Why do some creationists think evolution = atheism?

[Deeje]

It was not funny, it was childish.

 

[Deeje]

There are only two possible explanations for what we see in the fossil record:

1) Every living thing evolved from a shared common ancestor through a process of reproduction with variation and natural selection (both of which have been observed to occur).

2) Every species found in the fossil record appeared separately and spontaneously out of nowhere for no reason whatsoever, before shortly thereafter going extinct for no particular reason, and then a subsequent species that also appeared separately and spontaneously out of nowhere for no reason and also happened to coincidentally seem nearly identical in morphology to the prior species despite them sharing no ancestry appeared and then also went extinct, and that this exact chain of events happened millions of times over for practically every species we have uncovered in the fossil record but then suddenly it stopped when it reached the modern human age for no reason whatsoever and was replaced by a system of observable change over time through reproduction with variation and natural selection for no reason whatsoever.

Take your pick.


So is macro-evolution.


Actually, it is defined as evolution above the species level. Which we have observed multiple times.


I refer you to the fossil record argument above. If you don't believe macro-evolution took place, then you MUST believe that species can magically appear, full formed, out of thin air, and have done this on a regular basis since the dawn of life on this planet, despite the fact that "contemporary species popping into existence from nothing" has never been recorded. The only reasonable explanation for what we see in life today and in the fossil record, taking account of all the available facts we have, is the theory of evolution and common ancestry.

If you don't believe it, tough. Reality doesn't have to warp itself to your incredulity.

The rest of your post is conspiratorial rambling and not worth responding to.

Please show us all this proof.....especially "evolution above the species level" that have been "observed multiple times".

 

[Derek500]

Please show us all this proof.....especially "evolution above the species level" that have been "observed multiple times".

Sure. See the list of transitional fossils on Wiki. All those fossils were directly observed and can still be directly observed or casts of them can be directly observed by anyone interested.

 

[Derek500]

Deejee is a JW.

 

[ImmortalFlame]

Please show us all this proof.....especially "evolution above the species level" that have been "observed multiple times".

Observed Instances of Speciation
Some More Observed Speciation Events

 

[leibowde84]

"Gradual"? No.
'The "Cambrian Explosion" refers to the sudden appearance in the fossil record of complex animals with mineralized skeletal remains.'
--excerpt from The Cambrian Explosion - Origin of Animals and the Cambrian Explosion - Science - The Burgess Shale

New life 'suddenly appearing' over the course of 20 million years? Yes. The evidence (and diversity) discovered, agrees more with the Genesis creation model combining separate creative events, but y'all will never accept that; materialists will continue to say the "fossil record is incomplete." For CDers, it always will be.

And as worshippers of Jehovah as our Creator, we understand why He formed the genetics of animals to evolve in a limited fashion over time, but y'all would never believe it.

I'm confused with your reply here. The cambrian explosion lasted between 20-30 million years. It was only "sudden" relative to evolutionary time. So, why do you think that matches up with what is claimed in the Genesis?

 

[leibowde84]

The complexity of Life began through an accident, huh?

It didn't begin, it developed because of evolution via natural selection. It wasn't accidental. It developed for a very specific reason.

 

[Jose Fly]

There are only two possible explanations for what we see in the fossil record:

1) Every living thing evolved from a shared common ancestor through a process of reproduction with variation and natural selection (both of which have been observed to occur).

2) Every species found in the fossil record appeared separately and spontaneously out of nowhere for no reason whatsoever, before shortly thereafter going extinct for no particular reason, and then a subsequent species that also appeared separately and spontaneously out of nowhere for no reason and also happened to coincidentally seem nearly identical in morphology to the prior species despite them sharing no ancestry appeared and then also went extinct, and that this exact chain of events happened millions of times over for practically every species we have uncovered in the fossil record but then suddenly it stopped when it reached the modern human age for no reason whatsoever and was replaced by a system of observable change over time through reproduction with variation and natural selection for no reason whatsoever.

Take your pick.

Reminds me of Kathleen Hunt's summary of the horse fossil record, where she concludes with.....

A Question for Creationists: Creationists who wish to deny the evidence of horse evolution should careful consider this: how else can you explain the sequence of horse fossils? Even if creationists insist on ignoring the transitional fossils (many of which have been found), again, how can the unmistakable sequence of these fossils be explained? Did God create Hyracotherium, then kill off Hyracotherium and create some Hyracotherium-Orohippus intermediates, then kill off the intermediates and create Orohippus, then kill off Orohippus and create Epihippus, then allow Epihippus to "microevolve" into Duchesnehippus, then kill off Duchesnehippus and create Mesohippus, then create some Mesohippus-Miohippus intermediates, then create Miohippus, then kill off Mesohippus, etc.....each species coincidentally similar to the species that came just before and came just after?​

Does that fall under the category of "God works in mysterious ways"?

 

[Jose Fly]

Please show us all this proof.....especially "evolution above the species level" that have been "observed multiple times".

Why? If you were provided such data, would you recognize it as valid?

Or is this something else you cannot compromise on? If so, why ask for information that you already know you'll deny no matter what?

 

[It Aint Necessarily So]

Yes, the earth is round and at a time when most thought it was flat, the Bible referred to the "circle of the earth" The Hebrew word chug can also be rendered sphere or globe according to some reference works, for those who are spoon fed the idea that it can only mean circle, who are you to argue with reference books!

Your example of the earth being round is an example of something that can be proven! We have pictures!

We have pictures that prove that the earth is NOT a circle. It is a sphere more or less (oblate spheroid is the technical term for a slightly flattened sphere.)

Macroevolution can't be proven!

Evolutionary theory is not in dispute in the scientific community. The objections are religious in origin. There will apparently always be people who prefer to believe in creationism instead. That's fine, but their arguments fall on deaf ears.

Incidentally, science has no use for the term "macro-evolution" any more than it does macro-electricity or macro-gravity. There is no need to draw a partition in the spectrum of any of these. That term is also religious in origin.

As you said "Science works through demonstration, yada, yada" Yes! And it DOESN'T work when things CAN'T be demonstrated! Macroevolution can't be demonstrated!

Science explains what is observable, not what is not observable. That's pretty much why it has nothing to say about gods.

 

[It Aint Necessarily So]

Who would I believe, someone who has never baked a cake or an award winning baker? The award winning baker of course? That is why I believe the award winning scientist Frantisek Vyskocil that evolution is false!

That's not credible. You undoubtedly already believed by faith that evolution is false before you chose to align yourself with that particular scientist.

If he were mainstream and supported evolutionary theory, you'd undoubtedly have rejected him like the tens of thousands of evolutionary scientists that you never name, many of whom are also award winning.

Do you disagree? If so, why? What evidence can you offer that you believe that particular person for the reason you gave?

 

[Jenny Collins]

I returned to share this, but I am not reading anymore of the attacks on me on here: I am ignoring the notifications on here and ignored the personal message I got from someone on here!

But anyway, we had earlier discussed the pepper moth, fruit flies, and bacteria and I pointed out that these are examples of microevolution, nor macroevolution! There was a "chorus" of "You're wrongs" but I didn't give enough time to the subject, so I will explain it further: Evolutionists point to populations of bacteria, insects and peppered moths being "selected" by nature as a mechanism for evolution! What they don't tell you is that the genes for resistance to various antibiotics, insecticides, or for the color of the moths were already present in their gene pools and nature simply selected which would survive! Both light and dark peppered moths were present before and after the Industrial Revolution in England! Moths turning into moths is not evolution in the true sense! Any breeder of cats, dogs, cows, or horses knows that you can do a lot with a wild gene pool-within limits! And when those limits are reached you screech to a halt! Macroevolution would require new genetic material!

Now I know I will be bombarded with replies, I am a strong person as I have shown in dealing with ten people at once, but am kind of weary of it! So will just let you all carry on! I know you are shook up but what I am saying, so you will all scramble to respond! But try to be intellectually honest this time! Saying to someone: "I don't suffer fools" does not prove evolution, facts do! And if I am a fool, you are too, for joining a fool in his folly! Fools usually don't alarm and rattle others so much!

And please don't belittle my claims of being good at drawing, to prove evolution! Try not to prove I am wrong by saying things like "horsepucky" Calling names, using expressions like this, do not make a case for one's beliefs! I admit it did it once myself, when I simply replied "bogus"

Try not to clutter the conversation with word arguments, try not to use fallacious reasoning! Too often people learn about critical thinking and fallacious arguments, then never apply it to themselves, only misapply it to others! Refresh yourself about fallacious reasoning, there is an article in Wikipedia! Then ponder over it and think "How do I do this"

I will leave it at that! Bring on the sharks! I am ducking out because although I have all the time in the world (am recovering from foot surgery) there are wiser uses of my time! Since you are all scientists from good schools, I am surprised you spend every waking moment arguing with the fools here! My sister in law is a Veterinary Professor and spends her time getting grants for her school by improving the Iams diet! She goes on speaking engagements to Holland, Japan, Mexico and so on! She went to an Iams recognition award party which also honored Betty White and talked to her! Not bragging about her, only pointing out that there are much nobler uses of ones time when they are the educationally elite! So long and peace to one and all!

 

[It Aint Necessarily So]

You say "Humans are apes" Then why do evolutionists scoff when creationists say: "We didn't descend from apes" Evolutionists say: "We never claimed to have descended from apes" Well you are contradicting that!

Of course I know that spider eyes are not exactly the same as ours! Humans don't have more than two eyes on stalks! There are also internal differences! You continually miss my points! There are some things in nature that are repeated in various species! They are not exactly the same!

Humans are apes that descended from earlier apes. We are the bipedal, relatively hairless, manually articulate, and linguistic (intellectual) apes.

That's not debated outside of creationist circles, and creationists have no say in the scientific community just like all other non-evolutionary scientists..They don't care what either of us think.

I happen to agree with them, but they don't care about that, either.

 

[Jenny Collins]

That's not credible. You undoubtedly already believed by faith that evolution is false before you chose to align yourself with that particular scientist.

If he were mainstream and supported evolutionary theory, you'd undoubtedly have rejected him like the tens of thousands of evolutionary scientists that you never name, many of whom are also award winning.

Do you disagree? If so, why? What evidence can you offer that you believe that particular person for the reason you gave?

He IS mainstream! He grew up as an atheist in a communist country, wasn't influenced by religion in the least, became a MAINSTREAM scientist and then changed his views on evolution!

 

[Jenny Collins]

Humans are apes that descended from earlier apes. We are the bipedal, relatively hairless, manually articulate, and linguistic (intellectual) apes.

That's not debated outside of creationist circles, and creationists have no say in the scientific community just like all other non-evolutionary scientists..They don't care what either of us think.

I happen to agree with them, but they don't care about that, either.

"Humans are apes descended from apes!" So why the common protest that creation believers think evolution means we descended from APES? They laugh at people and say "No, we share a common ancestor with them! Now which is it?

 

[Jenny Collins]

Humans are apes that descended from earlier apes. We are the bipedal, relatively hairless, manually articulate, and linguistic (intellectual) apes.

That's not debated outside of creationist circles, and creationists have no say in the scientific community just like all other non-evolutionary scientists..They don't care what either of us think.

I happen to agree with them, but they don't care about that, either.

The gulf between apes and people is incredible! Humans have advanced in collective knowledge and technology! In my shortish life span of 50 years, I have seen tremendous change! As a kid and teen, we didn't have cell phones, few had computers, I didn't have a colored TV until I was an adult! Now they all are colored!

It was only a few centuries ago that we didn't have electricity, phone, cars, planes, etc! At one time, we had no printing presses, need I say more?

However if you take apes and monkeys and compare the ones alive today, they are exactly as the apes and monkeys of 200, 400, 800 years ago! There may be differences due to microevolution, but they haven't developed any communities, technology, etc Two hundred years ago, gorillas ate bananas, and whatever else they eat, pounded their chests, etc and today they do the same

They do have some ability to learn and teach other gorillas, I think some used sticks as tools and then taught other gorillas how to do it or something, but even that shows the huge gulf from man to ape!

As I mentioned earlier in this post, there are gorillas like Koko who learned crude sign language, and called someone "Dirty Toilet Devil" when she was mad at them!

Meanwhile, a human child, if exposed to several languages may pick up all of them and speak them fluently!

 

[It Aint Necessarily So]

A bunch of your articles are not from recogognized, peer-reviewed journals:

• BIO-Complexity: a house organ of the the Biologic Institute, funded by the Discovery Institute. They are not to be taken seriously.
• Life: another journal that has no scientific credibility. Also not to be taken seriously.
• The International Journal of Design & Nature and Ecodynamics : Fringe publication of the featherweight Wessex Institute of Technology, also not a real scientific journal, just a vanity press that publishes papers written by its own editors. McIntosh, the author of a listed paper, is on their Editorial Board, and one of their other editors is the young earth creationist Stuart Burgess

"Papers" that are published as part of the proceedings of a conference are not recognised peer-reviewed journals, so ditch them.

Chapters within books are not peer-reviewed journals, bye-bye.

Peer-Edited and Editor-Reviewed articles are not peer-reviewed articles … including these only serves to inflate the list and is scraping the bottom of the barrel

Then we've got articles in Philosophy journals … if you want to make claims regarding biology, publish in a biology journal, with real data.

Over 15% of the list is papers by David Abel, all his papers are non-evidentially supported, non-laboratory confirmed, and pure fabrication. Yuck! Abel "runs" a highfalutin sounding institute out of his garage, styling himself Director of the The Gene Emergence Project, The Origin-of-Life. Science Foundation, Inc. It is a fraud.

Let's look at what Skeptical Science said about the remaining articles:

Joseph A. Kuhn, “Dissecting Darwinism,” Baylor University Medical Center Proceedings, Vol. 25(1): 41-47 (2012).

• This is a medical journal, a rather odd place to attempt to refute evolution.
• The article itself is poorly written, dreadful, and full of scientific errors. It’s an embarrassment to the author, to the journal, and to the field of medicine as a whole. In essence we have a medical doctor claiming evolution is bunk and repeats the usual debunked Discovery Institute claims.
• Is it credible? Nope, a Professor in the Department of Ecology and Evolution at the University of Chicago, explains why it is not. – Fail

Michael J. Behe, “Experimental Evolution, Loss-of-Function Mutations, and ‘The First Rule of Adaptive Evolution,’” The Quarterly Review of Biology, Vol. 85(4):1-27 (December 2010).

• Jerry Coyne has a good summary, he writes “this paper gives ID advocates no reason to crow that a peer-reviewed paper supporting intelligent design has finally appeared in the scientific literature. The paper says absolutely nothing—zilch—that supports any contention of ID “theory.” – Fail

Wolf-Ekkehard Lönnig, “Mutagenesis in Physalis pubescens L. ssp. floridana: Some further research on Dollo’s Law and the Law of Recurrent Variation,”Floriculture and Ornamental Biotechnology, 1-21 (2010).

• Published where? Yes, that is indeed a very obscure journal.
• An Australian science communicator and biology student, explains here why this is just another daft paper that is not credible. – Fail.

William A. Dembski and Robert J. Marks II, “The Search for a Search: Measuring the Information Cost of Higher Level Search,” Journal of Advanced Computational Intelligence and Intelligent Informatics, Vol. 14 (5):475-486 (2010).

• There is quite a problem with Dembski’s and Marks’s definition of a search – it seems to be rather pointless, hence they really struggled to get this published.
• You can find quite a lot of criticism regarding this specific paper here: The Search for a Search - Measuring the Information Cost of Higher Level Search - RationalWiki
• Here is a criticism of an earlier draft of the paper. Some of these concerns raised were fixed and some were not: The Search for a Search - Measuring the Information Cost of Higher Level Search/Critique of the Draft - RationalWiki
• So is this a good paper? No it’s not.
• How did the authors respond to the criticism? They attempted to sue … seriously!!! getting published is about engaging in a conversation with the scientific community, not suing them when you face criticism – Huge Fail http://scienceblogs.com/goodmath/2009/11/16/dembski-stoops-even-lower-lega/

David L. Abel, “Constraints vs Controls,” The Open Cybernetics and Systemics Journal, Vol. 4:14-27 (January 20, 2010).

• Yes indeed a paper by Mr Abel, and sure enough, no actual data, no experiments, no measurements, and no observations
• The first eight references in it are him simply citing other similar papers he has written.
• And what about the journal? It is an obscure IT journal that handles articles that relate to human computer interaction. – Fail

William A. Dembski and Robert J. Marks II, “Conservation of Information in Search: Measuring the Cost of Success,” IEEE Transactions on Systems, Man, and Cybernetics-Part A: Systems and Humans, Vol. 39(5):1051-1061 (September, 2009).

• What do others have to say about this, do they find it credible as an ID paper? Nope, see reviews: evilution is good for you: Dembski's Law of Conservation of Information and Conservation of Information in Search - Measuring the Cost of Success - RationalWiki
• Dembski has, for years, been pushing an argument based on some work called the No Free Lunch (NFL) theorems. The NFL theorems prove that average over all possible search landscapes, no search algorithm can outperform a random walk. The NFL theorems are true and correct – they’re valid math, and they’re even useful in the right setting. In fact, if you really think about it, they’re actually quite obvious. Dembski has been trying to apply the NFL theorems to evolution: his basic argument is that evolution (as a search) can’t possibly produce anything without being guided by a supernatural designer – because if there wasn’t some sort of cheating going on in the evolutionary search, according to NFL, evolution shouldn’t work any better than random walk – meaning that it’s as likely for humans to evolve as it is for them to spring fully formed out of the ether. This doesn’t work for a very simple reason: evolution doesn’t have to work in all possible landscapes. Dembski always sidesteps that issue.
• So yes, this is an appropriate publication in its context, and the maths is OK, but claims that it supports ID when applied to Evolution are not in this paper. Nor can that claim be substantiated by any data from either here or anywhere else
• Status as a paper that supports ID – Fail.

Richard v. Sternberg, “DNA Codes and Information: Formal Structures and Relational Causes,” Acta Biotheoretica, Vol. 56(3):205-232 (September, 2008).

• Sternberg’s paper is a theoretical one in which he takes a structuralist approach and proposes “that a variety of structural realism can assist us in rethinking the concepts of DNA codes and information apart from semantic criteria”
• Little problem … no empirical data, so as a paper that actually support ID in our reality – Fail

Douglas D. Axe, Brendan W. Dixon, Philip Lu, “Stylus: A System for Evolutionary Experimentation Based on a Protein/Proteome Model with Non-Arbitrary Functional Constraints,” PLoS One, Vol. 3(6):e2246 (June 2008).

• This paper describes a computer program (Stylus) that was used for the study of protein evolution using Chinese characters
• The paper does not offer any support for ID. Indeed, Konrad Sheffler (the PloS editor for the manuscript) explicitly notes that he “did not detect any such [ideological] bias [towards ID] in this manuscript; nor do the results support intelligent design in any way.”
• As he also points out, “there is still no substitute for empirical data” when examining biological processes – Fail

Michael Sherman, “Universal Genome in the Origin of Metazoa: Thoughts About Evolution,” Cell Cycle, Vol. 6(15):1873-1877 (August 1, 2007).

• This a paper that makes some dodgy claims from ignorance that evolution can’t explain the Cambrian explosion or the evolution of body plans. It is then followed by an alternative hypothesis which explains nothing that can’t be explained by evolutionary biology, and simply relies on gaps in our knowledge to create doubt. (rebuttal here) – Fail

Very nice work.

Sternberg's the IDer who pulled a fast one just as he was leaving the editorial board of a prestigious mainstream journal, Biological Society of Washington. He got a piece from fellow IDer Stephen Meyer published in it surreptitiously.

"In a statement issued by 10 October 2004 the journal declared that Sternberg had published the paper at his own discretion without following the usual practice of review by an associate editor. The Council and associate editors considered the subject of the paper inappropriate for publication as it was significantly outside "the nearly purely systematic content" of the journal. The Council endorses a resolution "which observes that there is no credible scientific evidence supporting ID as a testable hypothesis", and the paper therefore "does not meet the scientific standards of the Proceedings." Sternberg peer review controversy - Wikipedia

 

[Derek500]

The gulf between apes and people is incredible!

I'm not too sure why you think that none of the thousands of biologists could be unable to distinguish between modern apes and humans and recognise the differences. Are you trying to imply that those hundreds of thousands of modern biologists with all their degrees are all stupid?

 

[It Aint Necessarily So]

Stephen C. Meyer, “The origin of biological information and the higher taxonomic categories,” Proceedings of the Biological Society of Washington, Vol. 117(2):213-239 (2004)

• • All we actually have here is a very bad attempt to reorganize already existing information. This article was not peer-reviewed according to the standards of the Biological Society of Washington, but rather slipped into the journal by an editor without proper review.
  • The publisher later withdrew the article, but that well-known fact does not appear to deter the DI from claiming it – Fail.

That's the one.

 

[It Aint Necessarily So]

Science cannot prove that there is a scale. That is an assumption. Science morphs one into the other as a 'given', when you have no actual evidence to prove that what you assume is true. Micro-evolution is "adaptation". Macro-evolution is adaptive change taken to extreme lengths with nothing to back it up but imagination. You have speculation about what "might have" or "could have" taken place, but there is not a shred of actual proof that what you assume ever took place. All of your back up is also imagined. DNA, embryology, etc....nothing in any of it is conclusive....it is assumptive. Do scientists hope that no one will notice? If you pretend it is fact, then everyone will assume that it is. I don't believe it, however, you are free to believe whatever you like.

You've never offered a mechanism that could prevent smaller changes in genomes that occur over lesser periods of time from accumulation into much larger changes over much longer periods of time, so there is no reason to give that objection any credence.

This is an area you and other creationist apologists making the same claim about an unseen boundary continually evade when asked of you. It's really not a question any more as in the sense of trying to get information. It's a statement in the form of question - a rhetorical question. The statement is that no such barrier exists. If it did, it would have been shown to us long ago.

And nothing needs to be proven or conclusive. If it works, we use it. What do I need to prove about my car to use it again? Evolutionary theory works. It unifies a huge body of evidence, offers a mechanism for its occurrence, makes predictions that have been confirmed, is falsifiable but has never been falsified, and has been profitably applied to assorted biotech applications.

Why would we walk away from that? What can you replace it with that can do more?

Besides, conclusive proof isn't your standard for belief, either. Why are you demanding of others what you don't require of yourself and cannot produce yourself? Why are you making an argument to others that you would reject if made to you mutatis mutandis?

Science is the 'religion' of academia apparently. Its scholars are looked to as 'prophets' whose 'predictions' come true when they interpret their 'evidence' to fit their theory. Their disciples stream into their 'temples' of higher learning, hanging off their every word. It's like worship...and any criticism is viewed as blasphemy!

Science doesn't need a religion, and like just about every other human enterprise, functions very well without one.

But if you'd like to compare the quality of the prophecies of science to those of religion, I'd be glad to engage you. We can discuss the difference between high quality prophecy (or prediction) - specific, unexpected, etc., and lower quality predictions - vague, self-fulfilling, etc.. We can compare the predictions Daniel made interpreting Nebudchannezzar's dream, and those made by Dr. Higgs.

Our magicians continually outperform the priests:

"Think of how many religions attempt to validate themselves with prophecy. Think of how many people rely on these prophecies, however vague, however unfulfilled, to support or prop up their beliefs. Yet has there ever been a religion with the prophetic accuracy and reliability of science?" - Carl Sagan

"Credentials" become the identification mark of an academic leader, much like the titles "Archbishop" or "The Most Reverend" do in Christendom. If the ones who educated you are flawed in their hypothesis to begin with, and everything they build on that hypothesis to turn it into a theory cannot be falsified, it is because it is judged by the criteria they themselves have set.....it becomes rather more farcical than religion's claims of an Intelligent Creator IMO.

The credentials of science are its stunning success at making life longer, safer, healthier, more comfortable, and more interesting. Have you seen much polio or smallpox lately? Do your lights still light up you home at night? Do still benefit from the engines and motors that work for you every day in your blender, car, and electric drill? Has the Internet opened any new and useful possibilities?

Pointing out misuses and abuses of science by industry and governments is not a rebuttal to the claim of the incredible utility of the scientific method in helping us predict and at times control aspects of nature..

Religion, on the other hand, has been comparatively sterile. What useful knowledge has come from it?