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Author Topic:   Design evidence # 177: male & female
lpetrich
Inactive Member


Message 15 of 101 (30192)
01-25-2003 4:44 PM
Reply to: Message 1 by DanskerMan
01-21-2003 10:57 AM


sonnikke:
How it is believed that ToE could ever produce male and female and so perfectly and consistently, is a question I would like answered.
The oldest organisms multiplied by dividing, as one-celled organisms continue to do.
However, they also exchange genetic material; some early protist invented conjugation -- genome-scale genetic-material exchange.
Another invention of an early protist was a cell cycle that goes like this:
diploid phase - meiosis - haploid phase - cell fusion - diploid phase
This would be followed by a mechanism to suppress inbreeding: cells can only fuse with cells that have a different "mating type"; some protists thus have several sexes, though they outwardly look alike ("isogamy").
The next question is the origin of differences between the sexes. A multicellular organism may reproduce by distributing haploid cells (gametes), which fuse with each other and start new diploid-phase organisms. But to have a good start, the gametes ought to be big and full of food. This would make them slow, but an ingenious workaround was invented more than once: only one sex of gamete becomes big; the other sex stays small and easily mobile. Thus are born egg and sperm cells.
These were initially released into the environment, as algae and primitive land plants and many aquatic animals continue to do ("external fertilization").
But living on land has the hazard of drying out, so land plants and several groups of land animals have invented internal fertilization -- a pollen grain grows a tube that seeks out the egg cells -- the male inserts his sperm cells into the female, where they seek out her egg cells.
S: Sorry, it was rejection of God that brought about ToE...you're on the wrong track.
That assertion is nothing more than the excrement of the male bovine.
I've yet to see ANY evidence for it.
(edited to change a bit of wording)
[This message has been edited by lpetrich, 01-26-2003]

This message is a reply to:
 Message 1 by DanskerMan, posted 01-21-2003 10:57 AM DanskerMan has not replied

  
lpetrich
Inactive Member


Message 23 of 101 (30633)
01-30-2003 12:28 AM


Simia quam similis, turpissima bestia nobis
How like us is that very ugly beast, the monkey
-- Ennius, ~200 BCE
I confess freely to you, I could never look long upon a monkey, without very mortifying reflections
William Congreve, 1695
So, sonnikke, I suggest that you look long upon a monkey. More specifically, a chimpanzee. Of all the nonhuman species currently alive, chimps are the closest to our species, in anatomy, in genetics, and even in behavior.
Well, for one we have a spirit.
How does one distinguish between entities with spirits and entities without?
And if one judges from some people believe about their pets, dogs and cats also have spirits -- some people seem to believe that they will be accompanied in Heaven by their favorite pets.
Secondly, we bury our dead and THINK about mortality.
Thirdly, we have creativity and imagination beyond any animal (fine art, space shuttle, etc).

We can control fire, no animal can do that.
We make and use advanced tools.
However, chimps can construct a variety of tools, and there is some evidence that suggests that they can create mental models. Very few other species have that capability.
We can speak, and write, and communicate with each other in intelligent ways.
However, chimps can learn lots of signs, though they do not seem capable of constructing full-scale sentences.
We think about our brain.
Chimps can recognize themselves in mirrors, something that very few other species can do.
We have dominion over the animals.
De facto dominion, certainly; however, some species of ants maintain fungus gardens in their nests, and some maintain herds of aphids that they "milk".
We debate about things, like evolution, origins, etc.
So?
We are NOT animals. We are created in God's image.
However, as a wise man once said, if horses and cows and lions were to make pictures of the deities they worshipped, they would make pictures of horses and cows and lions, as the case may be.

  
lpetrich
Inactive Member


Message 36 of 101 (31051)
02-02-2003 2:11 PM


And if you look further, you will find that we are essentially an oddball species of African great ape.
Part of the confusion is what is meant by "animal". The term is sometimes used as an insult, to suggest nasty behavor. Also, "animal", when contrasted with "human" roughly means "nonsentient".
So we are animals sensu lato but not sensu stricto, as some taxonomists would say.

Replies to this message:
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lpetrich
Inactive Member


Message 50 of 101 (31203)
02-04-2003 1:46 AM


wehappyfew:
2. But the only unique evidence cited so far indicating that humans are NOT animals is the Word of Ecclesiastes that humans without God are merely animals.
Worse, I've read that part of Ecclesiastes, and there is no "without God" qualification -- we will end up like the animals, no matter what.
Furthermore, nobody really knows who that book's Preacher really is; like most of the rest of the Bible, its author(s) is/are anonymous.

  
lpetrich
Inactive Member


Message 57 of 101 (31616)
02-07-2003 12:16 AM


(Sonnikke on various human behavioral features)
These could easily be side effects of having very big brains for our body size. To see why, consider the history of artificial "brains" -- computers. As they get faster and more capacious, their users do more and more with them. To name just one example, the graphics of the computers I've used has gone from ASCII art to almost-photorealistic 3D in only 20 years (I had started out on Intimidating Big Machines, as I like to call them).
Some numbers:
Human: body: 50-100 kg, brain: 1300 g
Chimp: body: 40-60 kg, brain: 400 g
Wolf: body: 40-60 kg, brain: 120 g
Jaguar: body: 60-120 kg, brain: 160 g
Sheep: body: 60-100 kg, brain: 140 g
Alligator: body: 150-250 kg, brain: 8.2 g
Nurse Shark: body: 250 kg, brain: 32 g
Though:
Bottlenose Dolphin: body: 190-260 kg, brain: 1500 g
A case of independent evolution of a very big brain.
[This message has been edited by lpetrich, 02-07-2003]

  
lpetrich
Inactive Member


Message 58 of 101 (31625)
02-07-2003 12:45 AM


Sonnikke quoting someone:
But right away in its introduction this book is very careful to point out that what it records is not divine truth. It presents only the human view of life. ...
Except that the whole Bible is supposed to be the "Word of God". And why should one have to go through a whole lot of detective work to figure out the Bible's true meaning? Especially when an omnipotent being could communicate his/her/its full message directly to the consciousness of every human being who has ever lived.
You'll find that over and over, throughout the whole course of Ecclesiastes, one phrase is repeated again and again: "under the sun," "under the sun." (...)
So what? That might be taken as evidence of divine inspiration, since only an omnipotent being could presumably be confident in hypothesizing that "there is nothing new under the sun".
The bible is inspired by God, inerrant.
Including the Book of Ecclesiastes, our mortality and animal-like nature and all.
If you read ecclesiastes and don't come away with the fact that everything is meaningless WITHOUT God, then you didn't understand it (or chose not to understand it).
Except that it does NOT explicitly state any such thing. And I'm serious about the "explicit" part.
The commentaries were suggested to complement the reading for those who didn't understand.
Why should a revelation need a commentary?
Christian rejection of astronomy??? Have you lost your mind?
Remember what happened to Copernicus and Galileo. The Church had thought it OK to present heliocentrism, but only as an unsupported theory. Copernicus published his book only at the end of his life, and his friend Osiander penned an "only a theory" preface for it. Galileo, however, when warned that he ought to present heliocentrism as "only a theory", published a book which followed the letter, but not the spirit, of that approach. Which got the Pope's goat, for whatever reason. And Galileo was forced to recant heliocentrism.
Early Protestants were no better. Martin Luther pointed out which heavenly bodies Joshua told to stop moving, and John Calvin pointed out that the Bible states that the Earth is stationary in some cosmic sense.
Nobody's rejecting ecclesiastes, it is part of God's inspired word, to show us how futile MAN's thinking is.
First, we are carbon copies of the Almighty, and then we are evil worms who can never do anything right. Which is it, O Sonnikke?
A question for you in closing, and this is actually for all evo's...I've always wanted to know what you will say that day, when you stand before Christ at the judgement seat, and you realize that you were wrong, but now it's too late. What will you say?
Pure Pascalian merde de taureau.
In the language that Pascal had spoken.

Replies to this message:
 Message 71 by DanskerMan, posted 02-13-2003 12:52 AM lpetrich has replied

  
lpetrich
Inactive Member


Message 74 of 101 (32176)
02-13-2003 9:56 PM
Reply to: Message 71 by DanskerMan
02-13-2003 12:52 AM


sonnikke:
... Ironically, the traditional beliefs that Galileo opposed ultimately belonged to Aristotle, not to biblical exegesis. ...
However, Martin Luther pointed out which cosmic objects that Joshua had stopped in order to win one of his battles. And those object do NOT include the Earth. And John Calvin pointed out what the Psalms state about the motions of the Earth. And in case you weren't aware, O Sonnikke, Martin Luther and John Calvin were two of the founders of Protestantism.
There are always two sides to every story.
Bull excrement.
me:
First, we are carbon copies of the Almighty, and then we are evil worms who can never do anything right. Which is it, O Sonnikke?
Where is this accusation coming from?
Creation allegedly in god's likeness, and Original Sin.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 71 by DanskerMan, posted 02-13-2003 12:52 AM DanskerMan has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 75 by DanskerMan, posted 02-20-2003 9:36 AM lpetrich has replied

  
lpetrich
Inactive Member


Message 82 of 101 (32814)
02-21-2003 10:57 AM
Reply to: Message 75 by DanskerMan
02-20-2003 9:36 AM


From Sonnikke's posting:
quote:
S:There are always two sides to every story.
Ip:Bull excrement.
--------------------
There are not two sides to every story? Please show how this is bull excrement.
And what was your point? That the Church was justified in making Galileo recant heliocentrism?

This message is a reply to:
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lpetrich
Inactive Member


Message 83 of 101 (32815)
02-21-2003 11:31 AM
Reply to: Message 76 by DanskerMan
02-20-2003 9:46 AM


As to Biblical astronomy, much of it is clarified by the noncanonical book 1 Enoch. According to it:
  • The Earth is flat.
  • The sky is a solid bowl overhead.
  • The Sun, Moon, and stars move inside of it along its surface.
  • When a celestial body sets, it goes through a door in the bowl, goes along the outer edge, goes through another door in the bowl, and then rises.
  • The Sun has different doors to rise and set through for different times of year.
  • The stars are animate objects; there is a jail for stars that dawdle.
Although 1 Enoch is fairly reasonable about directly-observable aspects, like the Sun's different rising and setting azimuths during the year and circumpolar stars, it is less reasonable about other aspects, making Ptolemy's cosmology seem relatively reasonable. While 1 Enoch does not have any reasonable explanation for the stars moving in lockstep, Ptolemy does.
Sonnikke:
"In many ways, the historic controversy of creation vs. evolution has been similar to Galileo's conflict, only with a reversal of roles. ...
GALILEO - What is the lesson that Christians should learn from Galileo? - ChristianAnswers.Net
Crackpots have long been fond of comparing themselves to Galileo.
Incidentally, I'm curious about your motives behind studying IC and ID, you seem to have read alot of Demski and Behe, what is your goal?
Let him speak for himself. And the same question can be asked about creationists and evolution -- why are they so obsessed with the idea of evolution? Could it be that creationists unconsciously know that evolution is true?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 76 by DanskerMan, posted 02-20-2003 9:46 AM DanskerMan has replied

Replies to this message:
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lpetrich
Inactive Member


Message 86 of 101 (32853)
02-22-2003 1:23 AM


I think that Sonnikke's most recent comments are Pascalian merde de taureau.
However, I think that I can out-Pascal him.
Sonnikke dies, and then an angel decides to give him a look at the history of his ancestors. The tour goes OK for the first 100,000-200,000 years ago, despite the absence of Noah's Flood and the Tower of Babel incident. But as the angel travels further backwards in time, Sonnikke notices something disquieting -- his ancestors start getting a bit simian. And less capable of language and fancy tool making. The angel travels further, and Sonnikke watches his ancestors get more and more simian, becoming upright-walking apes, and then not much different from Bonzo the Chimp. The angel tells him that that's evolution in action -- descent with modification -- and describes how delighted Charles Darwin had been to go on a similar tour.

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lpetrich
Inactive Member


Message 100 of 101 (34734)
03-20-2003 3:39 AM
Reply to: Message 90 by DanskerMan
03-18-2003 9:23 AM


Sonnikke:
According to the Creation model God created male and female (humans & animals) and told them to be fruitful and multiply. Is that what we observe? yes.
No, that is an extrapolation from an observation. The same could be said for any other creation story. Let's consider the Old Norse creation story in the Eddas. According to it, the familiar Universe was created from the dismembered body of the slain giant Ymir. Let's see how it adds up.
Ymir's skull becomes the sky. Both have a round-vault sort of appearance. Check.
Ymir's brain becomes the clouds. Both have a puffy appearance. Check.
Ymir's blood becomes the sea. Both are salty. Check.
Ymir's flesh becomes the soil. Both are relatively soft. Check.
Ymir's bones become the hills and mountains. Both are mineral. Check.
Ymir's hair becomes the vegetation. Both grow out of some substrate. Check.
So let us worship Odin and Thor and Freyja and so forth.
According to Creation there were two sexes created, is that what we observe? yes.
Except that there are many organisms that are hermaphroditic and many that reproduce asexually at least part of the time. And body cells reproduce asexually nearly all the time.
According to Creation male and female were made to compliment each other and be attracted to each other, is that what we observe? yes.
That's a necessary part of sexual reproduction, so all one can say is so what?
According to ToE there was one common ancestor and no specification as to how many sexes, why are there only two?
Except that some protists and fungi have more than two sexes or "mating types" -- which are often identical except for certain recognition molecules ("isogamy"). According to this review, basidiomycete fungi can have thousands of mating types -- thousands of sexes!
According to ToE even *if* two sexes had evolved simultaneously, which is impossible,
Actually, there is an easy way for that to happen. The first sexually-reproducing organisms could have been only one sex -- they would have been protists (one-celled eukaryotes) that do a haploid/diploid alternation, with any haploid individual being able to fuse with any other haploid individual to make a diploid one.
After that process is up and running, the next thing to appear would be some mechanism for preventing inbreeding -- mating types. If a protist discovers that another protist has its flavor of the recognition molecules, it will not fuse with that other protist.
but for the sake of argument, assuming they "fit" and that their reproductive systems complimented each other (the details of which are so complex that that alone would blow the theory out of the water),
Except that "mating types" are some sort of molecular recognition mechanism, something like how the immune system works.
And the complexities that Sonnikke obsesses about can easily be produced after the original sexual reproduction gets started; I had earlier explained some straightforward pathways for producing them.
they would have to *acquire* a desire for each other which is not a heritable trait and thus doesn't explain why men and women are attracted to each other.
Except that such a "desire" is genetically programmed -- one sex or both seeks out the other. A common mechanism is for one or both sexes to produce pheromones and the other sex to track them down. Usually, it is the female that produces the pheromones and the male that does the seeking, generally because males have lighter gametes than females. A more passive form of seeking is employed by pollen grains, which get blown or carried to pistils; pollen grains are much lighter than ovules.
Furthermore, our species has a LOT of evolution behind it; our species should not be mistaken for some early Proterozoic protist.
[This message has been edited by lpetrich, 03-20-2003]

This message is a reply to:
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