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Author Topic:   Biological classification vs 'Kind'
Modulous
Member
Posts: 7801
From: Manchester, UK
Joined: 05-01-2005


(1)
Message 166 of 385 (563409)
06-04-2010 7:07 PM
Reply to: Message 160 by BobTHJ
06-04-2010 5:28 PM


a deeper understanding
Of course....this is what I meant. Using the word "visible" was a poor choice on my part.
Excellent, I didn't think you had actually made that kind of error, but it's always good to be sure
According to your quote you are correct - it seems I mixed the terms. My apologies.
Apology accepted, though I did not require one. You have my respect, for what that's worth, for your speedy admission of error.
Your first sentence is speculative opinion. Mine is the opposite.
It is certainly opinion. However you opinion that it is 'speculative' is the only thing that is speculative, since you do not know upon what grounds I made the claim - since I did not specify them.
So, I see that chimps and humans can't synthesize vitamin C. The observation is that the reasons for this lie in the fact that there is a gene used for synthesizing vitamin C in both species but that it is broken by a mutation. The same mutation in both species.
What deep understanding can bariminology give us for this observation?
I would be interested in reviewing successful predictions made by common ancestry - as I am constantly in search of data that might invalide the YEC model (I have yet to find any - but I'm keeping an open mind).
Good to hear.
Well, take the above example. We discovered scurvy first. This occurred when sailors were at sea. The observation was just 'one of those things' for a while. Then we observed that eating certain fruits can stave of scurvy. So people began to think that a way to make sense of these two observations was that scurvy was caused by a nutritional deficiency that the fruit is a source of.
Then we discovered that some primates, for example Chimps, could get scurvy too.
So one explanation for this is common ancestry of those primates.
Then we discovered that Guinea Pigs could get scurvy. But we don't propose to have a common ancestor with Guinea Pigs and not rats. Since rats don't get scurvy. So there is a problem.
So here comes the prediction. If common ancestry of primates were true, and if the Guinea Pigs are more closely related to rats than they are to us and if other species don't generally get scurvy, then we should expect to find that there is a gene for vitamin C production in Guinea Pigs and humans and chimps but that it has been mutated sp as to no longer produce vitamin C. Not only that but we predict that the mutation(s) in the primate genes would share a similar pattern since it is thought that it was their common ancestor that first had the mutation(s) and they have inherited the same mutation(s) (though there may be difference due to subsequent mutations).
And finally we predict that the Guinea Pig mutation would be quite different and there be no reason to suppose that Guinea Pigs inherited the mutation from the common ancestor from primates.
You know the result before I say it, because why else would I bring it up?
There are plenty more. For example, if we were to compare any number of genes from Placental Moles and Marsupial Moles along with Kangaroos, humans, mice and alligators -- then we'd expect to find Placental Moles have a genome closer in appearance to Humans than they do to Marsupial Moles (despite their physical similarities) to abide by the common ancestry understanding derived from fossil records and anatomical studies.
Guess what?
Bariminology has no such history of predictions.
here is a more detailed video overview - it's 6 minutes long and is quite watchable.
Quite true. Psalm 19:1 - The heavens are telling the glory of God; and the firmament proclaims his handiwork.
Well I'm glad you accept that you might be fallible but I fail to see the point of citing poetry? Actually, of course, I do know. You think that the evidence (the heavens/firmament) is staring us in the face. But then - that's just the personal opinion of a long dead poet and that should be remembered.
The question is - was he right?
Not sure where you're going with this. Are you trying to imply that baraminology is an ancient science only? Modern baraminologists would disagree with you.
I'm saying the concept of 'created kinds' is an ancient one based on very rudimentary observations, and the concept has been much improved by classification schemes based on much more precise data than looking around the Fertile Crescent.
I'm sure there are all sorts of modern day people studying outdated, falsified and crazy ideas based on 'ancient wisdom' that would disagree with modern new fangled 'medicine' and 'orbital mechanics' and 'relativity' etc.
The question is, does trying to apply modern observation equipment to the 'science' of 'barminology' yield any useful results or deeper understanding? Or do they just say 'bariminology predicts that kinds will produce offspring 'after their kind', so we'll try and find examples of that kind of thing'?
I'd certainly like to see some good examples of bariminology but all I've seen is pointless nonsense promising breakthroughs any moment with a few erroneous criticisms of evolution thrown in for effect. So please, if you know of something substantive, I'd like to see it.
So when exactly would it cease to be premature? What would be required for you and other darwinists to accept a supernatural cause for a natural phenomena?
I have no idea what a 'supernatural cause' is and how we would tell there had been one. Nor am I a 'darwinist'. I'm just a guy that heard someone say that evolution was falsified by the 2nd law of thermodynamics so I excitedly began to study the subject to find out more. I quickly learned that evolution was on much stronger evidential ground than I had originally suspected - though understanding what was being claimed by the two broad camps took a lot of time and supplementary reading.
Anyway, there are plenty of scenarios in which an intelligent designer would not be a premature conclusion. As an extreme example, if NASA landed on Mars and found a Tabernacle with an ark containing all the blueprints for designing terrestrial life, with some HD-DVDs of the creation event and it was all in Ancient Hebrew, English and Chinese - I'd not consider the conclusion that life on earth was designed was premature.
Basically, if someone found evidence that there was a designer, then it wouldn't be premature to conclude that there was a designer. "I can think of no other way than to invoke a mysterious agent." is not evidence of a mysterious agent. It's just giving up. Be glad the police do not use this methodology: "Well I can't figure out how a robber can break into the shop, kill the manager, steal the goods and not be seen by any witnesses...so we're clearly looking for an invisible robber."
And a rabbit in the Cambrian would at least call common ancestry into serious question.
Your use of the word premature is humorous, considering the mythology of most every ancient culture on earth contains a creation story (in many cases bearing striking similarity to each other).
There are more differences than similarities between creation stories. But they do tend to start with something unformed that then becomes formed - but that's how we classify them as creation stories.
Almost every ancient culture has myths about diseases. All of them are wrong. So the argument from ancient culture is not one I think is valid to rest upon.
the concept of a naturalistic origin is both recent and laughable considering there isn't a shred of evidence supporting it.
Clearly your view is that there isn't a shred of evidence supporting it, and clearly my view is that multiple independent lines of evidence all converge on natural explanations for the origin of species, the origins of phyla, the origin of life and the origin of matter.
What surprises me is that you think recent ideas are somewhat lesser than older ones. Surely if the modern era has taught us anything its that we got a lot of things wrong in the past, and fantastic things are possible when we get them right (disease, communications, travel, sanitation etc).
I have a thread that explains why I have confidence in evolution, feel free to check it out and participate - Confidence in evolutionary science
Edited by Modulous, : No reason given.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 160 by BobTHJ, posted 06-04-2010 5:28 PM BobTHJ has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 216 by BobTHJ, posted 06-07-2010 9:27 PM Modulous has replied

  
Percy
Member
Posts: 22391
From: New Hampshire
Joined: 12-23-2000
Member Rating: 5.2


Message 167 of 385 (563426)
06-04-2010 8:10 PM
Reply to: Message 161 by BobTHJ
06-04-2010 5:32 PM


Re: Away for the Weekend
BobTHJ writes:
Sorry everyone - I didn't have time yet to respond to each post which warranted a response. I do intend to do so, but will be away for the weekend. I'll try and get back to this on Monday.
Hi Bob! Just wanted to say that since few of your sentences don't invite multitudes of responses, its possible you might return Monday to find far more responses than any non-obsessive/compulsive could ever answer (I know I'll be doing my part if I can find the time). If that happens then don't feel the need to reply to every message, especially since many people are probably telling you the same thing.
Also note that at the bottom of responses to you is a link that says, "BobTHJ has not yet responded." Click on it and it magically becomes, "BobTHJ acknowledges this reply." Poof, like that, you're done!
--Percy

This message is a reply to:
 Message 161 by BobTHJ, posted 06-04-2010 5:32 PM BobTHJ has replied

Replies to this message:
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Otto Tellick
Member (Idle past 2330 days)
Posts: 288
From: PA, USA
Joined: 02-17-2008


Message 168 of 385 (563463)
06-05-2010 1:46 AM
Reply to: Message 116 by BobTHJ
06-03-2010 1:21 PM


Re: Getting down to details
Hi Bob. Thanks for the detailed response. Lots to cover there... Let's start with this:
BobTHJ writes:
Wood's classification algorithm separated homonids into groupings of humans and apes. Au. africanus didn't fit neatly into either group. Wood's conclusion from the data is that Au. africanus is in a third group by itself. Matzke's conclusions from the data is that Au. africanus is a transitional form between the groups. This seems to me to be a clear case of both scientists acting upon their bias - which in this case makes a lot of sense as it appears neither conclusion is more reasonable than the other (unless considered with bias). In the end the data is not conclusive enough to show either interpretation to be correct.
To say that "both sides are showing bias" is to do serious violence to the meaning of "bias". Actually, this term tends to be used in so many ways with so many nuances that we should drop it completely when comparing scientists and YECs. Consider: I can honestly say that people who engage in rational, objective research are biased against unfounded assertions and vague generalizations, and I doubt that any of the people I'm referring to (the scientists) would dispute my statement. (They might express a preference for saying it in a different and more direct way, like "we do not accept unfounded assertions...") I can also say honestly that religious apologists are biased against any factual findings that contradict or diminish their articles of faith, and there's no shortage of evidence to support this claim. I am therefore able to agree with your statement that both sides are "biased", while disagreeing completely with your intent. This word doesn't help the discussion.
But the important thing here is to clarify the contrast between Wood and Matzke -- that is, between the two approaches that they represent. Wood begins with a hypothesis that the fossils of interest should fall into two clearly distinct groups: human and non-human. It turns out that the evidence does not fully support this hypothesis. There is one group that is clearly "human" and another group that is not, but then a third set of fossils turns out to share characteristics of both of those other groups, and doesn't fall clearly into one or the other.
If you say "well then, this is a third distinct group", you are (a) admitting that the initial hypothesis was wrong, and (b) misinterpreting the results rather badly, because this "third group" doesn't actually have any traits unique unto itself that make it different -- it simply has a distinct combination of the traits found in the other two groups. (That was the basis for Wood's "experiment": grouping fossils based on differentially shared traits.)
Please note that nothing in what I've explained so far has anything to do with "bias"; this is a simple, clear-cut, evidence-based progression from hypothesis to conclusion, and Wood is to be commended for being very clear about the evidence he used. The conclusion is simply that the hypothesis fails because it doesn't account for all the evidence. (No apologies or apologetics needed; this can happen to anybody.)
Now, Matzke's review of Wood didn't actually lay out the details of the evolutionary account for this same set of fossils -- that information is available elsewhere: several good urls are provided under the "Paleoanthropology" heading on the Panda's Thumb links page (NB: this heading is about two-thirds down from the top of a very long page full of many fascinating things). For example this one (chronology view) and this one (line-of-descent view). I'm sure there are even better ones to be found (I've seen them cited and quoted here at EvC over the last couple years).
Additional resources are easy enough to google, but beware: sources like AiG, Inst. for Creationist Whatever, and your good buddy Jay Wile are likely to show up using the same terms, but do not present the evolutionary account with any degree of accuracy or coherence. Whether deliberately or by plain incompetence, they get it wrong.
As for the large number of sites that present the information accurately, please don't waste time asserting that this is a "conspiracy". The facts and explanations arise from detailed debates and critical reviews about data collection methods, analytic procedures, and the logical consistency of conclusions. Researchers don't just make this stuff up, and presenters and publishers don't just buy it wholesale.
But getting back to the evolutionary explanation for those fossils, there's one more crucial point: this approach takes into consideration the temporal and geographical relationships among the various fossils -- something that is entirely missing from Wood's analysis. Naturally, this cuts to another core issue in the YEC "controversy": the reliability of dating methods. As I hope you know by now, there is a whole forum at EvC devoted to dating methods, and I highly recommend RAZD's detailed but quite approachable discussions about how independent results from a wide variety of distinct methods are found converge on consistent findings across time scales that far exceed YEC boundaries. (The Panda's Thumb link page cited above, and the older TalkOrigins web site also have lots of useful information about why YEC objections to dating methods fall flat, and why the YEC time scale is utterly, pathetically untenable.)
Not only does the evolutionary explanation provide a consistent account for all the gradations of features displayed by all the fossil evidence, but its account is also consistent with the temporal relations among the fossils, which have been established and confirmed by multiple independent measurements of both the fossils themselves and the materials in which they were embedded when they were uncovered. Again, there's nothing here having to do with bias -- just straight observation.
There's more stuff in your post that merits further response -- you raised the issues of "soft tissue" found in T-Rex fossils (not really a problem for evolutionary theory or dating methods) and a seemingly goofy fMRI "experiment" (not really an experiment, but a demonstration, for educational purposes, to highlight why users of fMRI must be scrupulous about how they analyze and interpret its output) -- but we can cover the bunch by noting that you got them all from Jay Wile.
Dr. Wile advertises himself as having a "PhD in Nuclear Chemistry", mainly to help sell his set of "science" text books that are tailored to the Christian home-schooling market. (His arguments against radiometric dating make it clear that he either forgot or never learned some very important stuff from his college and graduate courses.)
There's no denying that Wile puts religious apologetics first in his priorities (one of his home-schooling titles is "Exploring Creation with Chemistry"). His blog is rampant with quote mining and distortions, citing articles in popular science magazines in order to draw conclusions that really aren't warranted by those articles, let alone by the original research that the magazines are summarizing.
It's clear that he has an economic incentive for promoting creationism, so he can sell more books. And it's pretty easy to spot details in his blog posts that show how "promoting creationism" includes being dishonest, so apart from falling short of being a competent scientist, he isn't even a good Christian. I'd avoid him like the plague.
Edited by Otto Tellick, : (it's "lots", not "lot's")

autotelic adj. (of an entity or event) having within itself the purpose of its existence or happening.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 116 by BobTHJ, posted 06-03-2010 1:21 PM BobTHJ has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 224 by BobTHJ, posted 06-08-2010 3:01 PM Otto Tellick has replied

  
PaulK
Member
Posts: 17822
Joined: 01-10-2003
Member Rating: 2.2


Message 169 of 385 (563471)
06-05-2010 3:18 AM
Reply to: Message 163 by Blue Jay
06-04-2010 6:02 PM


Re: It's still a dog!
quote:
But, it's even harder to see how we can assume that creationists accept everything we accept about evolutionary theory.
I'm not proposing that creationists BELIEVE evolutionary theory, simply that they understand the basics. It is belief in the theory, not knowledge of the theory that is the issue to creationiists.
quote:
To me, it seems pretty obvious that what they think is different is that "macroevolution" (however they choose to define it) does not happen the same way "microevolution" happens. They think that macro breaks the rules somehow: otherwise, they wouldn’t be arguing that it can’t happen*.
But that is not enough for your argument. Your argument requires that they assume that the larger changes that they call "macroevolution" should be considered to be a separate creation. I'd say that that is obviously false.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 163 by Blue Jay, posted 06-04-2010 6:02 PM Blue Jay has not replied

  
PaulK
Member
Posts: 17822
Joined: 01-10-2003
Member Rating: 2.2


Message 170 of 385 (563472)
06-05-2010 3:29 AM
Reply to: Message 164 by Blue Jay
06-04-2010 6:02 PM


Re: It's still a dog!od.
quote:
This sounds like you're talking about the internal consistency of the creationist position.
But, you just told me that you're not talking about the internal consistency of the creationist position.
Now, I'm very confused.
Yes, you are confused because you didn't read what I wrote.
I said that we weren't debating the consistency of the creationist position - because I understood that both of us were assuming consistency. And I explicitly stated that I WAS assuming consistency.
Message 154
Not really, unless you are alleging an inconsistency (my argument assumes that they ARE consistent).
The post you refer to assumes consistency in the creationist position. So the posts you refer to agree exactly.
I suspected that the problem was that people weren't reading my posts with adequate care, and this confirms it.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 164 by Blue Jay, posted 06-04-2010 6:02 PM Blue Jay has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 172 by Blue Jay, posted 06-05-2010 2:27 PM PaulK has replied

  
Percy
Member
Posts: 22391
From: New Hampshire
Joined: 12-23-2000
Member Rating: 5.2


Message 171 of 385 (563507)
06-05-2010 10:28 AM
Reply to: Message 152 by BobTHJ
06-04-2010 4:31 PM


BobTHJ writes:
Why do bats and dolphins share the same protiens/enzymes for use in echolocation? There is no real nested heirarchy - it looks good at the big-picture level, but dig a little deeper and you'll see the details don't fit.
You're arguing this backward, just like in most of this thread. You have to argue *for* ID, not against evolution. You need to show how the evidence is more consilient with ID, not how it doesn't match evolution. Just because the evidence doesn't match evolution doesn't mean it must match ID. You must demonstrate that the evidence matches ID.
If ID is what really happened then you'd expect to find that species possess the same genes according to need and not relatedness. Both bats and dolphins need echolocation, so did the IDer design the gene for echolocation and use it in both? If the genes for echolocation in bats and dolphins are the same then it would be stunning evidence for ID. So are they the same?
Now before you go off and research whether the genes for echolocation are the same in bats and dolphins you need to tell us what you're expecting to find if these genes were the product of an IDer. What do you predict you will find? Do you expect the nucleotide sequence of the relevant genes will be the same in both bats and dolphins? Will it be the same even in different species of bats and dolphins? If different, how will you compare the different nucleotide sequences in different bat species to the different nucleotide sequences in different dolphin species.
So now that you've presumably posted your predictions, here's a link to an article that should be very helpful to your research. There are other papers, too, but this is a good starting point: Convergent sequence evolution between echolocating bats and dolphins
Unfortunately it's not available for free, but their supplemental data is available online, and it should give you a good idea of the complexity of the task you have set yourself. You see, there are about 1100 species of bats and 40 of dolphins, and all their echolocation genes and proteins will differ. Here's the supplemental data: Supplemental Data: Convergent sequence evolution between echolocating bats and dolphins
Perhaps the more reasonable one given the assumption of common ancestry...
Common ancestry is not an assumption. Every time you see a family walking down the street, the tall ones are the common ancestors of the short ones. We all know from personal experience that all people trace back to common ancestors, even creationists who believe that the two principle common ancestors were Adam and Eve . We all agree about common ancestry - it is not an assumption.
What you're actually arguing is that common ancestry does not continue infinitely back in time. You believe that at some point in the past all the species were created in independent acts of creation, and that the original individuals of each species were the common ancestors for multiple lines of descent leading to the modern species of today. That's your hypothesis. Now all you need is evidence.
I do not believe the evolutionary process capable of adding any information to any genome...
The real world doesn't really care what you believe, it carries on just the same. Mutations can both create and destroy information.
--Percy

This message is a reply to:
 Message 152 by BobTHJ, posted 06-04-2010 4:31 PM BobTHJ has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 225 by BobTHJ, posted 06-08-2010 3:46 PM Percy has replied

  
Blue Jay
Member (Idle past 2697 days)
Posts: 2843
From: You couldn't pronounce it with your mouthparts
Joined: 02-04-2008


Message 172 of 385 (563521)
06-05-2010 2:27 PM
Reply to: Message 170 by PaulK
06-05-2010 3:29 AM


Big Paulfish, Little Pond
Hi, Paul.
PaulK writes:
I said that we weren't debating the consistency of the creationist position...
Oh, is that the game we’re going to play?
I’m not impressed with your ability to retrospectively diagnose a subtle semantic discrepancy as your own clever sleight of hand.
-----
PaulK writes:
I explicitly stated that I WAS assuming consistency.
Yes, I noticed that you wrote this.
Then, I noticed that you wrote this to Straggler:
PaulK writes:
The issue yet again is that the two definitions taken in combination define "macroevolution" to exclude ALL evolution (in fact the term - as an oxymoron - cannot refer to anything at all).
This means that all evolution is microevolution.
This contradicts creationist beliefs.
Contradiction = inconsistency.
You told Bluejay that you are arguing that the creationist position is internally consistent.
You told Straggler you are arguing that the creationist position is internally inconsistent.
Bluejay’s brain imploded (cf. Chewbacca defense).
You said Bluejay wasn't reading carefully enough.
Perhaps you thought, when I wrote the creationist position, I was referring to the harmony between the definitions of macroevolution and kinds?
Context should have ruled this out for you: I was responding to your comment that my version of creationism is disharmonious with various tenets of evolutionary theory (which, I maintain, it obviously must be if it considers itself to be a separate idea from evolutionary theory).
It confused me that you kept bringing up how creationist viewpoints violate various elements of evolutionary theory, and your persistence on that issue led me to suspect that your entire argument might be stemming from a different angle than what I thought it was.
So, I wanted to clear that up before I continued with anything else.
But, then, your response to that was clearly coming from outside of the context of the question, which I thought I had specified clearly enough.
So, from my perspective, you seem to be the one who isn’t reading with adequate care.
-----
PaulK writes:
I suspected that the problem was that people weren't reading my posts with adequate care, and this confirms it.
Have you ever watched Star Trek: Enterprise (pathetic show that it is)? There was an episode in which the linguistics officer had to communicate with an alien in the alien’s language in order to save the Enterprise from destruction. Meanwhile, this highly-advanced alien was just sitting there on his massively superior technology, making no effort to learn human language, apparently oblivious to the fact that people from other species don’t necessarily speak his language, and waiting for her to rectify the problem.
This is how I feel in this discussion.
You make no attempts to clarify anything: you simply make interpretive assumptions, ignore context, and respond with a series of terse half-statements, then say my inability to understand what you’re saying is my fault because I am not reading carefully enough.
You have made no effort at all to ensure that this sort of miscommunication is not happening, and have simply dismissed any possibility that any change in your behavior is required to fix it. The onus is always on me to adjust to you and your cryptic debate tactics.
No care on my part will ever be adequate to make a conversation with you into anything but an exercise in futility drenched in insults to my intelligence.
So, unless you miraculously acknowledge that changing your behavior is also a viable solution to our miscommunication, I've lost my interest in beating my head against this wall.

-Bluejay (a.k.a. Mantis, Thylacosmilus)
Darwin loves you.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 170 by PaulK, posted 06-05-2010 3:29 AM PaulK has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 174 by PaulK, posted 06-05-2010 3:26 PM Blue Jay has not replied

  
Percy
Member
Posts: 22391
From: New Hampshire
Joined: 12-23-2000
Member Rating: 5.2


Message 173 of 385 (563523)
06-05-2010 2:41 PM
Reply to: Message 156 by BobTHJ
06-04-2010 5:05 PM


Re: Getting down to details
BobTHJ writes:
No fossil in and of itself would falsify Baraminology - because baramins are based on the work of an omnipotent Creator, who could (theoretically) make anything he desired.
Uh, okay. And you think unfalsifiable and unevidenced ideas are science?
It could be falsified if clear evidence were shown for common ancestry between chimps and humans - but the evidence for this (at present) is far from conclusive.
If you falsify common ancestry for chimps and humans then all you've done is falsified common ancestry for chimps and humans. Maybe orangutans and humans share a common ancestor. When Michelson/Morley falsified the ether it didn't prove the Biblical account. When geologists falsified static continents it didn't prove the Biblical account. So when you falsify evolution that doesn't prove anything about the Bible or ID. You need evidence *for* ID.
The supposed age of the fossil is based on scientifically irresponsible dating techniques.
If you'd like to try to use Mr. Wile's unevidenced arguments about dating then please first see rule 2 of the Forum Guidelines (stay on topic) and also rule 5 ("Bare links with no supporting discussion should be avoided").
Any conclusions based on evidence are assumptions as well.
Well, I guess when you have no evidence you have to believe this. Can we expect you to next argue that "evidenced assumptions" are no better than actual assumptions?
I think what you're actually thinking of, and what you're confusing with assumptions, is tentativity. We all agree that science is tentative and that good theory can only be displaced by better theory that explains more of the evidence. But underpinning all theory in science is evidence, and if you believe that ID is science than you need evidence *for* ID.
Phylogenetics is a useful tool ONLY if the assumption of common ancestry is correct.
Since we have evidence of common ancestry it isn't an assumption. Or, translating into Bob-speak, common ancestry is an "evidenced assumption."
No matter what terminology you use, an idea supported by evidence is head and shoulders above what you've got, which is an unevidenced assumption. I guess when you have no evidence you have to do things like invent terminological mumbo-jumbo like "evidenced assumption." Looking it up in Google it finds the term once on the first page of results, an 1886 book by J. W. Mendenhall. You might want to update your terminology a bit. Again, I think the concept you're thinking of is tentativity.
Baraminology (and other creation sciences) can be used to make predictions as well - such as "transitional forms between distinct known kinds will not be found in the fossil record" or more specifically "transitional forms demonstrating common ancestry between humans and chimpanzees will not be found".
You forgot the most important principle of baraminology: when transitional fossils are found, simply declare that they're not transitional.
--Percy

This message is a reply to:
 Message 156 by BobTHJ, posted 06-04-2010 5:05 PM BobTHJ has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 230 by BobTHJ, posted 06-08-2010 9:02 PM Percy has replied

  
PaulK
Member
Posts: 17822
Joined: 01-10-2003
Member Rating: 2.2


Message 174 of 385 (563525)
06-05-2010 3:26 PM
Reply to: Message 172 by Blue Jay
06-05-2010 2:27 PM


Bluejay's imagination runs away with him
quote:
Oh, is that the game we’re going to play?
I’m not impressed with your ability to retrospectively diagnose a subtle semantic discrepancy as your own clever sleight of hand.
There's nothing retrospective or subtle about. No sleight of hand and no game. I simply pointed out the bleedimng obvious.
quote:
Contradiction = inconsistency.
And a consistent creationist would avoid that inconsistency would they not ? A consistent creationist would NOT use those two definitions together. JUST AS I HAVE BEEN ARGUING ALL ALONG.
quote:
You told Bluejay that you are arguing that the creationist position is internally consisten
Correct.
quote:
You told Straggler you are arguing that the creationist position is internally inconsistent.
Utterly false. I said no such thing.
quote:
Bluejay’s brain imploded (cf. Chewbacca defense).
You said Bluejay wasn't reading carefully enough.
And you have just provided further evidence of that.
quote:
Perhaps you thought, when I wrote the creationist position, I was referring to the harmony between the definitions of macroevolution and kinds?
In fact I simply assumed that you meant what you said - that we were arguing over the consistency of creationism. I had no idea what you thought you were referring to.
quote:
It confused me that you kept bringing up how creationist viewpoints violate various elements of evolutionary theory, and your persistence on that issue led me to suspect that your entire argument might be stemming from a different angle than what I thought it was.
I think the fact that you seemed to be inventing a new creationist strawman for them was a large part of that. You have to admit that your idea that a creationist would think that "macroevolution" would somehow violate common descent is not something commonly seen in creationist writings (and you've provided no evidence that any creationist believes it) - and I think that even a reasonably informed creationist would not think of whatever you are proposing as an alternative is not evolution.
quote:
You make no attempts to clarify anything: you simply make interpretive assumptions, ignore context, and respond with a series of terse half-statements, then say my inability to understand what you’re saying is my fault because I am not reading carefully enough.
If you need clarification ask for it. However since you managed to understand two posts that were in perfect agreement as contradictory I have to say that the problem appears to be at your end. Especially as you have accused me of playing games for simply reiterating my understanding of one of your posts which turns out to be far from clear - and that I would describe as thoroughly misleading.
quote:
So, unless you miraculously acknowledge that changing your behavior is also a viable solution to our miscommunication, I've lost my interest in beating my head against this wall.
So far as I can see the problem is largely yours. For instance, I have NO idea how you could possible believe that my reply to Straggler argued that creationists WERE being inconsistent. So how can I change my behaviour to avoid that problem ? I believe that YOU could, at the least by asking for clarification if you failed to understand. I cannot agree to do something when there is not the slightest indication of what it is I am meant to do !

This message is a reply to:
 Message 172 by Blue Jay, posted 06-05-2010 2:27 PM Blue Jay has not replied

  
Percy
Member
Posts: 22391
From: New Hampshire
Joined: 12-23-2000
Member Rating: 5.2


Message 175 of 385 (563528)
06-05-2010 4:42 PM
Reply to: Message 160 by BobTHJ
06-04-2010 5:28 PM


BobTHJ writes:
I would be interested in reviewing successful predictions made by common ancestry - as I am constantly in search of data that might invalide the YEC model (I have yet to find any - but I'm keeping an open mind).
Again, you need evidence *for* ID, not against evolution. If you think there's an absence of evidence for evolution then one would have thought that you'd find the absence of evidence for ID even more stunning. Let's say you're right, that there's no evidence for evolution. Since there's also no evidence for ID, on what basis are you forming an opinion? The Bible? Would that be science? Wouldn't a scientist withhold judgement in the absence of evidence?
If you choose to reject all the evidence for common ancestry (tiktaalik is the one that's most recently received public attention) then, if you're a scientist, that puts you among the 1% of scientists who reject such evidence. 1% is not a consensus. I'll bet even relativity has more doubters among scientists than 1%.
And if you're not a scientist then that just puts you among the hoards of people who are more swayed by good stories than good evidence.
Not sure where you're going with this. Are you trying to imply that baraminology is an ancient science only? Modern baraminologists would disagree with you.
You mean there's been an evolution in thinking in baraminology? Don't they still take the Bible as their basis rather than evidence from the natural world?
So when exactly would it cease to be premature? What would be required for you and other darwinists to accept a supernatural cause for a natural phenomena?
Evidence is all it would take. Are you implying there's evidence of supernatural causes? Shouldn't I have already read about this in Time, Newsweek and the New York Times? Wouldn't it be the most momentous evidence of all time? Oh, by the way, this evidence of the supernatural, which of the world's religions does it tell us turns out to be right?
Your use of the word premature is humorous, considering the mythology of most every ancient culture on earth contains a creation story (in many cases bearing striking similarity to each other).
There you go again, stating your preference for stories over evidence.
Humans have accepted a supernatural creation of life for as far back in history as we can determine - the concept of a naturalistic origin is both recent and laughable considering there isn't a shred of evidence supporting it.
You have evidence of something with a non-natural origin? Again, wouldn't that be momentous?
--Percy
Edited by Percy, : Typo.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 160 by BobTHJ, posted 06-04-2010 5:28 PM BobTHJ has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 177 by bluegenes, posted 06-05-2010 7:26 PM Percy has seen this message but not replied
 Message 231 by BobTHJ, posted 06-08-2010 9:27 PM Percy has replied

  
Straggler
Member
Posts: 10333
From: London England
Joined: 09-30-2006


Message 176 of 385 (563541)
06-05-2010 6:26 PM
Reply to: Message 155 by PaulK
06-04-2010 5:03 PM


Re: It's still a dog!od.
You have not understood.
It seems I am not alone. I genuinely do want to get what you are saying. This is getting very frustrating.
The issue yet again is that the two definitions taken in combination define "macroevolution" to exclude ALL evolution (in fact the term - as an oxymoron - cannot refer to anything at all).
How?
I still don't see it.
Can you spell it out step by step?
Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 155 by PaulK, posted 06-04-2010 5:03 PM PaulK has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 179 by PaulK, posted 06-06-2010 2:44 AM Straggler has replied

  
bluegenes
Member (Idle past 2477 days)
Posts: 3119
From: U.K.
Joined: 01-24-2007


Message 177 of 385 (563549)
06-05-2010 7:26 PM
Reply to: Message 175 by Percy
06-05-2010 4:42 PM


Percy writes:
If you choose to reject all the evidence for common ancestry.....
I just thought I'd mention that, according to a recent analysis "harnessing powerful computational tools and applying Bayesian statistics", universal common ancestry of all life in all three domains appears millions of times more likely than any theory of multiple ancestry.
Nature abstract HERE and brief article HERE.
This applies even taking into account the possibility of lots of early horizontal gene transfer, and possible symbiosis events.
I'm sure it won't do anything to convince creationist Bob, who says (untruthfully) that he is constantly in search of data that might "invalide" the YEC model, but it's of interest to the realists amongst us.
There is only one kind!!!!

This message is a reply to:
 Message 175 by Percy, posted 06-05-2010 4:42 PM Percy has seen this message but not replied

  
BobTHJ
Member (Idle past 4997 days)
Posts: 119
Joined: 06-02-2010


Message 178 of 385 (563576)
06-05-2010 11:37 PM
Reply to: Message 167 by Percy
06-04-2010 8:10 PM


Re: Away for the Weekend
quote:
Hi Bob! Just wanted to say that since few of your sentences don't invite multitudes of responses, its possible you might return Monday to find far more responses than any non-obsessive/compulsive could ever answer (I know I'll be doing my part if I can find the time). If that happens then don't feel the need to reply to every message, especially since many people are probably telling you the same thing.
Also note that at the bottom of responses to you is a link that says, "BobTHJ has not yet responded." Click on it and it magically becomes, "BobTHJ acknowledges this reply." Poof, like that, you're done!
Thanks for the greeting - and also thank you for the tip! Unfortunately, I am a bit OCD so I'll probably respond to most of these messages anyway (sooner or later) - I look forward to the discussion!

This message is a reply to:
 Message 167 by Percy, posted 06-04-2010 8:10 PM Percy has seen this message but not replied

  
PaulK
Member
Posts: 17822
Joined: 01-10-2003
Member Rating: 2.2


Message 179 of 385 (563603)
06-06-2010 2:44 AM
Reply to: Message 176 by Straggler
06-05-2010 6:26 PM


Re: It's still a dog!od.
I guess that I'llhave to repeat myself again.
1) "kinds" are defined as seperate creations
2) "macroevolution" is defined as the evolution of a new kind
3) evolution is not creation
4) creationists believe that universal common descent requires macroevolution.
4) therefore anything produced by evolution is NOT a new kind (1,3)
5) therefore no evolution is macroevolution (2,4)
6) therefore all evolution is microevolution
7) therefore universal common descent requires only microevolution
1) and 2) are the definitions in question
3) and 4) are statements of creationist belief
5) 6) 7) are logical deductions from 1), 2) and 3)
7) contradicts 4)
QED.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 176 by Straggler, posted 06-05-2010 6:26 PM Straggler has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 180 by Straggler, posted 06-06-2010 6:00 AM PaulK has replied

  
Straggler
Member
Posts: 10333
From: London England
Joined: 09-30-2006


Message 180 of 385 (563615)
06-06-2010 6:00 AM
Reply to: Message 179 by PaulK
06-06-2010 2:44 AM


QED
1) "kinds" are defined as seperate creations
Yes.
2) "macroevolution" is defined as the evolution of a new kind
Yes.
3) evolution is not creation
Yes.
4) creationists believe that universal common descent requires macroevolution.
Yes. Both of which they consider impossible in practise.
4) therefore anything produced by evolution is NOT a new kind (1,3)
No. Anything that HAS actually been produced by evolution is not a new kind. This is the point where you extrapolate too far and include all imaginable evolution.
5) therefore no evolution is macroevolution (2,4)
No. They are saying that no evolution that HAS ACTUALLY occurred is macroevolution. This is not the same as believing that all conceivable evolution (i.e. what those evil atheist evolutionists believe) requires no macroevolution.
6) therefore all evolution is microevolution
No. All the evolution that HAS ACTUALLY occurred is microevolution.
7) therefore universal common descent requires only microevolution
No. See above.
1) and 2) are the definitions in question
3) and 4) are statements of creationist belief
5) 6) 7) are logical deductions from 1), 2) and 3)
7) contradicts 4)
Only if you ignore what they actually believe and instead apply your reasoning to a brand of conceptual evolution that they deny as impossible at the very outset.
QED.
Ditto.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 179 by PaulK, posted 06-06-2010 2:44 AM PaulK has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 181 by PaulK, posted 06-06-2010 11:56 AM Straggler has replied
 Message 182 by bluegenes, posted 06-06-2010 1:54 PM Straggler has replied

  
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