YEC Problem with Science Above and Beyond Evolution

ok, lets talk specifics, then, shall we?suppose we have a group of animals that is extinct. all of their immediate relatives anywhere near what a creationist would call a "kind" are dead. every last one of them. say, for instance, the dinosaurs. now, you might call "tyrannosaurs" a kind. you might call "theropods" a kind. you might even call all "dinosauria" a kind. but i hesitate to think that you would call all archosaurs a kind.unless you've grouped crocodiles and birds together in one kind, which i would find incredibly hard to believe. if you have done so, i apologize -- but i also fail to see the difference between this and the theory of evolution.do you agree that birds and crocodiles are separate kinds?

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sounds like an argument from incredulity if i ever heard one! lol.(see the other thread)

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if all reptiles are one kind, i fail to see why you object to evolution.also, are birds reptiles? on the contrary, birds and crocodiles (crocodiles more than other reptiles, btw) have a ton of homologous features. dinosaurs are even more STRONGLY homologous to birds. faith, you should know better. first of all, we have 7 specimens on that "one" fossil. and second, feathered dinosaurs are making the news all the time these days. we have more than a dozen species of feathered dinosaurs, most with quite a few specimens. we also have tons of primitve birds -- the line between the two is a subtle one. it comes down to stuff like proportion of the maxillary and premaxila bones in the skull. we're talking MINUTE details that make the difference. also false. have a look at the recent thread on gansus, for instance. gansus lived before t. rex. there's nearly modern birds by the k/t event, and lots of mostly modern (but not ancestral) "opposite birds." i fail to see your objection to evolution, if a crocodile can turn into a bird. that's a rather loose definition of "kind."

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god told me you're wrong.

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you are a p.r.a.t.t.-machine today, faith! earlier you said that "looks-like" evolution (based on observed "design" characteristics and similarity) was not enough. do you take this back? ok, so we're just gonna remove common descent, but still draw a graph of how things are superficially related? let's ignore that for a second. we'll come back around to it. are you aware that the tree we can draw from genetics is practically identical to the tree we can draw from observation? this much should be obvious: genetics dictates characteristics.agreed? can we now distill this down to a simple point, for the yec-pov? that genetics does not dictate descent?

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yet totally views the entire geologic column differently. and that doesn't relate to oil exploration at all does it? that bit where viruses and bacteria evolve new resistant strains -- whole separate species that cannot be fought by older drugs. "noah's ark." "christians" and "young earth creationists" are not one and the same. yec's are a subgroup of christians. i used to know a christian geologist. guess which camp he was in?

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so it's an issue of potential.(btw: you're still wrong. i think you'll find that birds are "birds of the air" and crocodiles are "beasts of the field." not only separate kinds, but created on different days.) all dogs are one species, canis familiaris. interesting trivia, i know. but it's why you can cross breed just about any two dog varieties within the realm of, ahem, physical possibility. nope. we know that birds evolved from reptiles because their homology to theropod dinosaurs, their genetic links to crocodiles, their remaining crocodilian homologies (especially the scale), and because we have a very large selection and range between more reptilian, dinosaurian forms, and modern birds. there's actually enough evidence to classify birds as a subgroup of dinosaurs, and dinosaurs as a subgroup of sauropsida, or "reptiles." oddly, in scientific circles, the evidence is SO good that birds are sauropsids that most people feel the term "reptile" is outdated.it appears the fork happened in about the late jurassic, maybe a little before. both dinosaurs and birds continued past them co-existing during the entire cretaceous period, until the dinosaurs were killed off in the k/t event.it's really quite fascinating. i can recommend a good book or two on the subject for you. did you catch the distinction i made above? the difference between what we call "bird" and what we call "dinosaur" is made on stuff like the proportion of the maxillary and premaxila bones. we're talking stuff that *I* barely know the details of. and i suspect if i showed you with a diagram, you'd say "so what?" in other words, we have dinosaurs on one side of the line, and birds on the other. and the difference between the two is "micro" evolution. far, far, less. we share something like 50% of our dna with plants. again, how is this different than common descent? if i were to use the example above as an analogy for the other example i was using, your "original cat kind" would include cats, hyenas, mongooses (mongeese?), seals, racoons, bears, walruses and dogs.that's the degree of a shift we're talking about with crocodiles and birds. the group that encompasses them is one of the very basal groups in sauropsida. well, i can tell you that one of noah's sons was semitic, and another black.

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ok, so you agree that genetics cannot prove descent, and this is a fundamental position of the yec-viewpoint? ie: that if we have a tree or genetic similarities, we cannot show that one organism gave rise to another? don't fight this too hard. i'm not trying to be a pain in the ass. i just want to make sure i understand the claim right, and the implication of that claim, before i run off and say something that will be a strawman, for lack of any better information. points refuted a thousand times. you're just full of old creationist gems today.

quote:

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faith writes:

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...Reconstructing them, studying their anatomy and physiology and figuring out how they would have lived are all perfectly legitimate and unobjectionable science...

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arachnophilia writes:

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...the question was, can you still do this without "macro" evolutionary relationships?

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faith writes:

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No.

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thank for the straighforward answer. we can check the vast majority of paleontology off the list now, as a science that daily depends on the theory of evolution. i'll stop bothering you now.

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did i misunderstand your answer? the question i asked was: can we reconstruct extinct speciments, and study their anatomy and physiology, and reconstruct how they would have lived, without the use of "macro" evolutionary relationships (in situations where there are no "micro" relationships available alive today)? you said "no."i took that to mean "no."was i wrong in assuming that "no" meant "no" ?

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well, um, we're having some problems with just WHAT the yec beliefs are. apparently, they're looking more and more like evolution by the post. it appears that in your attempt to rectify yec with practical science (and the evolution it requires) you are slowly removing any meaning whatsoever for the term "young earth creationism" as it applies to evolution. though, admittedly, not age of the earth.of course evolution is not a challenge to yec beliefs if you believe in common ancestry, as you apparently do.

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or, apparently even how god created things. faith appears to believe that god's creation is adaptable, along lines most everyone else would call "macro" evolution. and evidently, common design seems to be leading us further and further back, to common ancestry. yes, jar has brought this up in chat. it's starting to look like your faith may be jeopardy. please, please realize that there are other ways of approaching the bible, and not all of them involve forsaking christ. we are not trying to attack your faith in god, or your love of christ; only the miseducation.if you need help with questions of faith, and i think i can speak for jar here, we'd both be more than willing to help, as a reassuring and christian shoulder. crises of faith are hard, and we're both quite familiar with them. i'm not too sure about jar, but i am a former fundamentalist myself, though not as involved as some.

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lemme play devil's advocate for a second. or rather, god's advocate. while a testament to the wonders of the universe given to ignorant and earth-bound ancient hebrews would be truly inspiring, why would god do such a thing, besides to prove himself? sure, he could have given us the encyclopedia galactica had he wanted -- but would the people he was giving it to understand it? would we understand it today?abe: it also rather relies on the notion that bible is a science textbook, when clearly there are other more important things being said, and the cosmological context is background.Edited by arachnophilia, : No reason given.

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exactly. we tell our kids similar stories.but you don't see anyone arguing for "santa claus physics" or "the stork theory of birth."

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quote:

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Jhn 18:38 What is truth?

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yes, i agree. it's a very beautiful and profound, and important text. but does it need to be a science textbook to be of value, and contain truth?

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i find in Him no fault at all.

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actually, we'd expect a world-wide floodplain, composing one stratum. it would be like the k/t boundary, in that it covers the entire world, only it would have the characteristics of a floodplain.but, you know, that's only the educated geology expectation -- creationists are more than happy to postulate the effects of the flood doing all kinds of strange and wonderful things, and having whatever effects they wish to ascribe to it.you can't just pretend that the flood predicts something you are using it to explain. especially not when this prediction is absolutely contrary any established geology -- it involves throwing out everything we know about geological records of floods.(which, in turns, continues to screw paleontology...) genetically? no. the evidence does not say so.Edited by arachnophilia, : better wording

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