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Verifiable evidence for creationism?

Is there any verifiable evidence for creationism?

  • Yes

    Votes: 20 19.0%
  • No

    Votes: 85 81.0%

  • Total voters
    105

RRex

Active Member
Premium Member
Verifiable evidence for creationism?

Personally, I think the human body is onboard evidence, so to speak.

We are an extremely complex electrochemical, biological machine.

I don't think we happened by accident or coincidence.
 

james bond

Well-Known Member
Oh my good grief. :facepalm:

You went all that trouble of writing this long reply, only to ask me which one I was talking about?

Re-read my post, because it is very obvious who I am talking about, JB, so I am not going to dignify it with an answer...figure out yourself the context of my previous reply.

Ha ha. No need to re-read. It was courtesy question. It just gave me a chance to answer questions you can't answer about the limitations of science and give further evidence as to the goodness and greatness of God.

Proverbs 18:2
A fool takes no pleasure in understanding, but only in expressing his opinion.

Proverbs 29:11
A fool gives full vent to his spirit, but a wise man quietly holds it back.

Proverbs 1:7
The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge; fools despise wisdom and instruction.
 

Zosimus

Active Member
Human senses can be, and have been, unreliable. Hence reviews, experiments and dialogue from other than a single person matters. Again your video changes knowledge to his own definition making it stacking the deck since only his definition



Stacking the deck



Irrelevant as it is never just one person's opinion regarding the topics we are discussing. Again, if using the video's definition of knowledge there is no point in rebutting the rest of the argument as the first premise is flawed. I do not agree with the defination nor it is a standard one used from philosophy.




Not really as anyone that has studied the philosophy of science would of realized a long time ago science produces models which are approximation of what we believe happens in the real world. Never read Popper have you?



None as many many be fooled by outdated thinking from someone that confuses a model as if it were a 100% fact of the real world or for that matter care. You want science to be absolute so your arguments appear to work. However since it isn't you are left with nothing.
You realize that you're sunk, so you want to argue semantics. All right. Let's talk Popper from his own paper:

http://dieoff.org/page126.htm

Here we have the empiricist's case, as it is still put by some of my positivist friends.

I shall try to show that this case is as little valid as Bacon's; that the answer to the question of the sources of knowledge goes against the empiricist; and, finally, that this whole question of ultimate sources - sources to which one may appeal, as one might to a higher court or a higher authority - must be rejected as based upon a mistake.

First I want to show that if you actually went on questioning The Times and its correspondents about the sources of their knowledge, you would in fact never arrive at all those observations by eyewitnesses in the existence of which the empiricist believes. You would find, rather, that with every single step you take, the need for further steps increases in snowball-like fashion.

Take as an example the sort of assertion for which reasonable people might simply accept as sufficient the answer 'I read it in The Times'; let us say the assertion 'The Prime Minister has decided to return to London several days ahead of schedule'. Now assume for a moment that somebody doubts this assertion, or feels the need to investigate its truth. What shall he do? If he has a friend in the Prime Minister's office, the simplest and most direct way would be to ring him up; and if this friend corroborates the message, then that is that.

In other words, the investigator will, if possible, try to check, or to examine, the asserted fact itself, rather than trace the source of the information. But according to the empiricist theory, the assertion 'I have read it in The Times' is merely a first step in a justification procedure consisting in tracing the ultimate source. What is the next step?

There are at least two next steps. One would be to reflect that 'I have read it in The Times' is also an assertion, and that we might ask 'What is the source of your knowledge that you read it in The Times and not, say, in a paper looking very similar to The Times?' The other is to ask The Times for the sources of its knowledge. The answer to the first question may be 'But we have only The Times on order and we always get it in the morning', which gives rise to a host of further questions about sources which we shall not pursue. The second question may elicit from the editor of The Times the answer: 'We had a telephone call from the Prime Minister's office.' Now according to the empiricist procedure, we should at this stage ask next: 'Who is the gentleman who received the telephone call?' and then get his observation report; but we should also have to ask that gentleman: 'What is the source of your knowledge that the voice you heard came from an official in the Prime Minister's office?', and so on.

There is a simple reason why this tedious sequence of questions never comes to a satisfactory conclusion. It is this. Every witness must always make ample use, in his report, of his knowledge of persons, places, things, linguistic usages, social conventions, and so on. He cannot rely merely upon his eyes or ears, especially if his report is to be of use in justifying any assertion worth justifying. But this fact must of course always raise new questions as to the sources of those elements of his knowledge which are not immediately observational.

This is why the programme of tracing back all knowledge to its ultimate source in observation is logically impossible to carry through: it leads to an infinite regress. (The doctrine that truth is manifest cuts off the regress. This is interesting because it may help to explain the attractiveness of that doctrine.)
------------------------------------------

Thus you see, at a certain point, you give up the infinite regress and take something on faith.
 

Zosimus

Active Member

Personally, I think the human body is onboard evidence, so to speak.

We are an extremely complex electrochemical, biological machine.

I don't think we happened by accident or coincidence.
Certainly, I agree with you that the human body is evidence of creation.

The problem is that it is evidence of a multitude of other theories as well.

Thus, we can say that the theory of creation is underdetermined.
 

james bond

Well-Known Member
- The proportions of the Australopithecus pelvis and those of the two chimpanzee species can be measured. Australopithecus is wider than it is tall and the chimps are taller than they are wide. If you don't believe me, feel free to digitally make the measurements for yourself: Australopithecus africanus pelvis, bonobo pelvis, common chimpanzee pelvis.
- The evidence for arched feet comes from the "First Family", which was a collection of fossil bones from 17 different individuals of Australopithecus afarensis. At least one of those bones was a curved metatarsal.
- In this image, you can see that the jaw of Australopithecus is less protruding than that of a chimp.
- The Australopithecus africanus fossil STS-52 has all of the teeth on one side of the face, clearly showing small canines. KP 29283 shows this as well.
- The knowledge of knee-locking mechanisms comes initially from the 1973 Hadar knee, but we've found other knees since then (including for Australopithecus sediba fossil MH1 and a knee from the "First Family" fossil collection of A. afarensis).
- The Taung Child shows the human-like foramen magnum.
- I'll get to the toe when I have more time, it's quite late here for me.

You might as well ask how the differences came about between chimps and gorillas: even similar species can have different adaptations to their environment.

Evolutionarily speaking, there is no hard-edge line where you can separate the two. "Ape" and "human" are just convenient terms.

Similarities in mutations in the GULO pseudogenes (which normally manufacture vitamin C) between humans and the great apes evidence common descent, since the likelihood of all of the ape species (along with humans) independently "breaking" their GULO genes and developing similar mutations are small. Also, ERV similarities (the remnants of past retrovirus infections) between humans and chimpanzees are far too large for uncommon descent to be plausible. Humans and chimps have the majority of their over 98,000 ERVs in the same loci (same places in the genome), whereas retroviruses insert their RNA into the genome of infected cells far too randomly to account for independent infection in both chimp and human lineages. Even two separately-infected cells from the same individual have very different loci for ERV insertions, which demonstrates that this can only be accounted for by inheritance of ERV patterns from a common ancestor.

I've watched that video more than once, actually. Ardipithecus did give us more information than Australopithecus in some ways since the hands and feet are more complete. Not sure what you thinking I'm "glossing over".

Ardipithecus is not Australopithecus so I don't know what the lack or presence of teeth in one has to do with the other. We do indeed have Australopithecus jaws where the canine teeth are indeed present, so it's not just a matter of "reconstructing fossils to fit the ToE". The fossil KP 29281 is of a lower jaw of Australopithecus anamensis and has all of its teeth. This one also has at least one canine tooth preserved.

Interesting that you say that, as there are many members of genus "Homo" that would fail to meet the 1,000 cc criteria you have given. Homo habilis had capacities ranging from 510 to 687 cc, much smaller than those of modern humans and only slightly larger than the largest known chimp brains (500 cc). Many members of Homo erectus would be excluded, because the average brain size for early members was 900 cc (some could go down to 750 cc). Homo ergaster had a similar range to Homo erectus. This includes the subspecies Homo erectus georgicus, which was much smaller at 546 to 600 cc. Homo naledi went from 465 to 560 cc.

What does being religious have to do with it? If creation science is a science, then there is no need to get religion involved at all.

Yes. I never argued otherwise.

What I lost my faith in was a literal interpretation of the creation story in Genesis, not the Bible itself. If I have "faith" in evolution then I also have "faith" in gravity, nuclear fusion, and criminal forensics.

Careful now, you're treading close to a generalization/equivocation/straw-man fallacy. Accepting evolution does not automatically entail accepting the others. I accept neither the existence or non-existence of aliens, abiogenesis, or multiverses. Could they exist? Yes. Do we know for sure? No. Science bringing the dead back to life might be possible some day but we definitely can't do it now (at least not for anything that is unambiguously dead). For dark matter and dark energy, something is definitely causing strange effects for which we can attribute those names, but we just don't know the cause yet.

Which is not evidence that any given scientific theory will become falsified in the future.

That's possible true for many, but not all. Our fellow board member and Christian Serenity7855 accepts evolution but seems to have fairly conservative views (if I recall correctly).

Yes, we are all well aware by now that you believe that.

Which part? The creation account? If it's true, then it's metaphor. The only similarity between a literal reading of Genesis and the Big Bang theory is that both propose that the universe had a beginning. In the Big Bang context, stars (including the Sun) came a long time (billions of years) before the Earth did. In a literal reading of Genesis, the Sun and stars were created after the Earth.

I suppose what I am looking for are the nice diagrams and explanations of the beaks of Finches as in shown by natural selection. I just do not see that with apes-to-human. There is no need for an apeman or man-ape. And chimpanzees and other apes still exist today. Even Lovejoy had an alternative theory in since 1997 in 2009. At least that theory explains why we exist today with apes. Do we become the planet of the apes, Mr. Lovejoy? Evolutionists wil evo, creationists will crea.

To go against evolution. A creation scientist's beliefs may cause some discord within. It's basically unfair to be shut out of science since science today will not accept the supernatural, but the war wages on and eventually we should be able to teach creation in all schools without the religion.

Microevolution or natural selection happens.

The point you make about existence or non-existence is what creationists are saying. Could God exist? Yes. Do we know for sure? No. Until then it's philosophy or worldview. That said, God says in the Bible that we will not know the beginning or the end. Thus, we will never know the age of the universe or earth or how it will all end or what happens to someone in the great beyond. I even checked this out as near-death experiences which can be a topic for another day.

What made you think Genesis was a metaphor? Any evidence? Here's my explanation (except without the Big Bang) in a nutshell:


I agree about all the differing views of Christians. Just stereotyping.
 

Zosimus

Active Member
Could you expand on this? I'm not reading you on this point.
Okay, the basic concept of underdetermination can be explained thus:

Imagine that you are buying apples and oranges. Apples cost 3 and oranges cost 4. You spent 7. How many of each did you buy? The answer is simple: one apple and one orange.

But what if the amount you spent were 70? Yes, it's possible that you bought 10 apples and 10 oranges. But it's also possible that you bought 14 apples and 7 oranges or 6 apples and 13 oranges. Accordingly, we say that the problem is underdetermined. There are multiple possibilities.

Now, the human body is a marvel. Mine works very well, and when it gets broke it fixes itself. Is that evidence for a Creator? Sure. But couldn't it also be evidence for natural selection? Couldn't it also be evidence for ancient genetic-engineering aliens? Couldn't it also be evidence for the idea that it's all in your head and you're just dreaming? Yes, yes, and yes.

You see, your original argument said, "I don't think we happened by accident or [by] coincidence." Yes, few people think that the human body is accidental. However, this is not an exhaustive list of the explanations for the complexity of the human body.
 

RRex

Active Member
Premium Member
Okay, the basic concept of underdetermination can be explained thus:

Imagine that you are buying apples and oranges. Apples cost 3 and oranges cost 4. You spent 7. How many of each did you buy? The answer is simple: one apple and one orange.

But what if the amount you spent were 70? Yes, it's possible that you bought 10 apples and 10 oranges. But it's also possible that you bought 14 apples and 7 oranges or 6 apples and 13 oranges. Accordingly, we say that the problem is underdetermined. There are multiple possibilities.

Now, the human body is a marvel. Mine works very well, and when it gets broke it fixes itself. Is that evidence for a Creator? Sure. But couldn't it also be evidence for natural selection? Couldn't it also be evidence for ancient genetic-engineering aliens? Couldn't it also be evidence for the idea that it's all in your head and you're just dreaming? Yes, yes, and yes.

You see, your original argument said, "I don't think we happened by accident or [by] coincidence." Yes, few people think that the human body is accidental. However, this is not an exhaustive list of the explanations for the complexity of the human body.

Yes, okay. :)
 

SkepticThinker

Veteran Member
I suppose what I am looking for are the nice diagrams and explanations of the beaks of Finches as in shown by natural selection. I just do not see that with apes-to-human. There is no need for an apeman or man-ape. And chimpanzees and other apes still exist today. Even Lovejoy had an alternative theory in since 1997 in 2009. At least that theory explains why we exist today with apes. Do we become the planet of the apes, Mr. Lovejoy? Evolutionists wil evo, creationists will crea.

To go against evolution. A creation scientist's beliefs may cause some discord within. It's basically unfair to be shut out of science since science today will not accept the supernatural, but the war wages on and eventually we should be able to teach creation in all schools without the religion.

Microevolution or natural selection happens.

The point you make about existence or non-existence is what creationists are saying. Could God exist? Yes. Do we know for sure? No. Until then it's philosophy or worldview. That said, God says in the Bible that we will not know the beginning or the end. Thus, we will never know the age of the universe or earth or how it will all end or what happens to someone in the great beyond. I even checked this out as near-death experiences which can be a topic for another day.

What made you think Genesis was a metaphor? Any evidence? Here's my explanation (except without the Big Bang) in a nutshell:


I agree about all the differing views of Christians. Just stereotyping.
How? Which creation story?

We do know the age of the universe and the earth. So I guess the Bible is wrong.
 

Shad

Veteran Member
You realize that you're sunk, so you want to argue semantics. All right. Let's talk Popper from his own paper:

http://dieoff.org/page126.htm

No I am correcting your misuse of terminology which causes you to make errors in your conclusion. You also project positivism on to me as it is the only way your argument works. If I reject it, and I do, you have no argument.

Here we have the empiricist's case, as it is still put by some of my positivist friends.

I shall try to show that this case is as little valid as Bacon's; that the answer to the question of the sources of knowledge goes against the empiricist; and, finally, that this whole question of ultimate sources - sources to which one may appeal, as one might to a higher court or a higher authority - must be rejected as based upon a mistake.

First I want to show that if you actually went on questioning The Times and its correspondents about the sources of their knowledge, you would in fact never arrive at all those observations by eyewitnesses in the existence of which the empiricist believes. You would find, rather, that with every single step you take, the need for further steps increases in snowball-like fashion.

Take as an example the sort of assertion for which reasonable people might simply accept as sufficient the answer 'I read it in The Times'; let us say the assertion 'The Prime Minister has decided to return to London several days ahead of schedule'. Now assume for a moment that somebody doubts this assertion, or feels the need to investigate its truth. What shall he do? If he has a friend in the Prime Minister's office, the simplest and most direct way would be to ring him up; and if this friend corroborates the message, then that is that.

In other words, the investigator will, if possible, try to check, or to examine, the asserted fact itself, rather than trace the source of the information. But according to the empiricist theory, the assertion 'I have read it in The Times' is merely a first step in a justification procedure consisting in tracing the ultimate source. What is the next step?

There are at least two next steps. One would be to reflect that 'I have read it in The Times' is also an assertion, and that we might ask 'What is the source of your knowledge that you read it in The Times and not, say, in a paper looking very similar to The Times?' The other is to ask The Times for the sources of its knowledge. The answer to the first question may be 'But we have only The Times on order and we always get it in the morning', which gives rise to a host of further questions about sources which we shall not pursue. The second question may elicit from the editor of The Times the answer: 'We had a telephone call from the Prime Minister's office.' Now according to the empiricist procedure, we should at this stage ask next: 'Who is the gentleman who received the telephone call?' and then get his observation report; but we should also have to ask that gentleman: 'What is the source of your knowledge that the voice you heard came from an official in the Prime Minister's office?', and so on.

There is a simple reason why this tedious sequence of questions never comes to a satisfactory conclusion. It is this. Every witness must always make ample use, in his report, of his knowledge of persons, places, things, linguistic usages, social conventions, and so on. He cannot rely merely upon his eyes or ears, especially if his report is to be of use in justifying any assertion worth justifying. But this fact must of course always raise new questions as to the sources of those elements of his knowledge which are not immediately observational.

This is why the programme of tracing back all knowledge to its ultimate source in observation is logically impossible to carry through: it leads to an infinite regress. (The doctrine that truth is manifest cuts off the regress. This is interesting because it may help to explain the attractiveness of that doctrine.)
------------------------------------------

Thus you see, at a certain point, you give up the infinite regress and take something on faith.

Again if one rejects proof as a criteria, not to be confused with evidence, your argument is dead. Did you even read Popper's solution? Obviously not... Did you read Popper's acceptance of evolution and how he was in error? No you stopped at one point and read nothing further. Read your source and you find your answers. You made the same mistake all creationist make in assuming Popper was correct. You misapply ultimate source of knowledge as if science is that source when I never claimed as such. You rely on projection of views I do not hold, nothing more.

"
What we should do, I suggest, is to give up the idea of ultimate sources of knowledge, and admit that all human knowledge is human: that it is mixed with our errors, our prejudices, our dreams, and our hopes: that all we can do is to grope for truth even though it be beyond our reach. We may admit that our groping is often inspired, but we must be on our guard against the belief, however deeply felt, that our inspiration carries any authority, divine or otherwise. If we thus admit that there is no authority beyond the reach of criticism to be found within the whole province of our knowledge, however far it may have penetrated into the unknown, then we can retain, without danger, the idea that truth is beyond human authority. And we must retain it. For without this idea there can be no objective standards of inquiry; no criticism of our conjectures; no groping for the unknown; no quest for knowledge."

You seem to think I reject this view. I don't. Again you reliance on projection creates issues for your argument. Popper cuts down your God speak as a solution but you never read that far.
 
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Parsimony

Well-Known Member
I suppose what I am looking for are the nice diagrams and explanations of the beaks of Finches as in shown by natural selection. I just do not see that with apes-to-human. There is no need for an apeman or man-ape. And chimpanzees and other apes still exist today. Even Lovejoy had an alternative theory in since 1997 in 2009.
Type in "human evolution timeline" into Google image search and you'll find a lot of diagrams. This is one. However, these kinds of things tend to undergo revisions a lot as new fossils are discovered.

Regardless of that, I’ve provided you with the differences between chimps and australopithecus. Even the pelvis alone is practically impossible to deny as looking different from that of a chimp if you are even remotely intellectually honest with yourself. You can see them all right there. Surely you can tell (and measure) the proportion differences. Another difference I didn’t mention before was that Australopithecus africanus had styloid processes on its third metacarpals, something that chimpanzees lack:
A. africanus lived in South Africa 3.2–1.8 Mya (Klein, 1999). Ricklan (1987) concluded from examination of 16 hand bones that A. africanus had a firm power grip and a strong capacity for ulnar deviation of the wrist, as occurs in clubbing. Well-developed muscles were present that could stabilize the wrist to prevent rebound of a club at impact. Wrist extension comparable to modern humans (Richmond & Strait, 2000) would have aided throwing efficiency. A styloid process on the third metacarpal, appearing for the first time, would have protected against hyperextension from throwing, and the capacity to rotate the second and fifth metacarpals during flexion (Ricklan, 1987) would have improved the throwing grip. A distal thumb phalanx with a broad apical tuft for support of a fingertip pad and a site for insertion of the flexor pollicis longus muscle (Marzke, 1997) would have aided both clubbing and throwing grips.
So do you still deny that there are differences?
At least that theory explains why we exist today with apes.
So does the Australopithecus theory: nowhere does it imply that all apes should have evolved into humans. Some evolved into humans while others evolved into other, non-human species of ape like gorillas, chimpanzees and orangutans. It’s just like the first cat species evolving into many different species of cats such as lions, caracals, lynxes, etc.
Do we become the planet of the apes, Mr. Lovejoy? Evolutionists wil evo, creationists will crea.
I think that’s rather mischaracterizing Lovejoy’s statements. He never implied anything of the sort.
To go against evolution. A creation scientist's beliefs may cause some discord within. It's basically unfair to be shut out of science since science today will not accept the supernatural, but the war wages on and eventually we should be able to teach creation in all schools without the religion.
Thing is, the supernatural cannot be included in science because it makes no testable predictions. Science is all about testing hypotheses, but how can a supernatural hypothesis be tested? If you can find a way to test a supernatural claim, then you can include it in science. Simple as that.
Microevolution or natural selection happens.
I don’t deny that.
The point you make about existence or non-existence is what creationists are saying. Could God exist? Yes. Do we know for sure? No.
Heck, everyone who’s being logical, even atheists, would say that God could/ exist. If something can’t be disproven, then there is no way to know that it does not exist.
Until then it's philosophy or worldview.
I don’t think I would go quite that far. If someone says “A purple rock could exist under my house, but I don’t know for sure”, I don’t know anyone who would classify that as a philosophy or worldview. They’re just being honest about what could be and what they do not know.
That said, God says in the Bible that we will not know the beginning or the end. Thus, we will never know the age of the universe or earth or how it will all end or what happens to someone in the great beyond. I even checked this out as near-death experiences which can be a topic for another day.
Wait a minute, if we cannot know the age of the universe or Earth then why do so many creationists try to peg it at 6,000 years, give or take a little? I’d also like to see you quote those particular verses.
What made you think Genesis was a metaphor? Any evidence?
A lack of consistency of a literal interpretation with existing knowledge.
Here's my explanation (except without the Big Bang) in a nutshell:


I agree about all the differing views of Christians. Just stereotyping.
You're free to believe that if you want to, even though the video gets some things wrong about what the Big Bang theory claims (such as equivocating it with the theory of evolution and saying that light came into existence after the Earth did). What about the part where it says the universe wasn't created in six literal days? I thought you believed that it was?
 

Sapiens

Polymathematician

Personally, I think the human body is onboard evidence, so to speak.

We are an extremely complex electrochemical, biological machine.

I don't think we happened by accident or coincidence.
A much cleaner and more logical case can be made (and has been made) for evolution than for any form of creation.

By the way, no one ever suggested that species evolved by accident or by coincidence, were-ever to you get such a bizarre notion?
 

Zosimus

Active Member
No I am correcting your misuse of terminology which causes you to make errors in your conclusion. You also project positivism on to me as it is the only way your argument works. If I reject it, and I do, you have no argument.
No, the argument still works just fine against you.

Again if one rejects proof as a criteria, not to be confused with evidence, your argument is dead. Did you even read Popper's solution?
Of course I did, but his solution is flawed.

Obviously not... Did you read Popper's acceptance of evolution and how he was in error?
Laughable. The original text is right here in which he says: "If formulated in this sweeping way, [Darwin's theory] is not only refutable, but actually refuted. For not all organs serve a useful purpose; as Darwin himself points out, there are organs like the tail of the peacock, and behavioral programs like the peacock's display of his tail, which cannot be explained by their utility, and therefore not by natural selection."
-------------------------
So no, Popper didn't accept natural selection (not to be confused with evolution) and your claim is factually wrong.

No you stopped at one point and read nothing further. Read your source and you find your answers. You made the same mistake all creationist make in assuming Popper was correct. You misapply ultimate source of knowledge as if science is that source when I never claimed as such. You rely on projection of views I do not hold, nothing more.
I'm not a creationist. I'm agnostic.

"What we should do, I suggest, is to give up the idea of ultimate sources of knowledge, and admit that all human knowledge is human: that it is mixed with our errors, our prejudices, our dreams, and our hopes: that all we can do is to grope for truth even though it be beyond our reach. We may admit that our groping is often inspired, but we must be on our guard against the belief, however deeply felt, that our inspiration carries any authority, divine or otherwise. If we thus admit that there is no authority beyond the reach of criticism to be found within the whole province of our knowledge, however far it may have penetrated into the unknown, then we can retain, without danger, the idea that truth is beyond human authority. And we must retain it. For without this idea there can be no objective standards of inquiry; no criticism of our conjectures; no groping for the unknown; no quest for knowledge."
Relevance?

You seem to think I reject this view. I don't. Again you reliance on projection creates issues for your argument. Popper cuts down your God speak as a solution but you never read that far.
I have no God speak. I'm agnostic. Who's the one projecting?
 

Zosimus

Active Member
A much cleaner and more logical case can be made (and has been made) for evolution than for any form of creation.
"Cleaner" is a matter of opinion. However, no more logical case can be made for either choice. Both theories are underdetermined.
 

Shad

Veteran Member
No, the argument still works just fine against you.

No since you errors rendering you conclusion unsupported.


Of course I did, but his solution is flawed.

No as such a flaw only applies to scientific realism.


Laughable. The original text is right here in which he says: "If formulated in this sweeping way, [Darwin's theory] is not only refutable, but actually refuted. For not all organs serve a useful purpose; as Darwin himself points out, there are organs like the tail of the peacock, and behavioral programs like the peacock's display of his tail, which cannot be explained by their utility, and therefore not by natural selection."

A great example of your poor research skills even after I linked you a source with a citation. I will do so again

https://ncse.com/cej/6/2/what-did-karl-popper-really-say-evolution

So no, Popper didn't accept natural selection (not to be confused with evolution) and your claim is factually wrong.

Except he did as pointed out above. Great research skills you have, you ignore sources that refute your claim. Im impressed.


I'm not a creationist. I'm agnostic.

I said you make the same mistakes creationist make not that you were a creationist.


Relevance?

I was just posting the information you left out since it undermines the point you were trying to make.


I have no God speak. I'm agnostic. Who's the one projecting?

You did propose God as an answer thus are not nearly as agnostic as you claim. Combined with making the same mistakes as creationist make, along with mirroring their arguments, leads me to believe your agnostic label is a facade.
 

Zosimus

Active Member
No since you errors rendering you conclusion unsupported.
No, to the best of my knowledge I have never errors.

No as such a flaw only applies to scientific realism.
No, it applies to anyone who thinks that evidence can confirm a hypothesis regardless whether the person is a scientific realist.

A great example of your poor research skills even after I linked you a source with a citation. I will do so again

https://ncse.com/cej/6/2/what-did-karl-popper-really-say-evolution
So I should accept a third-party over the original source? You're hilarious!

Additionally, most of the arguments contained in the article don't apply to me in the slightest. For example the link argues:

"First, natural selection being untestable is not the same as evolution being untestable."

What was my claim? I said: Natural selection is a tautology.... Not evolution, mind you, I clearly said natural selection. So what's the problem?

Your link carefully avoids mentioning the crux of Popper's argument. Let me repeat it for you:

"In its most daring and sweeping form, the theory of natural selection would assert that all organisms, and especially all those highly complex organs whose existence might be interpreted as evidence of design and, in addition, all forms of animal behavior, have evolved as the result of natural selection; that is, as the result of chance-like inheritable variations, of which the useless ones are weeded out, so that only the useful ones remain. If formulated in this sweeping way, the theory is not only refutable, but actually refuted. For not all organs serve a useful purpose; as Darwin himself points out, there are organs like the tail of the peacock, and behavioral programs like the peacock's display of his tail, which cannot be explained by their utility, and therefore not by natural selection. Darwin explained them by the preference of the other sex, that is, by sexual selection. Of course one can get round this refutation by some verbal maneuver: one can get round any refutation of any theory. But then one gets near to rendering the theory tautological."

Except he did as pointed out above. Great research skills you have, you ignore sources that refute your claim. Im impressed.
You can only claim that by quoting him out of context.

You did propose God as an answer thus are not nearly as agnostic as you claim. Combined with making the same mistakes as creationist make, along with mirroring their arguments, leads me to believe your agnostic label is a facade.
No, you have a bad definition of agnostic. God is one possible explanation. I do not share your philosophical biases about natural explanations. God is not the only possible explanation, nor is he a proven explanation, but the explanation is as plausible as any other. Thus, I remain agnostic.
 

james bond

Well-Known Member
Please be so kind as to explain why you think you are exempt from the above quoted verses?

You've been following along, so you should KNOW why. I've read, investigated and experienced both. The process continues until I can't do it any more.
 

james bond

Well-Known Member
How? Which creation story?

We do know the age of the universe and the earth. So I guess the Bible is wrong.

We will not know but we can continue to find out. If there is no way to tell, we can make a good guess-timate.

This relates to public schools. Both the teaching of creation or evolution involves "religion." Both are similar to religion (philosophy), but opposite in view. Some prefer teaching both theories and comparing the two. Others want to go the ID route, but you still have to account for both views. The main problem is creation is shut out of science altogether as the supernatural is discarded.
 

james bond

Well-Known Member
Type in "human evolution timeline" into Google image search and you'll find a lot of diagrams. This is one. However, these kinds of things tend to undergo revisions a lot as new fossils are discovered.

Regardless of that, I’ve provided you with the differences between chimps and australopithecus. Even the pelvis alone is practically impossible to deny as looking different from that of a chimp if you are even remotely intellectually honest with yourself. You can see them all right there. Surely you can tell (and measure) the proportion differences. Another difference I didn’t mention before was that Australopithecus africanus had styloid processes on its third metacarpals, something that chimpanzees lack:

So do you still deny that there are differences?

So does the Australopithecus theory: nowhere does it imply that all apes should have evolved into humans. Some evolved into humans while others evolved into other, non-human species of ape like gorillas, chimpanzees and orangutans. It’s just like the first cat species evolving into many different species of cats such as lions, caracals, lynxes, etc.

I think that’s rather mischaracterizing Lovejoy’s statements. He never implied anything of the sort.

Thing is, the supernatural cannot be included in science because it makes no testable predictions. Science is all about testing hypotheses, but how can a supernatural hypothesis be tested? If you can find a way to test a supernatural claim, then you can include it in science. Simple as that.

I don’t deny that.

Heck, everyone who’s being logical, even atheists, would say that God could/ exist. If something can’t be disproven, then there is no way to know that it does not exist.

I don’t think I would go quite that far. If someone says “A purple rock could exist under my house, but I don’t know for sure”, I don’t know anyone who would classify that as a philosophy or worldview. They’re just being honest about what could be and what they do not know.

Wait a minute, if we cannot know the age of the universe or Earth then why do so many creationists try to peg it at 6,000 years, give or take a little? I’d also like to see you quote those particular verses.

A lack of consistency of a literal interpretation with existing knowledge.

You're free to believe that if you want to, even though the video gets some things wrong about what the Big Bang theory claims (such as equivocating it with the theory of evolution and saying that light came into existence after the Earth did). What about the part where it says the universe wasn't created in six literal days? I thought you believed that it was?

Approximately, how many fossils in each of those as shown in the infograph?

I'm sure there are differences, but it is natural selection at wprl. Why can't apes remain apes and humans remain humans? What demonstrates that a macro change occurred?

He states that chimps could have evolved from humans in the vid and its on the Kent State website. Regardless, its another theory. I only point it out as an alternative theory.

The testable part was even questioned by Karl Popper (I think he changed his view) and GK Chesterton never meant that. Even today, the view is changing as it eliminates proposing dark matter and dark energy, multiverses and what not. I got my Guy Berthault experiment vid and Mt. St. Helens as evidence, but non-believers will not believe or refuse to accept the evidence or discussion. Science is very biased.

I'll get to the other points when I get a chance. Also, I want to post what more science-minded Christians are saying about old earth vs young earth creation.
 
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