The Believabliltiy of Evolution

[joelr]

Humans are not machines.

You lie.

Did I though?

Humans are not machines or computers. We do obey the laws of probability however.

 

[joelr]

Give that man a cigar!!

"Credentials" can make anyone MORE LIKELY to be wrong. In the 1850's every surgeon thought washing their hands and tools was a waste of time with critical patients. No doubt many people washed splinters and tweezers before removing foreign objects. No doubt folk remedies and "witches" often included using cleaned instruments. But the patients of surgeons almost all died.

.

This is just confirmation bias leading to an incorrect conclusion.
One mistake in 1850 and you think the surgery of the time was more likely wrong?

You would have to take all people in 1850 who needed surgery. Then look at the data. How many of those people had an attempted healing by an alternative treatment, prayer, witchcraft, voodoo, law of attraction, surgery performed by amateurs, whatever. Then take all the people who had surgery from an actual surgeon. Then you could make a determination about who is more likely to be wrong.
You have a strawman argument about a witch who washed the tools. But you provide no data about how successful witch surgery was in 1850.
Just because a witch had a ritual where tools were washed out of superstition doesn't mean witch surgery was a better idea than going to a hospital. There wasn't even an actual witch who did that it's just a made up argument?
Going to a hospital in 1850 was likely far safer than amateur treatment. As if you would not go to a surgeon if you needed heart surgery and don't realize that medical science has the best accumulated version of how to perform surgery?

There will always be mistakes by the overall success of combined knowledge is always better. Just because an occasional plane crashes do you think you would be safer in an untested aircraft designed by someone who followed no known principles of aircraft and had a new unique design? How about jumping off a cliff on a witch broom?
This is an absurd argument it's flawed here and equally as much applying to to evolutionary science.

 

[Dan From Smithville]

The same process that hundreds of thousands of results demonstrate evolution is a real and natural phenomenon. So given you accept the process, you now accept the results of this process all through the sciences, including evolution, yes?

Be aware that you cannot have it both ways. You can't describe an objective process as a way to make true conclusions, but have an exemption for one phenomenon, and a phenomenon that just happens to be a big burr under the saddle of conservative Christians.


So that's it, you are envious of experts in biology for all their success, and you have none for your beliefs. Well it takes education and ethical work.


Experimenters satisfy the rules set out to require the fewest possible assumptions, account for all the data, and use facts when applicable. There is no social standard to what science requires in experimentation.


No, it's not a science fair competition. I take it you have no understanding how science works. I'd love to give you a high school science test and check your answers. The predictions in an experiment have to be very specific. The hypothesis can refer to other theories as part of how it is designed, along with relevant facts.

I'm new to the thread and there's about 1400 posts, so give me a few sentences of what your HYPOTHESIS (you don't have a theory yet, you haven't earned it. Look up what a hypothesis is, and what it must do BEFORE it is a theory) states. And let me, and perhaps a few others, give us our two cents about your prediction. I'm super curious.


Well, disciplined minds can choose their own beliefs. Most beliefs of the average person are formed in the subconscious through life experiences. Most people end up believing in ideas without any actual awareness or deliberation.


That's bold. Your example of the peppered moth is a classic example of evolution and fitness being the factor that favored them. So we can say your belief is absurd since fitness is exactly what breeders use when they are creating an animal to perform certain tasks, or look a certain way, or behave a certain way. Plants have been pollenated a certain way, or gene engineered, to be more "fit" for the environment. This is a deliberate selection. In nature the selection is governed by the circumstances of the weather and environment. Species can go extinct because the environment becomes too harsh, and there is no fitness that can survive. This is all covered in 7th grade science class.

The one exception you have is humans and many bred animals. We have manipulated our environments to a degree that humans don't need to be fit to survive. Nor do many of our pets. Ever see a pug? Cute as hell, but no way it would survive in the wild. It's not fit.



Well modern America has closed most institutions and there is a real lack of mental health care of any type. Most mentally ill end up in prisons where they seldom get adequate care. But this topic is irrelevant.


These are political issues, nothing to do with science.


By "peers" you mean experts in biology, yes? And what you think they are wrong about is evolution, yes?

And you have to be very, very specific about what you are talking about. For example germ theory was shown to be a real and natural phenomenon and scientists read the papers and accepted the results. No doubt there were a few hold outs because people become attached to what they believe and can't let it go. Today all scientists accept that microorganisms exist and cause infection.

Evolution is a pretty simple concept, but there is a massive list of what makes it work, from chemistry to cosmology. Every part of it has to work for evolution to be real. Scientists can be wrong about how one small element works, but evolution still works. And scientists adjust their understanding. You have yet to provide anything I've seen that would overturn a process like evolution.


You're right because there is no way to predict with so many unknowns. This isn't science. You mean speculation. If you want to make sound predictions you need to account for the variables. That's how science shows its work.


Thank god we have experts in biology to explain it to us. You should listen to them.

I'd suggest a few other tests that might explain things better than a high school biology test.

 

[Dan From Smithville]

Did I though?

Humans are not machines or computers. We do obey the laws of probability however.

Our bodies could be described as machines of biological origin.

 

[Dan From Smithville]

Where did he make that claim? And I suggest that you edit your post. Saying that someone lied is a big no no.

You may be one of the few that actually reads those posts.

 

[Subduction Zone]

You may be one of the few that actually reads those posts.

I usually have him on auto ignore. But he was extremely active tonight. And it was a rather short one for once.

 

[exchemist]

I usually have him on auto ignore. But he was extremely active tonight. And it was a rather short one for once.

Ditto.

 

[cladking]

Is the conspiracy theory.

So the guy who said "science changes one funeral at a time" was a conspiracy theorists, eh?

It's good to know part of the brainwashing is to belittle and marginalize those who don't agree with you.

 

[metis]

Suffice to say your premises are very very different. Many of your premises are simply wrong. They seem to be right because they make perfect "sense" but they only makes sense because you think in a confused language that you learned along with beliefs and ideas that were not true. They seem to make sense because words can be ephemeral even in our own thinking and virtually worthless for communication.

If it makes you feel better, then I guess you can believe that-- and anything else your mind may conjure up. As for me, I'll go with science and other forms of objectivity.

 

[cladking]

The same process that hundreds of thousands of results demonstrate evolution is a real and natural phenomenon. So given you accept the process, you now accept the results of this process all through the sciences, including evolution, yes?

Studying "rabbits" is not deduction and looking at fossils is not experiment. The methodology that turns changes in species to "survival of the fittest" is flawed.

 

[cladking]

As for me, I'll go with science and other forms of objectivity.

I'll go with objective evidence as well but I see none presented that shows a different interpretation of the evidence isn't justified. I see a bunch of believers just repeating the same thing over and over.

If evolution is gradual and based on survival of the fittest then how do you account for the existence of dog? They are smaller, weaker, less intelligent and more dependent than wolves and they arose suddenly because of traits related to behavior just as my theory predicts. The existence of dogs shows Darwin was wrong and I am right. You are wholly incapable of showing that ANY species at ANY time arose through survival of the fittest over a very long time so it's just as well YOU CAN'T EVEN SEE THIS POST. You can't show any evidence for Darwin nonsense because... ...drumroll please... ...Darwin was wrong and he was wrong because his beliefs got in the way of his ability to see the evidence. We all see our beliefs preferentially to reality because this is an effect of modern language.

 

[SkepticThinker]

Meantime, according to a website about blind fish, "Cavefish are a fish typically found in dark freshwater caves. Surface dwellers need eyesight in order to survive, but when they migrated into caves this sense was no longer necessary. Mutations rendered some fish blind and the mutation flourished. A prime example of convergent evolution, unrelated cavefish species all over the globe independently developed this trait."
Obviously NOT "survival of the fittest," although seemingly reported as such, but it was convenient that they survived. Period. NOT survival of the fittest. Say what you want, the fact that this mutant strain flourished does not in any way prove survival of the fittest. It means these offspring continued living as -- fish -- that were blind. NOT to their particular advantage, but managed to survive. In fact, I'm thinking it's proof (yes, proof) that the idea "survival of the fittest" just is not so.

It actually does. Because what it means is that they survived in their environment long enough to produce offspring which would carry on their genes.

You really don't understand evolution at all. Thanks for thoroughly demonstrating that.

 

[SkepticThinker]

I'll go with objective evidence as well but I see none presented that shows a different interpretation of the evidence isn't justified. I see a bunch of believers just repeating the same thing over and over.

If evolution is gradual and based on survival of the fittest then how do you account for the existence of dog? They are smaller, weaker, less intelligent and more dependent than wolves and they arose suddenly because of traits related to behavior just as my theory predicts. The existence of dogs shows Darwin was wrong and I am right. You are wholly incapable of showing that ANY species at ANY time arose through survival of the fittest over a very long time so it's just as well YOU CAN'T EVEN SEE THIS POST. You can't show any evidence for Darwin nonsense because... ...drumroll please... ...Darwin was wrong and he was wrong because his beliefs got in the way of his ability to see the evidence. We all see our beliefs preferentially to reality because this is an effect of modern language.

You know that human beings have bred dogs for thousands of years, right?
As in, artificial selection?
In that light, I don't see how your post makes much sense.

 

[gnostic]

First of all.

With or without eyes. They remain fish. Period. Thanks, though, for your thought on the subject.

Fish isn’t a species, nor a genus. You are talking as if fishes were species, just only demonstrated your ignorance, and I am not talking about Evolution.

Your ignorance is the whole biology.

Second...

The experiments proving evolution are ridiculous. Guppies make guppies, with or without the same characteristics. They don't morph into different type entitites.

You don’t how ridiculous ignorance this statement is, because you are forgetting that in Genesis 2:7...

7 then the Lord God formed man from the dust of the ground

Lifeless DUST from the ground - most likely silt soil or clay soil - MORPHED INTO a living adult human being.

That’s even more unrealistic than Evolution, dust or soil morphing into a man, is pure fiction and fantasy.

If there were NO living animals, plants, fungi or bacteria BEFORE THE CREATION OF ADAM, then there are no organic materials in the soil.

Soil ONLY have organic matters when living organisms leave waste like urine, sweats or feces, falling feathers or hair or flaky skin from animals, shedded leaves or fallen branches falling, or any organisms that died, decomposed and permeate the soil, and so on.

But from verses 5 to 6, the Earth was completely lifeless, no plants or animals. Adam was the first life...hence Adam was created from inorganic soil.

Soil by themselves are inorganic matters, made from weathering of rocks and minerals (soil minerals come from either feldspar, mica or quartz) from winds or rain, breaking them down to sediment of inorganic minerals that are either grainy soils or powdery soil. But according to verse 5, there were no rain too, so how did the land have so much soil without weathering rocks from rain.

Plus, every soil have base-chemical compounds, depending on the weathered mineral types.

If Adam was created from these inorganic minerals, then the human body should still have these silt minerals or clay minerals, but no such minerals exist in your body or mine.

If you understood what the human body are made of, and understood what soils are made of, then you would understand that Adam morphing from dust, is not only impossible, it demonstrated the AUTHORS OF GENESIS were bloody idiots!

 

[F1fan]

So the guy who said "science changes one funeral at a time" was a conspiracy theorists, eh?

It's good to know part of the brainwashing is to belittle and marginalize those who don't agree with you.

The disagreement isn't like being on the wrong side of the Coke versus Pepsi debate, it is non-experts who think their beliefs are superior to what the consensus of experts report of their work.

Non-experts disagreeing with experts is not a side that has much credibility. It's the Dunning Kruger effect. Look it up.

 

[F1fan]

Studying "rabbits" is not deduction and looking at fossils is not experiment. The methodology that turns changes in species to "survival of the fittest" is flawed.

Fossils are evidence. Geology allows fossils to be dated. These bits of data get recorded and contributes to a growing puzzle as pieces are put into place. This is why more primitive hominids are found in older strata. More modern hominid features are found in newer strata. So we can see the linage of change over time from fossil remains that paints the picture of how humans evolved. The same process works for any other animal, like horses.

The prediction is that more primitive hominids are found in older strata, and this is verified time and time gain.

I anticipate that you reject all this, but you have no choice because you have your personal beliefs that you need to protect. But that's OK because the science remains robust, and your personal opinion is irrelevant.

 

[F1fan]

The fact that scientists continue to peer into the strata of life, such as examining and looking at cells and also improve health by making such things as vaccines (debatable by some), it still does not prove or mean evolution of the Darwinian kind.

When I was in college some years ago I found a copy of Cell Magazine, and I picked it up out of curiosity. I mean who knew there was a journal, a monthly magazine, that was only about cells and all the current research and discoveries? Not me.

So I opened it up and tried reading some of the content. Holy ****, this was way over my head. The complexity of how cells work, and how much is understood about how cells work, was way beyond what i thought possible. The amount of specific knowledge science has these days is incredible.

I am aware that I am poorly educated on the sciences, as this magazine illustrated to me. I have good basic knowledge, and understand how science works and how it attains more precision and accuracy over time. What astounds me is how many people who are even more poorly educated than me refuse to acknowledge their ignorance, and refuse to acknowledge how their ignorance is a liability, and who refuse to open their minds to being educated when others point out their errors of belief. I'm further astounded that there is no shame or even acknowledgement that these folks cannot debate against more educated people. These threads aren't debate. These are threads of educated people correcting the errors of belief of the poorly informed believer. The arrogance of that still surprises me. And much of that ignorance and arrogance comes directly from the strong influence of religious belief and fervor.

 

[exchemist]

Meantime, according to a website about blind fish, "Cavefish are a fish typically found in dark freshwater caves. Surface dwellers need eyesight in order to survive, but when they migrated into caves this sense was no longer necessary. Mutations rendered some fish blind and the mutation flourished. A prime example of convergent evolution, unrelated cavefish species all over the globe independently developed this trait."
Obviously NOT "survival of the fittest," although seemingly reported as such, but it was convenient that they survived. Period. NOT survival of the fittest. Say what you want, the fact that this mutant strain flourished does not in any way prove survival of the fittest. It means these offspring continued living as -- fish -- that were blind. NOT to their particular advantage, but managed to survive. In fact, I'm thinking it's proof (yes, proof) that the idea "survival of the fittest" just is not so.

There is an article here: Sensory Adaptations of Fishes to Subterranean Environments that explains how cave fishes, while losing their (to them, useless) eyesight, evolved other sensory organs that are useful in perpetual darkness.

If you were to put a normal fish and a cave fish together in a cave, it would be the cave fish that survived to reproduce, while the normal fish would just starve. That means it is the cave fish that is "fittest" for the cave environment. That is what "fittest" means, in evolution.

 

[cladking]

The disagreement isn't like being on the wrong side of the Coke versus Pepsi debate, it is non-experts who think their beliefs are superior to what the consensus of experts report of their work.

Non-experts disagreeing with experts is not a side that has much credibility. It's the Dunning Kruger effect. Look it up.

Are you not aware it was Max Planck who said this? He was one of the finest scientists, physicists, and metaphysicians of all time. Most modern scientists are mystics in comparison especially in terms of their grasp on what they know and what they don't. In other words the statement is FAR MORE TRUE TODAY than when he said it. This is not to demean all scientists because there are hundreds and even tens of thousands of scientists world wide who know what they know. Almost all good metaphysicians can change their opinions in the face of evidence and logic and every good metaphysician will change in the face of well crafted experiment. I have a lot of respect for biologists but as a rule this is not a field where you'll find much good metaphysics because its methodology tends to exclude individuals do want to know what they know. includes people who accept that most relevant experiment can not be performed at all.

You're still just ignoring the fact I've said repeatedly that people see what they believe and become their beliefs for this reason. If this applies to biologists then it is populated by those who have evolved over the last generation or four. They can no more question their premises than Schrodinger's cat can lick its abstraction. They have assumed that reductionism can be applied to understanding how species change and I'm saying IT'S IMPOSSIBLE TO UNDERSTAND HOW SPECIES CHANGE WITHOUT UNDERSTANDING EVERY INDIDIDUAL AND ITS CONSCIOUSDNESS THAT CAME BEFORE AND AFTER THE CHANGE.

Why can't anyone address this!!!? All you do is continually gainsay it. The logic and evidence I present to support this specific contention is ignored.

I'm very very sorry "evolution" is so damnably complex but this is the hand we were dealt. You can't parse Ancient Language. You can't reduce individuals to "species". You can't dissect consciousness and this applies infinitely times over when you have no definition. You can't predict chaos. You can't induce the causes of species change by gazing at skulls. The methodology and assumptions that underlie our understanding are erroneous.

Our science is all reductionistic and this works fine for some things but it is misleading in others and there is no biologist competent to judge my theory who is aware of it because very very few are competent to judge anything that is outside of their beliefs. They rarely even see anything that isn't taylor made for Peers Whom most believe then vote on its accuracy.

Change in species is caused by random events that lead to bottlenecks while wiping out typical behavior of the individuals of a species. There is no such thing as "survival of the fittest" because ALL INDIVIDUAL ARE FIT. Biology is already evolving to coincide with this understanding. It will occur generationally because science advances one funeral at a time. Change in species does NOT

 

[F1fan]

There is an article here: Sensory Adaptations of Fishes to Subterranean Environments that explains how cave fishes, while losing their (to them, useless) eyesight, evolved other sensory organs that are useful in perpetual darkness.

If you were to put a normal fish and a cave fish together in a cave, it would be the cave fish that survived to reproduce, while the normal fish would just starve. That means it is the cave fish that is "fittest" for the cave environment. That is what "fittest" means, in evolution.

I see a lot of anti-evolution folks interpret "fitness" like the local guy at the gym. That isn't the case. They need to be aware that fitness is how well an organism can survive in an environment, like the peppered moth that just happened to be better suited to a dirty, sooty, city environment than white moths, who were then targeted more by predators and eaten, leaving fewer white moths. the peppered moths weren't stronger or better, they just happened to have natural darker coloration that gave them an advantage in a dirty environment.

The clad guy wants to dismiss this phenomenon of "fitness" when it is often observed happening. Antibiotics and anti-bacterials are examples of "fitness" in action as bacteria slowly build resistance. I'll bet that poster has had antibiotics at some point, yet denies the very principle that makes them work.