What is creationism?

[SkepticThinker]

You said the first one... but OK- the next longer piece is:

Well, we are now about 120 years after Darwin and the knowledge of the fossil record has been greatly expanded. We now have a quarter of a million fossil species but the situation hasn't changed much. The record of evolution is still surprisingly jerky and, ironically, we have even fewer examples of evolutionary transitions than we had in Darwin's time. By this I mean that some of the classic cases of darwinian change in the fossil record, such as the evolution of the horse in North America, have had to be discarded or modified as a result of more detailed information -- what appeared to be a nice simple progression when relatively few data were available now appear to be much more complex and much less gradualistic. So Darwin's problem has not been alleviated in the last 120 years and we still have a record which does show change but one that can hardly be looked upon as the most reasonable consequence of natural selection.


Doesn't this underscore the point even further? I honestly can't see where he refutes it, can you pinpoint what you are referring to here?

Finish reading the whole page. Then maybe look up the work it is quoted from.


Just FYI: This is basically what I do before I post quotes from anyone (which I rarely do anyway) in order to verify that I'm properly representing someone's position. Someone else shouldn't have to do this for you.

 

[Guy Threepwood]

Doesn't this underscore the point even further? I honestly can't see where he refutes it, can you pinpoint what you are referring to here?

Finish reading the whole page. Then maybe look up the work it is quoted from.


Just FYI: This is basically what I do before I post quotes from anyone (which I rarely do anyway) in order to verify that I'm properly representing someone's position. Someone else shouldn't have to do this for you.

I thought not..

let me know if ever you find anywhere that he retracts, contradicts, refutes the statement in any form

 

[ImmortalFlame]

I thought not..

let me know if ever you find anywhere that he retracts, contradicts, refutes the statement in any form

See, this is part of the problem. They take a quote out of context, then when presented with the context continue to assert that the quote means what they implied it does and therefore they need to "retract" the statement.

The statement doesn't have to be contradicted, retracted or refuted if it isn't implying what you think it is. In this case, all that Raup is claiming is that the fossil evidence (at least the fossil evidence that they had at their disposal in 1979) is more consistent with an evolutionary model that suggest punctuated equilibrium than one that suggests universally gradual change. He is not presenting it as evidence "against evolution", nor does he present this as a flaw in evolutionary theory in general.

Not that it matters. Guy Threepwood has a history of never retracting dishonest quote mines.

Also, could someone please present Guy Threepwood with these (he has me on ignore):

"Now let me step back from the problem and very generally discuss natural selection and what we know about it. I think it is safe to say that we know for sure that natural selection, as a process, does work. There is a mountain of experimental and observational evidence, much of it predating genetics, which shows that natural selection as a biological process works." (p. 25)

"So natural selection as a process is okay. We are also pretty sure that it goes on in nature although good examples are surprisingly rare." (p. 25)

"Part of our conventional wisdom about evolution is that the fossil record of past life is an important cornerstone of evolutionary theory. In some ways, this is true -- but the situation is much more complicated. I will explore here a few of the complex interrelationships between fossils and darwinian theory. . . Darwin's theory of natural selection has always been closely linked to evidence form fossils, and probably most people assume that fossils provide a very important part of the general argument that is made in favor of darwinian interpretations of the history of life. Unfortunately, this is not strictly true. We must distinguish between the fact of evolution -- defined as change in organisms over time -- and the explanation of this change. Darwin's contribution, through his theory of natural selection, was to suggest how the evolutionary change took place. The evidence we find in the geologic record is not nearly as compatible with darwinian natural selection as we would like it to be." (p. 22)
- David M. Raup, "Conflicts Between Darwin and Palaeontology,"
https://archive.org/stream/fieldmuseumofnat50chic#page/n21/mode/2up

 

[SkepticThinker]

I thought not..


let me know if ever you find anywhere that he retracts, contradicts, refutes the statement in any form

You didn't read the whole page then. I'm not getting back on this quote mine merry-go-round with you. Several other people already pointed out how the quote is a misrepresentation, so there's no point in my going over it again. This should not be this difficult.


Rusra posted the quote to back up the claim that there is some limit or barrier that stops macroevolution from occurring. The quote is not speaking to that claim, nor does it back it up. (Not to mention the quote was from 1979).

 

[SkepticThinker]

See, this is part of the problem. They take a quote out of context, then when presented with the context continue to assert that the quote means what they implied it does and therefore they need to "retract" the statement.

The statement doesn't have to be contradicted, retracted or refuted if it isn't implying what you think it is. In this case, all that Raup is claiming is that the fossil evidence (at least the fossil evidence that they had at their disposal in 1979) is more consistent with an evolutionary model that suggest punctuated equilibrium than one that suggests universally gradual change. He is not presenting it as evidence "against evolution", nor does he present this as a flaw in evolutionary theory in general.

Not that it matters. Guy Threepwood has a history of never retracting dishonest quote mines.

Also, could someone please present Guy Threepwood with these (he has me on ignore):

"Now let me step back from the problem and very generally discuss natural selection and what we know about it. I think it is safe to say that we know for sure that natural selection, as a process, does work. There is a mountain of experimental and observational evidence, much of it predating genetics, which shows that natural selection as a biological process works."

"We must distinguish between the fact of evolution -- defined as change in organisms over time -- and the explanation of this change. Darwin's contribution, through his theory of natural selection, was to suggest how the evolutionary change took place. The evidence we find in the geologic record is not nearly as compatible with darwinian natural selection as we would like it to be."

"So natural selection as a process is okay. We are also pretty sure that it goes on in nature although good examples are surprisingly rare."
- David M. Raup, "Conflicts Between Darwin and Palaeontology,
"https://archive.org/stream/cbarchiv...0/conflictsbetweendarwinandpaleo1930_djvu.txt

This ^^^

(And these quotes can be found on the page I linked him to, though this is a better source.)

 

[ImmortalFlame]

This ^^^

(And these quotes can be found on the page I linked him to, though this is a better source.)

I've edited the post with a better, non .txt link to scans of the article:

https://archive.org/stream/fieldmuseumofnat50chic#page/n21/mode/2up

Good old Internet Archive.

 

[SkepticThinker]

I've edited the post with a better, non .txt link to scans of the article:

https://archive.org/stream/fieldmuseumofnat50chic#page/n21/mode/2up

Good old Internet Archive.

Wow, good find!

 

[muhammad_isa]

That God created each animal and plant "according to it's kind", as Genesis describes.

You mean 'like with a magic wand' ..
Well, it might be how, or Almighty God knows best how. Does it really have to be 'either or' ?

 

[Sapiens]

And yet we see such limits manifest in the fossil record and in living things today. "
“Instead of finding the gradual unfolding of life,” says evolutionary paleontologist David M. Raup, “what geologists of Darwin’s time, and geologists of the present day actually find is a highly uneven or jerky record; that is, species appear in the sequence very suddenly, show little or no change during their existence in the record, then abruptly go out of the record.”

Lies. More quote mining. http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/quotes/mine/part1-2.html

 

[Guy Threepwood]

I think anyone would find Raup was very consistent in his skepticism of Darwinism

"In the years after Darwin, his advocates hoped to find predictable progressions. In general. these have not been found-yet the optimism has died hard and some pure fantasy has crept into textbooks."
David M. Raup

 

[SkepticThinker]

I think anyone would find Raup was very consistent in his skepticism of Darwinism

In the years after Darwin, his advocates hoped to find predictable progressions. In general. these have not been found-yet the optimism has died hard and some pure fantasy has crept into textbooks.
David M. Raup

Raup referred to himself in the third person?

 

[Guy Threepwood]

Raup referred to himself in the third person?

No, Guy Threepwood just left out the quotation marks!

 

[SkepticThinker]

No, Guy Threepwood just left out the quotation marks!

But you accredited the quote to David Raup. I'm guessing someone else wrote it.

 

[ImmortalFlame]

Raup referred to himself in the third person?

I can't find any direct source for this quote. Could you request one?

Also, Guy still hasn't acknowledged their quote mining.

 

[SkepticThinker]

I can't find any direct source for this quote. Could you request one?

Also, Guy still hasn't acknowledged their quote mining.

Request made.

This is what comes up for me, when I do a search:
https://books.google.ca/books?id=Yt...ure fantasy has crept into textbooks.&f=false

It looks like it's from Darwin on Trial by Michael Behe and Phillip E. Johnson.

 

[Sapiens]

Request acknowledged and fulfilled.

"A large number of well trained scientists outside of evolutionary biology and paleontology have unfortunately gotten the idea that the fossil record is far more Darwinian than it is. This probably comes from the oversimplification inevitable in secondary sources: low level textbooks, semi-popular articles, and so on. Also, there is probably some wishful thinking involved. In the years after Darwin, his advocates hoped to find predictable progressions. In general, these have not been found yet the optimism has died hard, and some pure fantasy has crept into textbooks...One of the ironies of the creation/evolution debate is that the creationists have accepted the mistaken notion that the fossil record shows a detailed and orderly progression and they have gone to great lengths to accommodate this 'fact' in their Flood Geology." DAVID M. RAUP, Chicago Field Museum, Prof. of Geology, Univ. of Chicago in: New Scientist, Vol. 90, p.832, 1981

 

[ImmortalFlame]

Request made.

This is what comes up for me, when I do a search:
https://books.google.ca/books?id=YtrGVVwk5HsC&pg=PA220&lpg=PA220&dq=In+the+years+after+Darwin,+his+advocates+hoped+to+find+predictable+progressions.+In+general.+these+have+not+been+found-yet+the+optimism+has+died+hard+and+some+pure+fantasy+has+crept+into+textbooks.&source=bl&ots=sCZtjhfpfb&sig=VEK7RCcb8OfimSk8qDLPd6Z8bHE&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwj8ksvQ84HLAhVEk4MKHS7hCSMQ6AEIITAB#v=onepage&q=In the years after Darwin, his advocates hoped to find predictable progressions. In general. these have not been found-yet the optimism has died hard and some pure fantasy has crept into textbooks.&f=false

It looks like it's from Darwin on Trial by Michael Behe and Phillip E. Johnson.

Found it:

http://science.sciencemag.org/content/213/4505/289.1

He prefaces the point by stating:

"Darwinian theory is just one of several biological mechanisms proposed to explain the evolution we have observed to have happened." (paragraph 2, emphasis mine)

Again, this is just another case of creationists equating Darwinism and evolution theory in general. What Raup is discussing is specifically the Darwinian interpretation and expectation of the fossil record, not evolution theory in general. In all of these quotemines attributed to him, the actual contexts reveals that he is extremely careful to make that distinction, and the fact that creationist sources feel the need to dig through the letter sections of Scientific journals to find a handful of out-of-context sentences that can be made to read like criticisms of evolutionary theory only demonstrates the depths of their dishonesty.

 

[SkepticThinker]

Found it:

http://science.sciencemag.org/content/213/4505/289.1

He prefaces the point by stating:

"Darwinian theory is just one of several biological mechanisms proposed to explain the evolution we have observed to have happened." (paragraph 2, emphasis mine)

Again, this is just another case of creationists equating Darwinism and evolution theory in general. What Raup is discussing is specifically the Darwinian interpretation and expectation of the fossil record, not evolution theory in general. In all of these quotemines attributed to him, the actual contexts reveals that he is extremely careful to make that distinction, and the fact that creationist sources feel the need to dig through the letter sections of Scientific journals to find a handful of out-of-context sentences that can be made to read like criticisms of evolutionary theory only demonstrates the depths of their dishonesty.

Ah, I thought as much (that usually turns out to be the case with this stuff). Another good find.

 

[Guy Threepwood]

Request made.

This is what comes up for me, when I do a search:
https://books.google.ca/books?id=YtrGVVwk5HsC&pg=PA220&lpg=PA220&dq=In+the+years+after+Darwin,+his+advocates+hoped+to+find+predictable+progressions.+In+general.+these+have+not+been+found-yet+the+optimism+has+died+hard+and+some+pure+fantasy+has+crept+into+textbooks.&source=bl&ots=sCZtjhfpfb&sig=VEK7RCcb8OfimSk8qDLPd6Z8bHE&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwj8ksvQ84HLAhVEk4MKHS7hCSMQ6AEIITAB#v=onepage&q=In the years after Darwin, his advocates hoped to find predictable progressions. In general. these have not been found-yet the optimism has died hard and some pure fantasy has crept into textbooks.&f=false

It looks like it's from Darwin on Trial by Michael Behe and Phillip E. Johnson.

oops you are correct! my mistake? but seems to be accredited to both?

At any rate the quote is certainly entirely consistent with Raup's position though- it's something he reiterates several times


250,000 species of plants and animals recorded and deposited in museums throughout the world did not support the gradual unfolding hoped for by Darwin.
David Raup "Conflicts Between Darwinism and Paleontology"


The title of the article is a pretty clear confirmation of the context also

 

[SkepticThinker]

oops you are correct! my mistake

No problem. Stuff happens.

Though that quote is entirely consistent with Raup's position- it's something he reiterates several times

250,000 species of plants and animals recorded and deposited in museums throughout the world did not support the gradual unfolding hoped for by Darwin.
David Raup "Conflicts Between Darwinism and Paleontology"

The title of the article is a pretty clear confirmation of the context also

So I guess you think this supports Rusra's assertion that there is some limitation or barrier that prevents macroevolution from occurring? Raup doesn't seem to be saying that.
Instead, he seems to be discussing the gradualism versus punctuated equilibrium debate.


And of course all of this assumes that all we have is the fossil record and hasn't even taken into account everything we now know about genetics that supports the theory of evolution.