmurphy]

No, "evolutionary theory" is a human explanation of evolution. "Evolution" is the process itself.

In the biological context, i.e. the context of this discussion, evolution is (quoting the American Heritage Dictionary):




No, I think the problem is that a good number of pages of this thread have been spent on what's turned out to be a semantic disagreement.

Yep, that's exactly what it is.

 

[Willamena]

Then why do you keep arguing with me the factual nature of evolution? I've given you reasons why I believe evolution is a fact. You keep denying those reasons are valid. Since you believe evolution is a fact, then there must be a reason why. What is (or are) those reasons?

It think this explains our discrepancy, as my best guess.
http://www.religiousforums.com/forum/1027110-post11.html