Register | Sign In


Understanding through Discussion


EvC Forum active members: 65 (9162 total)
4 online now:
Newest Member: popoi
Post Volume: Total: 915,806 Year: 3,063/9,624 Month: 908/1,588 Week: 91/223 Day: 2/17 Hour: 0/0


Thread  Details

Email This Thread
Newer Topic | Older Topic
  
Author Topic:   If evolution is wrong, is Creation right?
:æ: 
Suspended Member (Idle past 7184 days)
Posts: 423
Joined: 07-23-2003


Message 34 of 64 (82131)
02-02-2004 12:58 PM
Reply to: Message 30 by MPW
02-02-2004 12:25 PM


MPW writes:
Genetic information is information in the gene code. Does that make sense? New information would be EXACTLY the same as NEW INFORMATION.
Like I can have shorter ears and a longer nose than my father, thats the same info. But I will NEVER grow wings and fly away because that
is NEW INFORMATION. I'm kinda young and can't really quote a lot of scientific babble, but what I'm writing is real easy to understand.
I think it seems easy to understand to you because you do not have a proper understanding of information theory. You see, the mathematical treatment of information stipulates that wherever selection operates, information increases. It is measured (in Shannon theory) by an inverse proportion of the number of possibilities and the number of selections. The formula is Information (in bits) = -log2(s/p) where s = selections and p = possibilities.
Since you've conceded that selection operates on biological organisms, you've also conceded that information increases. It's just that you don't understand how information is calculated, and so you didn't know that by conceding the former, you've conceded the latter.
THERE IS A LIMIT TO CHANGE!
Really? What is it?
Nothing can get better. Everything goes down the tubes given time.
Give me a break. See? This is what you get for pulling arguments from Kent Hovind's website. If you don't want to get ridiculed, you'll need to seek a better source for info.
Everything does NOT "go down the tubes" given time. Look at the accelerating improvements in human technology for an obvious falsification of your statement. Surely you won't assert that technology is getting worse, will you?
Evolution is not possible in a closed universe.
Please first show unambiguously that this is in fact a closed universe. I assure you, a Nobel Prize awaits you if you can meet that challenge.
I will repeat THERE IS A LIMIT!
And I will repeat: What is it?
We have seen those bacteria do who knows what but we've never seen them grow wings or new legs and eyes.
And we've never seen Pluto complete an orbit around the sun, yet it is the most reasonable interpretation of the data. That's how science works. Since we've seen the closer planets complete solar orbits ("micro"-orbiting), it is reasonable to infer that the farthest planet has a complete solar orbit as well ("marcro"-orbiting). Your argument seems to insist we shouldn't believe that Pluto can complete its orbit since we've only seen complete orbits for inner planets. But what's there to stop it?
This argument hasn't been answered either, are mutations passed down to the next generation????
Some are, and some aren't. It depends, really.
Ok, I will repeat THERE IS A LIMIT!
And I'll repeat again: What is the limit?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 30 by MPW, posted 02-02-2004 12:25 PM MPW has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 40 by MPW, posted 02-02-2004 1:27 PM :æ: has replied

:æ: 
Suspended Member (Idle past 7184 days)
Posts: 423
Joined: 07-23-2003


Message 35 of 64 (82132)
02-02-2004 1:05 PM
Reply to: Message 33 by MPW
02-02-2004 12:48 PM


MPV writes:
And to prove my point, the red squirrel was created red, and if two red squirrels were taken and bred billions of times, they could be orange, red, or brown, because thats all the same color more or less pigment. But they will NEVER become black if all the trees are black, proving that there is a LIMIT.
This is, of course, your repeated assertion, and you've truly "proved" nothing. Now I request that you cease asserting this until you can back it up with some actual evidence. Perhaps you can formulate a testible hypothesis and describe what evidence might be falsify it. That's how scientists operate.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 33 by MPW, posted 02-02-2004 12:48 PM MPW has not replied

:æ: 
Suspended Member (Idle past 7184 days)
Posts: 423
Joined: 07-23-2003


Message 57 of 64 (82170)
02-02-2004 2:37 PM
Reply to: Message 40 by MPW
02-02-2004 1:27 PM


MPW writes:
To me, that makes NO sense at all. Are you trying to throw me off here?
No, I'm using the standard calculation of information according to information theory. I gave you the formula and explained how it works. Wherever a few are selected out of many, information has increased. Since you conceded that selection operates (even if only within "kinds," whatever that is), you've necessarily conceded that information increases.
Whatever you were trying to say, INFORMATION HAS NEVER BEEN ADDED TO THE GENE CODE.
Let me ask you this: What would consititute an information addition in the gene code, according to you? How would you measure it? Do you know? I'll suggest refraining from speculation if you don't.
You have just proved my point. Firstly I did not get that from Hovind's website, I got that from the second law of thermodynamics. (The entropy of the universe is always increasing)
The 2ndLoT saying nothing of what you first claimed it did. It does not say things are "running down," nor that things are "getting worse." This is the Creationist definition of the 2ndLoT, and as far as physicists know, it is not valid in this universe.
And technology, hehe, proves that it takes INTELLIGENT ENERGY to make something get better!!!
That was just an example. See crashfrog's or JonF's examples in this thread where we've observed the emergence of new traits in bacteria, including nylon digestion and phage resistance.
BTW - evolution only deals with change, not with concepts of "better" or "worse."
Everything goes down the tubes with time
Again, this is not what the 2ndLoT states. "Entropy" in the thermodynamic sense has to do with the amount of useable energy in a system, and has nothing to do with "order" or "disorder." Prigogine won his Nobel Prize by demonstrating that complex and orderly dissipative structures can form spontaneously in non-equilibrium thermodynamics.
If evolution is true, where did the laws of thermodynamics come from anyway?
Why do you believe that it came from anything at all? It seems from our observations that it simply is.
Again, flawed reasoning. Pluto is in orbit.
How do you know? You've never observed it orbit the sun.
Keep in mind, this is your reasoning I'm using.
Reading your pluto example mmight make sense at first, but if you think, it doesn't compare in the least. We see what pluto is doing now. It likely has gone around the sun, and will go around the sun.
We see what biological organisms are "doing now," and it is likely that they have been changing over the entire history of their existence just as we've observed them in the present.
But you cannot prove that it has reversed direction 8 times and became purple, than orange, then green, and now blue!! Thats what you are trying to tell me about the animals.
Don't put words in my mouth. I have argued none of this that you claim I have. This is an argument of your own imagination, and I'd appreciate it if you'd come back to reality and deal with the actual facts of the matter.
We see them dong the same things, cats having cats, dogs having dogs, just like pluto goes around the sun! But ten you try to tell me that they went from a fish to a frog to a dinasour to a bird, thats like saying that pluto has reversed direction 8 times and became purple, than orange, then green, and now blue!!
Again, Your argument is evidence for my theory, not yours.
Sigh... so much ignorance abounds, it's disheartening. Your claim that a cat cannot become a non-cat implies that you know of a barrier that would prevent it. Please, as I've asked before, present this barrier and a methodology of testing for its existence.
Different for every animal. I already gave tons of examples.
No, you've offered nothing but unsubstantiated assertions. Not a single example was offered. You are, of course, free to run around shouting loudly that the sky is green, but the fact of the matter is that the sky is blue and no amount of shouting will change that. The same is true with the hypothetical barrier between micro and macro evolution. You can continue to shout that it exists, but if you can't demonstrate it, all you have is hot air.
Animals can change and vary and adapt but they can NEVER be something else!
Why not? What is to stop a bunch of little changes adding up to big ones with time?
If I begin piling soil in front of you with a shovel, what is to prevent the slowly forming hill from eventually becoming a mountain?
If I begin walking due westward in St. Louis, MO, what's to stop my little 3-foot steps from eventually adding up to hundreds of miles?
The answer to all of these questions is "Nothing." You've conceded that change happens. As a result, information increases. Over time, little changes can add up to big ones. These are the facts, and I suggest you get used to them.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 40 by MPW, posted 02-02-2004 1:27 PM MPW has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 61 by MPW, posted 02-02-2004 2:53 PM :æ: has not replied

Newer Topic | Older Topic
Jump to:


Copyright 2001-2023 by EvC Forum, All Rights Reserved

™ Version 4.2
Innovative software from Qwixotic © 2024