Bill Nye vs. Ken Ham

But maybe when the scriptures say that animals reproduce after their kind it really means transformers change after their kind. Or perhaps it was a typo and it stated animals reproduce after they're kind, a subtle reference to the sexual act.

If the rapid-speciation-after-the-flood scenario was valid, how many generations would it take for "Ark-cats" to differentiate into house cats, lions, tigers, etc.? Wouldn't you expect to find fossil remains of intermediate generations? If so, how would you distinguish between an intermediate form in the Ark-cat-to-housecat lineage and an intermediate form in the evolutionary lineage?It seems to me that if there was any evidence for your scenario it would actually be evidence for evolution.

I agree that such confusion would be counterproductive.If I may, I would suggest using cladistics instead of traditional taxonomy as it appears closest to the way creationists discuss kinds:Cladistics - Wikipedia

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Cladistics ... is an approach to biological classification in which organisms are grouped together based on whether or not they have one or more shared unique characteristics that come from the group's last common ancestor and are not present in more distant ancestors. ...

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The techniques of cladistics, and sometimes the terminology, have been successfully applied in other disciplines: for example, to determine the relationships between the surviving manuscripts of the Canterbury Tales,[7] or also between 53 manuscripts of the Sanskrit Charaka Samhita.

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... The outcome of a cladistic analysis is a cladogram — a tree-shaped diagram (dendrogram)[17] that is interpreted to represent the best hypothesis of phylogenetic relationships. Although traditionally such cladograms were generated largely on the basis of morphological characters ... genetic sequencing data and computational phylogenetics are now commonly used ...

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This allows us to discuss the "dog clade" and the "cat clade" without getting into family\genus\species etc definitions.The bottom of the clade\cladogram would be the ancestral breeding population, and the top of the clade\cladogram would be the reproductively separate derived populations living today ... the lions, tigers, cheetahs, cougars, domestic cats, etc.In between are the intermediate\transitionals and the branching points that isolate and divide the current populations into reproductively isolated sub-populations (whether you call them speciation points or not).Here are a couple of examples: The middle one is the vombatiform clade and it shows that the koala bear is more "basal" (closer trait-wise to the ancestral population) than the others, the tasmanian wolf\lion is intermediate and the wombats are the most derived (most changed from the "basal" ancestral population.If we use this clade as an example of a kind, then we can see that there would need to be intermediate\transitional forms along the branches to the more derived forms, the stages where the derived traits first occur:Fossil - Wikipedia

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A transitional fossil is any fossilized remains of a life form that exhibits traits common to both an ancestral group and its derived descendant group. ...

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A transitional form\species\variety\etc is one that exhibits traits common to both the ancestral group and its derived descendant group.Remember that the animals are grouped based on shared characteristics, and those shared characteristics would be inherited from the basal ancestral population rather than derived multiple times.Multiple derivation does occur -- as in nocturnal behavior in different branches of primates: Monophyletic clades (yellow) are ones that include all descendant populations from a single ancestral population. Note that the whole picture is also a monophyletic cladeParaphyletic clades (blue) are ones that don't include all descendant populations, and thus they are incomplete clades.Polyphyletic clades (red) are ones that include several sub-clades without the basal ancestral population or all intermediate populations. The traits in these cases would be due to convergent evolution rather than inherited evolution.Kinds, no matter how defined, would have to be monophyletic clades, as they would be descendant from the ancestral kind on the ark.So if we use clades we can avoid any confusion from family\genus\species taxon descriptions and focus on the share characteristics and end populations.Edited by Admin, : Reduce image width.Edited by Admin, : Rerender for more mobile friendly placement of images.

Indeed, but the question here is whether we have slow biological evolution over many generations, or rapid creationist evolution (creolution) just after the ark landing.The evidence would be in recent (in the last 4500 years) and it would be bones rather than fossils.The issue is timing.

What I showed you is that there is not only no evidence for your post ark transitionals, there is evidence of current forms of species living earlier than 4,500 years ago -- evidence that is apparently contradictory to your claim.It is your job to show that your argument can be substantiated by evidence rather than just wild assertions.Note this part of my previous post:

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The diagram below presents a contemporary (2010) view of feliform evolution and familial relationships (cladogram) overlaid onto the geological time scale. The information presented is based on fossil records and systematic classifications.

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Those lavender bars represent "Fossil range extant species" -- fossils of the current forms well into the "unwitnessed past" -- while what your position predicts is all those vertical branches occurring in the last 4,500 years or so ...The transitionals that we see in stone fit the evolutionary paradigm.The transitionals that we should see in dirt\soil\sediments to fit the creationist paradigm are not only missing, but evidence of current forms extend without transition between them back much longer than 4,500 years ago, contradicting the creationist paradigm.Simple.

Except that these words are not really synonyms. That are used in distinctive ways. Actually, the only classification rank below species officially used for animals is subspecies. Breed is also used when referring to domesticated animals. Variety is typically a legal term used for plants that have been selectively bred. subspecies typically refer to two or more groups of organisms that are inter-fertile but posses significant morphological differences. race is similar to subspecies except that the differences are not significant enough to warrant a separate classification rank.The best way to think about species is that they are distinctive populations of organisms that a separate classification enables more effective communication about that population. Inter-fertility is usually considered a criteria of separating species, but it is not always set in stone. For example, lions and tigers are, for the most part, inter-fertile, but they are different enough in their habits and morphology that they warrant a classification as two separate species. That classification enables us to talk about them more efficiently. You mean that you want your cake and eat it too. A speciation event creates two sub-populations that are significantly different from each other so as to require separate classification. You realize that you need to acknowledge that amount of change but don't want to have it recognized as any sort of evolution.HBD

Which is the biological definition of species. Which is the biological definition of species. Which is both the biological definition of macroevolution and the biological definition of species.If you truly want to be clear then just use the biological definitions because they mean what you are saying. The true test of a definition is that you can use the word and the definition interchangeably with no loss in communication.

But it's really not a lot of variability when you think about it. This has to account for variations within species as well as between species of the same kind. As I understood from your argument, and please correct me if I'm wrong, but the creation of species within a kind is a result of populations splitting off with a subset of this diversity. So as more species occur within a kind this diversity will rapidly go down, so many of these gene loci will tend towards a single allele.
I do agree with you many traits are influenced by a number of genes interacting with each other. Now let's take human skin colour as an example since you brought it up. There are 3 main genes common to all humans, with additional genes getting involved depending if you are from European or East Asian descent. However one of the main genes is MC1R which regulates melanin production. It has been documented that there are 90 nonsynonymous, frameshift or stop mutations known to affect the activity of the protein and 8 of these are found in more than 1% of the population. So just to reiterate, for this one gene there are 90 alleles with 8 of these alleles in greater than 1% of the population. Where did these additional alleles come from if not from individuals on the ark? SourceAs I said above, it is not much genetic variability, but I've read creationists arguments before that the missing genetic variability is hidden in the junk DNA. If you are not one of these creationists I apologise.
I wouldn't quite describe junk DNA as dead, but it is non-coding DNA. This means it does not directly affect an individuals survival so it accrues random mutations which are neither advantageous or detrimental. However, from a scientific point of view it does serve a constructive purpose since when you compare these regions between two species you can identify by how much they have diverged from a common ancestor and how long ago this occurred. This is all based on current rates of mutation as seen today.The other structures I mentioned which I managed to confuse you with, the ERVs and pseudogenes, can also be used to identify relationships. This is because two organisms with the same genetic sequences at the same location, with the same mutations, could only have resulted if they shared a common ancestor. But I don't expect you to accept this, and my original reason for bringing them up was in case you thought further variability was in junk DNA, so won't push you further on this. Which dating estimates are you referring to? As I said above it is simply comparing genetic sequences of a number species, identifying how many differences there are and how long it would take for those differences to accumulate based on current mutation rates. With the dogs here is one study comparing the mitochondrial DNA between different breeds and they found that breeds diverged greater than the 14,000 years of the last known archaeological evidence of domesticated dogs known at the time. Of course mitochondrial DNA is highly conserved and any destructive mutations would be fatal to the individual, so this is based on neutral mutations and the rate in which they accumulate.The study on the big cats you can read about here. In this case they looked at two genes, EGLN1 and TYR and again compared the number of differences between different species. Interestingly TYR as well as being associated with light fur in cats is also involved in light skin colour in european humans. It is involved in transport of tyrosine which is a precursor to melanin production.

This is something I posted on another forum about this idea of rapid diversification after the flood. I will just cut-N-paste it.

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Let's start by assuming a very conservative estimate that there is 1.2 million species on earth. This number can take into account that some species are split into separate species when they shouldn't be, but those numbers are offset by species that have not yet been cataloged.

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Next let's assume that each originally created species has undergone 2 speciation events on average. This seems rather reasonable since speciation is not doubted only the extent to which it occurs. Two speciation events on average would take into account kinds that diversified rapidly and others that remained rather static. I personally think the estimate should be much higher, but this is an extremely conservative value. This would mean that there were 400,000 original created kinds and 800,000 speciation events.

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Now if these speciation events have occurred in only 6,000 years that would average to 133 speciation events per year. Call this hypothesis A

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(Note if you included all extinct species and increased the current species to recent estimates the average estimate would be considerably higher. In addition if you figured this from the time of the flood - 4400 years ago, the average is again significantly increased. Also estimates say that there were only 50,000 animals on the ark, so 1.2 million species needed to diverge from that 50,000)

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[ABE: Using these numbers, the speciation rate would be 260 speciation events per year. ]

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Now let's plug in the numbers that scientists suggest.

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8,700,000 species on earth. An estimated 99% of all species that ever lived have gone extinct. This yields 870,000,000 species (and thus speciation events). These speciations are supposed to have occurred over at least the last 3 billion years. This yields an average of .29 speciation events per year. Call this hypothesis B.

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Now, one of the supposed evidences against evolution is that we have observed thousands of generations of breeding experiments and have never seen one type of creature become another type of creature. Now we certainly have observed speciation events, but what I take this to mean is that we don't see multiple speciation events that lead to the formation of new kinds.

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So ... which hypothesis fits the observation better?

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If hypothesis A were true we should be observing all kinds of speciation events. When we breed fruit flies for generation upon generation, we should see new species emerging all the time. Speciation would be extremely rapid.

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If hypothesis B were true, speciation should be a rare event. We would not be observing speciation events even after a couple of hundred generations.

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Which hypothesis fits the observations better?

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The idea for this came from creationist complaints that we don't observe evolution happening right in front of our faces. When in fact, if this idea of rapid diversification were true we should be seeing hundreds of speciation events, but we don't. Speciation events are rare, which is more in keeping with a slow, gradual progression of evolution.HBD

Hydraulic sorting is just non-sense. Why would giant sauropods like Apatosaurus be found towards the middle of the column and smaller, lighter animals like trilobites be found lower in the column? Why does fine sediment drop out of solution before coarse grains?Original location means little because all the original land surfaces were scoured off by the flood.Level of the currents still doesn't explain how extremely large animals were lifted to the upper portions of the column. Now we are getting somewhere!HBD

I don't know how hydraulic sorting would work and neither do you so why are you speculating about it?Original location would determine which current the creature got carried along in to which ultimate grave.As I said I don't know how it all happened and I don't think it's necessary to explain everything. The large animals often look like they were buried in mudslides but it's hard to fit that all into the picture too.But what I do know is that the strata look like they had to have been laid down in a huge deluge, that WOULD have involved transportation in water, and the usual interpretation of them as time periods is ridiculous, I mean insanely ridiculous.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

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I don't know how hydraulic sorting would work and neither do you so why are you speculating about it?

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Shouldn't the question be why are YOU speculating about it, when you don't understand it at all ? Anyone with a decent understanding of the issues can see that it is a very silly idea.

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Original location would determine which current the creature got carried along in to which ultimate grave.

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Which really only applies to fossils found in marine rock, and even then it would be an incredible (as in not at all credible) for all of the numerous and diverse dinosaurs, all over the world, to happen to end up in strata identified as Triassic, Jurassic or Cretaceous.

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As I said I don't know how it all happened and I don't think it's necessary to explain everything. The large animals often look like they were buried in mudslides but it's hard to fit that all into the picture too.

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Should be pretty easy. They died where they were found. You aren't going to move a huge pile of dead bodies buried in mud without disturbing it.

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But what I do know is that the strata look like they had to have been laid down in a huge deluge, that WOULD have involved transportation in water, and the usual interpretation of them as time periods is ridiculous, I mean insanely ridiculous

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Of course, the opposite is true. The idea that all the strata were laid down by the deluge is silly, while the idea that it took long periods of time is the only sensible explanation. That's why you have to hand wave away so much evidence.

Herebedragons is discussing it because you brought it up. Why mention it in the first place if you know nothing about it. Than you know nothing about science. Science is man's attempt to explain the world around him. Why would anyone want to engage you on this since you don't even care to back up your claims with any shred of evidence.I will leave off with these quotes about evidence for you to ponder. Edited by DevilsAdvocate, : No reason given.

Why is HBD speculating about it? How cheeky of you! *You* were the one who introduced hydraulic sorting into the discussion, he's merely responding to your mention.But even more cheeky, how can you claim hydrologic sorting had anything to do with "why no crab fossil has ever been found in the same rock as a trilobite fossil" (the question from Message 319 that you claimed it was the answer to) when you "don't know how hydraulic sorting would work."By the way, you don't really mean "hydraulic sorting," because that's just "the sorting of small particles (as of ground ore) by allowing them to settle against rising currents of fresh water of different velocities" (see Merriam Webster), which is precisely what we've been explaining happens in moving water, and which is also precisely the progression we don't see when we pan across the layers of the geologic column. The term you really meant to use was "hydrologic sorting," which is the type of sorting that Berthault worked on, and for which there is no evidence of its occurrence in the geologic column. Could you explain to us how "original location" could influence final resting place when carried along by violent Flood waters? What we observe is that the larger and more violent the flood the more destructive and more random the result, and yet you somehow manage to keep a straight face while claiming your Flood would sort material and fossils into neat layers according to original location, even maintaining entire dinosaur broods, footprints, burrows, etc. What is painfully obvious to everyone but you is that you have no idea how any of it happened. We're not asking you to explain everything, but just making a little sense about something every once in a while would be very, very welcome. No, Faith, you don't know this, because you've never studied a flood of the scale you imagine, and all the evidence we have says that the larger the flood the wider the destruction. Arguing that a huge flood could sweep across a landscape and organize it into neat layers is like arguing that a tornado could sweep through a junkyard and build a 747. What's insane is advocating an interpretation that has no evidence at the expense of an interpretation that has all the evidence. The layers we see in the geologic record are of the same type being deposited today all around the world. The fossils in the layers become increasingly different from modern forms with increasing depth, and there is no mixing. Radiometric dating of the layers indicates increasing age with increasing depth.--Percy

For Faith, the bible trumps any and all evidence no matter what.I wonder where in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders that would fall...This is not a snark. I just can't understand how someone can totally dismiss evidence of that nature, as often and as well as it has been explained, and be considered rational.