Creationists: Why is Evolution Bad Science?

Welcome to EvC Katie. Enjoy you visits here. Guess what! We do have just that similarity. Of course, pond scum is a long way from us so there is only limited similarity. However, that is just in the places you would expect. The basic operation of the cell of both ourselves and single celled organism work with similar genetics and chemisty. On this one you are right. What your peer said is very silly and not related to biological evolution. We have changed. We have changed since the rise of our species even over the last 200,000 years. If you want details I'll see what I can find.You are right again. If the change in the enviroment happens too quickly then the evolutionary processes may not be fast enough for a species to survive. That is exactly what happens. Almost all the species that have ever existed are gone. I don't know the current estimate but IIRC it is over 99 % of all species have become extinct just as you predict.Katie, could I suggest you read over some of the material already posted here? I can make a pretty big bet that you will come up with nothing new. Everything has already been discussed more than once.If you really want to learn about the real science involved rather than the lies and distortions pushed by various members of the creationist community then browseing some threads and asking clear questions will get you a long way.Almost oeveryone here is glad to help if you have a real interest in leaning. Start by understanding that there is much more to this than you probably have been exposed to. And understand that some of what you've been told is not true. (In fact, maybe a lot of what you've been told isn't true)You could check out: Suggestions for Creationists
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Suggestions for the EvolutionistsThis message has been edited by NosyNed, 06-05-2004 05:26 PM

I'd be interested in that, thank you.

The ToE is the theory of evolution. More specifically biological evolution.Can rocks evolve? Can sea water evolve? No. Is anything not alive "biological"? No!The ToE we are talking about is NOT the "other" ToE. That is, it is not the theory of everthing that the physicists are talking about. It is the theory of how biological entities can change over time.It doesn't need to explain anything else, it isn't trying to and it wasn't formulated in the first place to do so.It does an excellent job of what it does do. For that reason it can "stand tall".This message has been edited by NosyNed, 06-16-2004 02:02 AM

Almeyda, what if we all said:
"Right on, God started all life on earth" ?How would that change one single thing about the ToE? Show your logic.

The point is that saying God created the first life forms does absolutely nothing to the ToE. NOTHING! It simply answers the question of the origin of life. From Darwins "Origin of Species" to today the ToE does not talk about or depend upon any of the details of how life arose. It only discusses how life forms change after they exist.If you think otherwise answer the question put to you. How would God creating life have any affect on the ToE. Not from a philosophical view but from a nuts and bolts view in discussing evoluion and how it unfolds. The fact is that a majority of Christians already accept that God caused everything but that Darwinian evolution is the best eplanation for how life changed on this planet.You seem to be using the word "religion" in some odd way. Could you please define what is and is not a "religion"? In the context here it is not simply a "belief". If that is what you mean by the word "religion" then how is Christianity different from believing that, in fact, the dog did eat Johnnies homework?

Then go to the thread on fossil sorting for "simple" and show how it fits with a flood. You make these ridiculous statements and don't seem to have any support. Fossil sorting for simpleIt isn't a matter of hindering here. The fossil ordering completely destroys the idea of there being one global, recent flood.

The study of how fossils form is called taphonomy. If you google that you will find a ton of stuff on it.Basically, you are right: it takes some pretty special circumstances for a fossil to be allowed to form. They must be protected from the environment pretty quickly.This is a major reason why a very large percentage (I don't how much) of fossils are of marine creatures.If you look at the fossils we do find you see them associated with what had been rivers, volcanic eruptions, sand, amber and other things allowing for rapid burial. In other cases they are in an environment with little or no oxygen to support other creatures (some lake bottoms).Taphonomy gives us some idea both of how fossils form and just what a very tiny percentage of all living things will be fossilzed.It does require something to protect them. This is frequently a "catastrophe". However, it is just a catastrophe for that particular creature (a local mud slide, volcano or flood) not a world wide catastrophe.In fact, when you think about it the nature of the fossils we do (or don't) find demonstrates a lack of one big, global catastrophe. This would have formed a large number of fossils at one level, under a homogenized layer of sediment with no living animals to scavange the fossils. What we see instead are discreet, local, rare and sometimes partially scavanged remains.So in summary, you're right. They have to have something special happen to them to protect them. Those somethings are known, usually determinable from the fossil site and very, very rare.

I am no expert Bob, but I don't think you have the nature of prions described correctly.
Please supply the source from where you got this information.Prions are a different folding of perfectly normal proteins. The DNA is involved, I presume, in the creation of the normal protein. There isn't , I don't think, any difference in the DNA coding.A protein may "fold up" in a number of ways. A prion is the "wrong" folding of a normal protein. The bad news is that a prion can catalyze the refolding of the normal protein. It has nothing to do with the DNA.If you have a source which supplies other informtion I'd be interested in it.This message has been edited by NosyNed, 11-02-2004 02:43 PM

I've proposed another topic to allow this to be discussed out of this thread. Sorry.

While we are waiting for a specific off shot thread on the beetle let's discuss the more generic science issues in this post. "There is no known physical or chemical mechanism to generate heritable variations that will improve adaptivity or increase the complexity of living organisms."This is, of course, not true. We have observed in great detail the changes in genomes now that we can sequence them. These changes are random mutations, they are heritable and they run the range from not helpful to both increasing the adaptivity and complexity (whatever that is ) of liveing organisms."The neo-Darwinians have rejected nonrandomness as the major feature of variation."I don't get the point of this particular line. Could you explain? In other threads it has been shown that IC things can, in fact, evolve. Simply saying that something is irreducibly complex does not mean it can not be evolved by the understood processes.

Hi RunningMan97 (RM97 for short?). Welcome to EvC. There is a lot of opportunity for learning things here.However, to do that you'll have to understand that you need to learn a few things. You should avoid critisizing something that you don't know much about.How about looking at my comments in Message 125??The fact that cells are complex has NOTHING to do with biological evolution-- it many have something to do with the origin of biological things but you haven't shown that.You will have to define "genuine" "intermediate forms" before that can be discussed with you. If you understood anything about the actual evidence available you would be able to list the 100's (or more) of examples of exactly the intermediate forms that one would expect and show, one at a time, why they are not genuine. Instead you don't know what evidence is available and, like John in the referenced link above are doing the equivalent of accusing Christians of being cannibals because you don't know the actual facts.I assure you that scientists are not afraid of ANY alternative. They fall into two camps:1) the significant percentage who are believers in one form of God or another.2) The, perhaps, somewhat larger percentage who don't care at all about any form of God. They just don't (to quote an old movie) "don't give a damm".

I'd like you to explain this sentence a LOT more.If we found someone murdered and suspected John Smith of having commited the murder we might surmise that his finger prints could be at the crime scene. If we found his finger prints there we would take that as evidence that he did in fact commit the crime.We would then go on surmising and seeing what we actually find.In the case of aquatic species evolving to adapt to the land we can surmise that we should find certain fossils. certain living animals (maybe) and certain relationships in the DNA.We have found all of those things. They are ALL evidence that supports aquatic forms evolved to the land.Another interpretation (that I just thought of) is that you are saying that someone is suggesting that one aquatic species ITSELF "adapted" to the land. If that is your assertion then you are right: there is no evidence for that. No one has suggested such a silly thing.This message has been edited by NosyNed, 04-18-2006 05:55 PM

Hi romajc, Welcome to EvC. This is a place to learn stuff and it seems you should have done more reading before you started posting.You have a lot to learn. Since we see fish TODAY which have partial legs and walk on land AND climb trees most of your idea above is clearly wrong. In addition, we have fossil fish, leggy fish, half fish, fishy amphibian and amphibians. So we see the transitions that took place. Not all fish are free, fast agile swimmers today and clearly there are niches where they do not need to be.Your conclusion is based on incorrect facts. That sentence is almost right. It should read "It is a theory!!!". A theory is not JUST anything. It is the highest form of scientific statment you can make. The atomic theory, germ theory and Einstein's theory of gravity are others that are about as well substantiated as the evolutionary explanation. You are making the mistake of useing the colloquial definition of the word "theory". That is NOT the right one. Another incorrect statment. We see mutations occuring today in other animals AND in humans that are clearly beneficial in the current environment.Again you need to get your facts straight.

Others will probably supply you with links. I have told you what is true. If you don't believe me, fine, it doesn't bother me it just means you don't learn something. If I thought you would change your mind when you saw the details it might be worth digging them up. So far I am not convinced you will.You don't have to feel bad for not knowing things. There is a great deal to learn an we are all pretty ignorant about a LOT of things.It is a matter of asking questions and being sure you have your facts straight.BTW, no one says that a fish turns directly into a land animal. The fossils show that it occured over more than 10,000,000 years. If there are only 10,000 fish born each year that is time enough to have 100 billion different fish. All of them different from each other.You keep making statments that sound like you are so sure of them as fact. Like "The more its fins turn into legs, the more it will die in the water.". The example of the mud skipper (google that)and the fossil transitions is to show that this isn't true.If you think those kind of things it is probably a very good bet that EVERYTHING you think you know about evolutionary theory and the facts of life on the planet earth is ALL wrong. (or at least so close to all that you might as well consider it to be all wrong). No one suggests that this happened at ANY time. If a mutation causes a very large change the chances are very high that it will be bad.However, a few mutations (you have from 5 to 100 yourself) in each of 100 BILLION fish can add up to a lot of change over time periods of from millions to 10's of millions of years.If you doubt the dating then I suggest you go to the dating forum and look at the evidence there. There is no goood reason to doubt that the earth is around 4.5 billlion years old.It is unlikely you thought this up yourself. There are, out there in books and on the web (and speaking too) people who lie about the facts . You will have to figure out how to tell who is lying and who is not.

This is a good one. This is at least very much on topic. You made a firm statment here.What, exactly, things have been changed in the theory to fit new facts? Be sure you understand what you are refering to.