Finches named for Darwin are evolving

Say what? Creationists proposed the idea of natural selection? And Darwin and Wallace did not cite them? The fiends! You are going to have to provide a citation for such an extraordinary claim. And in your very first post, too! Congratulations! This will absolutely rock the scientific world!

Yes, right down to the extraordinary claims that can't be documented. (Creationists thought up the theory of natural selection before Darwin, according to Murky)

No you didn't. Darwin's theory of natural selection encompasses a lot more then mere "survival of the fittest" and a lot more then evolution. Darwin's contribution was to show how natural selection serves as a mechanism for evolution. No one else except maybe Wallace gets the credit for that, and even Wallace did not develop the concept with example after example from direct observation of nature the way that Darwin did. In particular, Darwin developed the concept of "sexual selection" and noted that it was not enough to "survive", one also had to reproduce. So Darwin's concept of the "fittest" included differential reproduction. In other words, Darwin put all of the pieces together. There is a good reason why we don't talk about "Blythism" or "Wellsism" or "Matthewsism" or "Huttonism" or even "Wallaceism." Darwin rightly gets the credit, as much as AIG would like to deny it. What you are saying would be like saying that Watson and Crick don't deserve the credit for describing the structure of DNA because others came up with all of the the structures of nucleic acids. But only Watson and Crick showed how the nucleic acids went together and could replicate themselves. The same is true for Darwin and natural selection. AIG is not a reliable source for describing how Darwin's ideas were developed because they have a vested interest in discrediting Darwin and promoting creationists. AIG is also notorious for the use of selective out of context quotes from evolutionists to buttress their claims. If you are going to rely on them you will not have a happy time here. Besides, this issue has been hashed over by modern evolutionary biologists, including Stephen J. Gould. They have no vested interest in protecting Darwin. It is the IDEA, not the man that they are interested in promoting, so they would want the credit to be rightly placed. And Gould and the others (except Loren Eisley, whose research on the issue Gould decisively discredits) come down soundly on the side of Darwin. No offence but I trust the research abilities of Gould over AIG any day. Gould's take on the whole issue here: (thanks to MangyTiger for the link) Darwin's precursors and influences: 4. Natural selection

This is another historical non fact from AIG. Huxley defended Darwin, sure, but Darwin's work stood the test of time long after Huxley and Darwin were gone. It is ludicrous to suggest that the popularity of Darwin into the 21st century is a result of his friendship with Huxley in the nineteenth century. Scientific ideas stand or fall on their own. They don't need publicists. Wegener's IDEA of Continental Drift was originally derided and rightly so because he proposed a ludicrous mechanism. However, a plausible mechanism (plate tectonics) was discovered later on and the IDEA of Continental Drift was revived. And no one would suggest that the credit for plate tectonics should go to Wegener. That would be the equivalent of giving Blythe the credit for Darwinism.Edited by deerbreh, : posted prematurely

This is not quite correct. The term Neo-Darwinism usually refers to the syynthesis of Darwinism with the genetic insights of Mendel and the heredity understanding of Wallace. "Neo" actually refers to the insight that Wallace had about heredity being the basis of transferring traits to the next generation which was confirmed by Mendalian genetics. So the addition of a heredity mechanism is new in terms of what Darwin understood. Mutation is of course necessary to generate genetic variation but Mendalian genetics did not initially include the concept of mutation and Wallace certainly knew nothing about mutation so it is kind of a stretch to say that the Neo of NeoDarwinism is mutation. http://www.biocrawler.com/encyclopedia/Neodarwinism

Staying away from Answers in Genesis would be a good place to start because that will get you nothing but trouble here, as it is like shooting fish in a barrel for the evolutionists.

Uh, you left out the rest of my argument. No one denies that Gould is an evolutionary biologist. But it is the IDEA he is going to defend, not the man. He has no vested interest in defending Darwin from the charge of plagiarism, why would he? And note that even on the IDEA, he broke with Darwin somewhat by promoting the "puctuated equilibrium" theory, which deviated from Darwin's notion of gradual, incremental evolution.

Huh? I responded to a post by MurkyWaters. I have no idea what your point was so how could I be responding to it?Edited by deerbreh, : left off quote

This is faulty reasoning. I am not setting myself up as a source of information on Darwin - AIG does set themselves up as a source on creation and evolution issues. If I make a logical observation with the relevant citations my bias does not enter into it. And by the way, I have no reason to defend Darwin, contrary to your assertions. I do believe he was mostly correct in his evolutionary theory, yes, but if it could be shown that he stole the idea from someone else, it would not change my belief that his ideas were correct, I just would not attribute them to him anymore. On the other hand, AIG has a vested interest in discrediting Darwin because many creationists have the mistaken idea that if they somehow discredit Darwin as a person, it will reflect negatively on Darwinism the idea. Hence the nonsense that some have promulgated that Darwin recanted his theory on his deathbed. It is kind of like saying that if we prove that Henry Ford was anti-Jewish (which he was), it means that his method of mass producing cars on an assembly line was somehow flawed. Or that if we show that Ford got his idea for assembly line production from someone else, it means that his way of producing cars that way was flawed. Of course that is all nonsense, Ford's application of the assembly line for automobile production stands on its own merits (and there were flaws in Ford's approach) independent of Ford's anti-semitism or where he may have gotton the idea for assembly line production.

And Joe McCarthy had a list of Commie pinkos right there in his coat pocket. I won't hold my breath, as I hate fainting.

Post away by all means. You are entertaining in the way of the end timers setting dates for the rapture that come and go. I for one would give my eye teeth to see the theory of evolution falsified in my lifetime. If it is going to happen I want to be around to see it. But as I noted in the other post, I am not holding my breath.Edited by deerbreh, : edit quote codes