The Sex Life of 747 Aircraft

I'm proposing this topic so it can be referred to anytime anyone brings up the 747 in a junkyard strawman (or any other arguments like Paley's watch).This particular one was triggered by: I'll present a short comment on what is wrong with this argument and then a slightly longer one.1) 747's don't f**k!2) The analogy is a complete straw man if it is intended to be an argument against evolutionary theory because it doesn't represent in any way what evolutionary theory is saying.It suggests that evolution is a random process and this isn't true. The analogy leaves out the mechanism of natural selection. It is wonderfully ironic when a poster puts "but refuse to look at other theories" and this strawman in the same paragraph. (The poster may be disappointed to discover that most of the "evilutionists" here have studied his theories more than he has. I'd suggest that any poster wanting to use this argument explain why they think it applies and then we can discuss it further here.

But why do you believe that?It is not a leap of faith to suggest that while we are not the result of accident (that is a misunderstanding of the process) we are also not the result of the kind of design process that produced the 747.We have run various experiments in design by evolutionary processes. The "designs" produced have characteristics that are like us but not like the 747. This work is evidence for (and therefore not needing faith) that we are the product of evolutionary processes and not of human-like (the only kind we know) design.The process that produced the 747 should not be called an "evolutionary process" when comparing it to biological evolution. The two processes are very, very different.ABE
for a bit more discussion see --Message 7 and
Message 16 blowing my own horn here Edited by NosyNed, : a bit more

You use the term "evolution" for aircraft and for living things. However, as was pointed out, the two processes are very different.Just saying they are both "evolution" only confuses the issue.I'll use bevolution (for biological evolution) and sevolution (for changes of designs).747s have the attributes of things that under went an sevolutionary process they do NOT have the attributes of things that come from a bevolutionary process.Humans have characteristics that are produced by bevolution and NOT by sevolution.You didn't answer the fact that we can actually produce evolutionary designs (bevolution) and they are NOT like things we design at all.There is no grounds for suggesting that humans are a result of design evolution because of these facts.You may offer up Collin's explanation for his views if you think they are germane. As I recall he simply believes that all of creation was kicked off by his god and that living things did, in fact, evolve (bevolve) through biological processes and that humans do not show specific signs of intelligent design. Just that the universe is set up so that it is possible. If he says otherwise I'd like to see his arguments in support of his views.

Which, for now, I have no argument with. Therefore Collins has no argument with evolutionary biology at all. Maybe he has a disagreement with the gaps in our knowledge in the area of cosmology.Within the context of this thread then he and I are in agreement. Since you quoted him I presume you are too.He and I may then disagree about the initial formation of the universe and it's physical laws but then my rational answer is "I don't know" so it is hard to be in disagreement even there.The danger is that sounds an awful lot like God of the Gaps and we might yet close that gap too.

I think we are wandering rather far from the original topic.Please take these questions to somewhere else.

Living things don't develop any traits because they recognize they "need to". Living things, through mutations, develop huge numbers of traits. Almost all of them very close to the traits the species had in the previous generation.A very large number of these "traits" (changes from the previous generation) are weeded out immediately. We see this in humans were something like half are conceived with "traits" that cause them to never be born.Every animals carries slight differences within it. Every one!None of them "know" that they need them, none of them developed them through any need. They were just something that appeared and gets a try at seeing how it does. Some do well and become the new normal in subsequent generations.So living things have characteristics that have proven to be necessary or good for reproducing abundantly. That is the nature of the selective sieve. It isn't that they got them because they were good for reproduction it is that they kept them because they were good for reproduction.This applies to traits for speed, defense and, of course, reproducing well.Trees come from some billions of years of organisms that reproduced. Obviously they couldn't have come from organisms that didn't reproduce ! They've had time to filter out a lot of different ways of doing that and have kept the better ones.Of course, reproduction is itself one of the basic definitions of what it is to be alive. Chemicals that "reproduced" 3 and a half some billion years ago are the ones that became more common than ones that didn't.Plants didn't come up with the methods they reproduce with now by "luck". Luck is when you buy one lottery ticket and it wins. Living things don't do that so they aren't depending on "luck". They buy all the available lottery tickets (or at least a heck of a lot of them) each generation. Then they keep the ones that win. I don't call this "luck" in the way we usually use the word.Humans for example try something up to as many as 30 billion some new "tickets" each generation.

Perhaps you should have read and quoted the whole paragraph from the OP. From that it is clear that the unknown poster was using at as an argument against evolution. In fact, maybe you should read up on the history of this particular analogy.It was originally used, I believe, as an argument against abiogenesis. That was discussed earlier in the thread. And since then it has been used (over, and over, and over, and over) as an argument against evolution.You are implying exactly the same argument in your statement: It is possible that you have a "747" idea of reproduction looking at how things reproduce now. We see in the lab that very simple chemicals can reproduce themselves which might be equivalent to a falling leaf compared to a 747 as a flying vehicle.You may think it is a slim chance but you have no basis in knowledge for calculating a chance. In fact, it is still unknown what the chances are for chemicals to become reproducing entities. It may be, indeed, very slim but that doesn't preclude it from happening somewhere. It may also be that it is almost a sure thing once conditions meet some set of requirements. We don't know the odds of those requirements being met either.You are arguing against evolution when you say "one slight change at a time". It is only abiogenesis that we are uncertain about the chances of.It is very clear that different reproductive strategies can arise "one slight change at a time" because we see a near continuum of different strategies in living things alive now. It is your lack of familiarity with biology that makes you think the chances of evolution working to build lots of different reproduction methods is low. You are making a judgment on too little knowledge.

--- my emphasisI would agree wholeheartedly!But evolution doesn't try to build any one anything. It produces kajillions of different things. The chances of any one having cropped up might well be low. (for somethings: eye like things e.g., the chances appear to be not so low).In fact, they may well be much lower than we can begin to estimate. There is all that unexplored territory out there. All the various body plans and living methods that didn't get stumbled over or couldn't be reached "one slight change at a time" from where life was are produce a huge range of possibilities and reduce the chances of any one, particular one to be pretty darned low.