Evolution: a red herring?

Actually, I don't. Yeah, never heard it before.Can you explain to me exactly what phenomenon you purport to describe with the term "macroevolution"?

Let's put it this way. If I had a series of dated photographs showing me standing in front of a car parked in front of the nation's national monuments, would any of those photographs show me at the wheel of my car, in motion, like a video tape?No, of course not; that's not what photographs are able to record. But such a collection of pictures would be proof that I had driven from one side of the country to the other - and, indeed, if you laid the photos out in chronological order, you could tell about where I had started and where I had ended, even though none of those pictures showed me driving on the road - the transition, in other words.Fossils are evidence of evolution because they show the various species that evolution has acted on over time. They don't, of course, show one creature changing into another, because that's not how evolution works. How about the various species of Protocaptorhinus? Any of those species would qualify. Indeed; multiple thousands of such species are known.

I don't understand what you mean by "higher" and "lower."Is a dog higher than a beaver? Is a bird higher than an iguana? Or is an iguana higher than an alligator, and if so, why? Is fungus higher than bacteria, or the other way around?I think you'll find that most of your misunderstandings about biology come from the fact that you apply a great deal of your own prejudices to your understanding of the world of living things.

Absolutely we can. For instance, we could design an experiment to test whether or not organisms inherited any of their traits from their parents. If this was not true, evolution would be impossible.Your problem is, you've confused the fact that evolution does not appear to be false with the idea that it's somehow not falsifiable. That's simply untrue - evolution could be disproven; it just hasn't been. That's exactly what we should expect for a theory that is essentially accurate. I'm not sure why you're hung up on "genus", which after all is a completely arbitrary taxonomic classification (which may or may not be relevant to evolution.) Certainly we've observed the evolution of new genera, and we certainly see from the fossil record that it has happened many times in the past. And obviously it has happened at least once for every genera we're currently aware of. Feline never did evolve into Canine, so it's not clear how this consistutes any sort of rebuttal for evolution. Why? You act like changing your mind and position to suit new evidence as it is uncovered is a bad thing, or is somehow dishonest. What could be more honest than admitting error and correcting it? Well, wait a minute. Is the creator outside of science, or not? How is it that you managed to directly contradict yourself in the space of a paragraph?

Because you found new evidence that prompted you to do so. Why wouldn't you? I still don't understand your objection. What, start from scratch every time you learned something new? That sounds like a bunch of wasted time and effort. And what if portions of your old model were still accurate? Why throw the baby out with the bathwater? I think you'll find that no scientist does that - the laws of physics are accepted as useful approximations of whatever principles truly underly behavior in the universe. There's a difference between the map and the territory, in other words. I accept laws one through three, as a matter of fact, because they make accurate predictions about behavior of heat in the universe. But I doubt you even have an accurate understanding of what those laws say, because you're about to use them as a proof of God. That alone is sufficient evidence that you don't understand thermodynamics - the study of the movement of heat. What could heat possibly have to do with gods?

But that's exactly the case - you don't understand thermodynamics.Thermodynamics are the statistical rules that govern thermodynamic systems. Nether the first, second, nor third laws makes any reference to the creation of universes. Since absolutely none of this follows from the first law as understood by either chemists or physicists, I have to conclude that you do not understand thermodynamics, and that you're probably lying about your credentials. There's no evidence for God. That's the proof he doesn't exist; the same as it's proof that fairies don't exist, unicorns don't exist, and there are no such things as elves. There's no faith required to be an atheist, which you would know if you had ever talked to any of them.But I guess you don't seem to have a problem taking ideological positions on subjects you are completely ignorant of.

No, no, not gene therapy - genetic programming:

quote:

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Genetic programming (GP) is a patented[1] automated methodology inspired by biological evolution to find computer programs that perform a user-defined task. Therefore it is a machine learning technique that uses an evolutionary algorithm to optimize a population of computer programs according to a fitness landscape determined by a program's ability to perform a given computational task. The first experiments with GP were reported by Stephen F. Smith (1980)[2] and Nichael L. Cramer (1985),[3] as described in the famous book Genetic Programming: On the Programming of Computers by Means of Natural Selection by John Koza (1992).

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Genetic programming - WikipediaIn other words, the use of mechanisms you claim don't work to produce exactly what you claim they can't produce - complex structures and programs. Wrong about what? I'd say, at this point, it's pretty much impossible to honestly doubt the fact that organisms inherit traits from their parents, that mechanisms of genetic replication are not completely perfect, and that a given population tends to produce more offspring than can be expected to survive in their environment.And as long as those things remain true, you'll have random mutation and natural selection, and therefore evolution. There's no more a possibility that evolution is wrong than the laws of chemistry are wrong. Which is not to say that it's impossible, but just extremely unlikely. Nobody here is accepting it without question. Evolution has been constantly tested for a century, now, and it's met every challenge. Don't confuse the fact that we've been convinced for some kind of lack of skepticism on our part. I used to be a creationist who refused to accept evolution. There was nobody who was more of an evolution doubter than I.But I was convinced by the evidence. As was everybody else. The only reason you haven't, yet, is because you're largely ignorant of what that evidence is. There are plenty of creationists around here. But even they know better than to advance the grade-school level of argumentation you've been presenting. The bar for science is set pretty high around here, and excuse me for saying that you aren't meeting it.

The fact that I can read, and see that neither the first, second, nor third laws refer in any way to the creation of universes? I don't see how what I could tell you would possibly matter. I mean I'm sure I could invent some very impressive educational credentials indeed, but without my real name (which I won't provide), you won't be able to verify them. And you knowing what schools I went to and what subjects I studied wouldn't make my arguments any more correct than they already are. Well, properly understood the research, for one thing. And I haven't tried to misrepresent physical law to promote my religion, either. I expect you to argue from the evidence, as I am. Our backgrounds are irrelevant to that. But you insist on arguing from your own anonymous authority. Can you understand why I fail to find that compelling, especially when you say things that I know are wrong? But we have looked; we've looked exactly where God is supposed to be. God is supposed to be everywhere at once, remember? But the fact that he's not anywhere we've ever looked is sufficient to prove that that god doesn't exist. Of course, you could redefine God to change the criteria, but how does that bear any relationship to truthfinding?The proof that god does not exist is the fact that the only evidence ever brought forward is based on make-believe. The proof is that god has the same morphology as other things that are mythical, and is nothing at all like anything that is real and exists. Since this is a science forum, let's stick with the definition of "first law of thermodnyamics." Can you show me where that law refers to the creation of universes being possible only by God? This is true. But to conclude from this fact that any willy-nilly process - like just making things up - produces truth is incorrect. Science is not the sole path to truth. But not all paths lead to truth, and religious revelation, theology, and woowoo thinking are such paths.