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Author Topic:   NEWSFLASH: Schools In Georgia (US) Are Allowed To Teach About Creation
Adminnemooseus
Administrator
Posts: 3974
Joined: 09-26-2002


Message 77 of 148 (22285)
11-11-2002 6:10 PM


Might not much of the recent discussion be better off in one of the "Intelligent Design" topics?
Adminnemooseus
Added by edit:
I've just given one ID topic a bump. It can be found at http://EvC Forum: Intelligent Design Debate Continues
The ID index page is at http://http://www.evcforum.net/cgi-bin/forumdisplay.cgi?action=t... igent+Design&number=10
[This message has been edited by Adminnemooseus, 11-11-2002]

Quetzal
Member (Idle past 5871 days)
Posts: 3228
Joined: 01-09-2002


Message 78 of 148 (22325)
11-12-2002 4:25 AM


In a sort of late, irrelevant, off-topic way, I'd like to add a bit of information to one of Ahmad's earlier posts (#34), where he presented a list of alleged scientists supportive of creationism, with the question about whether they could be considered "fundamentalists". In point of fact, most of them ARE fundamentalists. It was actually a mixed bag, but for those who don't know some of the players:
1. fundamentalists:
J.D. Thomas, author of "Evolution and Faith", wherein he quite forcefully argues that "goddidit" is a MUCH more realistic "religion" than evolution
William Dembski, the man who needs no introduction, is an accomplished Christian apologist with many articles in the Princeton Theological Review. One nice example of the way our ID leading light thinks of the subject can be found in his article The Act of Creation: Bridging Transcendence and Immanence, which is filled with gems like "An act of creation is always a divine gift and cannot be reduced to purely naturalistic categories." Wonder why the IDists keep insisting it doesn't have anything to do with God?
Peter Russell is another theist pretending to be non-religious. His book From Science to God is pretty explicit - you can read a few chapters at that link. Admittedly, he's more of a anthropic principle type of person rather than a literalist, but still...
Walter Bradley is most definitely a fundamentalist and a literalist. A nice article Scientific Evidence for the Existence of God can leave little doubt in anyone's mind as to where he stands.
Philip Johnson, one of creationism's leading lights, is about as fundy as they get. Here's a nice biography The Evolution of a Creationist
2. sort-of or mostly Anti-Darwin, but not necessarily religious:
Robert Shapiro is a biochemist - a real scientist. He is a proponent of the XT origin of life (a la Hoyle). Interestingly, although quoted several times in Johnson's "Darwin on Trial" as a witness for the prosecution as it were, Shapiro actually vehemently opposes creationism, devoting an entire chapter in "Origin's. A Skeptic's Guide To The Creation Of Life On Earth" to bashing the fundamentalists. Johnson strangely neglects to mention that...
Sir Fred Hoyle, an astronomer who developed a rather idiosyncratic view of the extraterrestrial origin of life, "panspermia". Again, not really anti-darwin, but had his own idea on OOL (like Shapiro).
3. Michael Behe. He gets a separate category. Roman Catholic, believes in a personal creator, etc. But you can't say he's a fundamentalist, nor even really anti-Darwin, since he accepts nearly everything else in the ToE, including common descent, RM&NS, etc. Again, it's only OOL and an ill-defined "designer". Probably the only true "IDist" on the list. A "god of the gaps" argument from incredulity, IMO, but he reminds me a lot of Denton. Other than that, he's slipperier than an eel when it comes to the nature of the Designer.
Two other people mentioned in the post, Pierre de Grasse and Norman Macbeth, are a bit different. Macbeth is a retired lawyer, who has a very weird sort of anti-darwinism. Published one book condemning evolution as a religion (projection?), but I haven't found anything about his personal beliefs. Pierre de Grasse is one of my favorite anti-darwinists - primarily because he's so often misunderstood by creationists. de Grasse is the last of the great French lamarckians. He's definitely anti-Darwin (but I bet it's 'cause Darwin was a Brit ). However, he is very much an evolutionist. Consider this quote from the same book Ahmad quoted: "Zoologists and botanists are nearly unanimous in considering evolution as a fact and not a hypothesis. I agree with this position and base it primarily on documents provided by paleontology, i.e., the history of the living world ... [Also,] Embryogenesis provides valuable data [concerning evolutionary relationships] ... Chemistry, through it's analytical data, directs biologists and provides guidance in their search for affinities between groups of animals or plants, and ... plays an important part in the approach to genuine evolution." (Pierre de Grasse, Evolution of Living Organisms, Academic Press, New York, 1977, pp. 3-7). Evolution - Yes. NS - No.
Creationists thrive on misquotes and misrepresentation. Unfortunately, all it takes is a bit of effort to uncover their "perfidy".

gene90
Member (Idle past 3822 days)
Posts: 1610
Joined: 12-25-2000


Message 79 of 148 (22400)
11-12-2002 8:41 PM
Reply to: Message 60 by Ahmad
11-11-2002 8:08 AM


[QUOTE][B]Firstly, what criterias do you use to distinguish between a scientific magazine (as SCIAM, discover) and journals?[/QUOTE]
[/B]
A scientific journal uses the process of peer review. Incoming papers from a scientist in field X are anonymously submitted to a randomly chosen group of anonymous researchers in field X. The panel reviews the evidence and claims the author makes and decides if those claims are supported, and what revisions should be made. The reviewers mail the requirements to the journal, who forward the requirements to the author. After a couple of rounds both parties are satisfied and the article is published in the journal. Neither party knows the identity of the other until the author is revealed when the paper is published. Many papers are published anonymously so the author is never known, except to the journal. This way scientists can write about unpopular or controversial topics without having an affect on their professional reputations.
This is where science happens. Before you read it in the newspaper or hear it on TV, discoveries are announced in these journals. Usually when an announcement is made you will notice it starts with "Scientists in the journal Nature announced..." (or whatever journal).
Journals are intended primarily for one audience: scientists and researchers and are usually highly technical. They are the primary means of communication in the scientific community.
[QUOTE][B]Secondly, why don't you accept quotes from scientific magazines or even medias like national review? Do they lie?[/QUOTE]
[/B]
I'm not going to accuse anyone of deliberate dishonesty but nobody is checking them for accuracy. Also, the articles in them are written by journalists. The papers in the journals are written by the scientists themselves. Finally I do not offer a vote of confidence for the National Review. Again, I am not accusing them of dishonesty but they seem far too politically motivated.
[QUOTE][B]For the sake of fairness, Nature should have at the least taken the step to publish one creation article or hold debates. They don't do that now do they?[/QUOTE]
[/B]
Why should Nature publish a Creationist article "for fairness"? Shouldn't they also publish a pro-astrology article or flat-Earth paper for fairness as well? Fairness is irrelevant. It's all about the evidence. Plus, if Creationist papers are not submitted to a journal that journal cannot publish a Creationist paper. Where are the rejection slips?
[QUOTE][B]Well yeah... Science is another magazine like SCIAM. Here's their website[/QUOTE]
[/B]
No, it's a scientific journal, sciam is a popular magazine.
Here are links to how incoming manuscripts are reviewed. The differences caused by the peer-review system are apparent:
http://www.sciencemag.org/feature/contribinfo/home.shtml
[QUOTE][B]Its not a letter or a commentary but a statement by H.P Lipson, a physicist.[/QUOTE]
[/B]
A statement of his personal opinion. Not a technical paper.
[QUOTE][B]Have you sent rebuttals to the author of the site?[/QUOTE]
[/B]
No, what point is there? But if you will pick an argument we will offer rebuttals.
[QUOTE][B]Have a look at the essay by Timothy Wallace as he rebuts and clarifies how evolution violates the 2LOT[/QUOTE]
[/B]
Have a look at talkorigins.org, there are rebuttals there.
[QUOTE][B]No living thing can live without such energy conversion systems. Without an energy conversion system, the sun is nothing but a source of destructive energy that burns, parches, or melts.[/QUOTE]
[/B]
With life, these mechanisms are large molecules. Miller demonstrated that amino acids are generated by fairly mundane processes in the lab. This was order from disorder at the cost of energy, with very little in the way of "energy conversion mechanisms" necessary. Then of course you have order from disorder in nature all of the time. Sand dunes, charge differentiation in thunderstorms, desalination through the water cycle, these things don't require any "conversion mechanisms" outside of what nature provides. And finally, the 2LOT equations themselves never mention any conversion mechanisms at all. The whole idea seems to be a Creationist one, "Creationist Voodoo Thermodynamics" I have heard it called.
[QUOTE][B]Actually, the 2LOT also includes open systems.[/QUOTE]
[/B]
Yes, it includes all systems. But it does not require that entropy always increases everywhere, just that net entropy increases.
And I would encourage you to cease taking quotes out of context.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 60 by Ahmad, posted 11-11-2002 8:08 AM Ahmad has not replied

Ahmad
Inactive Member


Message 80 of 148 (22509)
11-13-2002 1:17 PM
Reply to: Message 62 by mark24
11-11-2002 8:29 AM


quote:
Where was the sarcasm?
None of the above have been DEMONSTRATED to be IC.It has been shown again and again, how certain systems are irredubily complex. You can start by reading Behe's book.
quote:
I have read the actual paper (Thornhill.pdf), & find no support for IC structures as defined by creationists. That is, a structure such that at least one of its components is essential, with its loss rendering the whole structure absolutely nonfunctional. Meaning that the structure had to have been designed, & could not have evolved (or some such).
[Shortened long link. --Admin]
Exactly. I don't know if you have read the article also by Thornhill, R.H., Ussery, D.W. 2000. "A classification of possible routes of Darwinian evolution." J. Theor. Bio. 203: 111-116.
The article outlines Behe's theory of IC:
"However, the more theoretical question about the accessibility by Darwinian evolution of irreducibly complex structures of functionally indivisible components, if such exist, has not been thoroughly examined. .One factor hampering examination of the accessibility of biological structures by Darwinian evolution is the absence of a classification of possible routes. A suggested classification is presented here."
Although one can argue about it, this can be viewed as a fundamental confirmation of Behe's thesis that the origin of these IC structures has not been explained by science. However, what should be clear is that Behe's skepticism has served as an impetus for these scientists to develop a classification that did not exist before. Therefore, Behe has indeed contributed in an indirect way by serving as the stimulus for the creation of such a classification.
quote:
Your cite agrees with me that T&U’s definition of IC differs from Behes.
Of interest also is their definition of Darwinian evolution. It includes the following: "no intervention by conscious agent(s) occurs." So we see how an a priori assumption of science works to exclude a teleological cause (reminding us that science is simply not an authority when dealing with question of teleology vs. non-teleology).
quote:
Can you provide any scientific literature that concludes that no IC structure can have evolved?
How can an irredubly complex system have been evolved? Let me quote Behe's defintion for IC:
"By irreducibly complex I mean a single system composed of several well-matched, interacting parts that contribute to the basic function, wherein the removal of any one of the parts causes the system to effectively cease functioning."
and
"An irreducibly complex system is one that requires several closely matched parts in order to function and where removal of one of the components effectively causes the system to cease functioning."
SO the key point here is: "ALL COMPONENTS OF THE SYSTEM HAS TO BE PRESENT". Evolution stands on natural selection which has no consciousness and simply eliminates the weaker of the species or in genetics, selects the dominant genotypes for organisms. The next best explanation, they come up with is random mutation. If organelles like the bacterial flagellum developed through evolution from simples flagella by small minute mutations over a period of time, it would not be irreducibly complex in the first place. So my question to you will be: How do you think an IC structure be evolved?
quote:
Once again, where was the sarcasm?
In your statement. You provide no empirical evidence.
quote:
IC (as creationists define it) most definitely ISN’T evident. If it were, you would be able to produce a paper that concludes that an IC structure couldn’t evolve.
How can an IC structure evolve, in the first place? According to Behe's definition, it is impossible.
quote:
This contention has NEVER been demonstrated, it is therefore NOT evident.
http://www.arn.org/behe/mb_ic.htm << Read some examples of IC and then you'll know how it is evideny.
quote:
My point precisely, hardly an explosion. Not all the organisms appear at the base of the explosion, do they?
The first thing that strikes a lay mind of the word explosion is some burst, or something that blew off. In science, especially in the Cambrian explosion, it is abrupt appearance of living organisms during the Cambrian era. Richard Fortey in the Science journal has this to say:
"This differential evolution and dispersal, too, must have required a previous history of the group for which there is no fossil record. Furthermore, cladistic analyses of arthropod phylogeny revealed that trilobites, like eucrustaceans, are fairly advanced "twigs" on the arthropod tree. But fossils of these alleged ancestral arthropods are lacking. .....Even if evidence for an earlier origin is discovered, it remains a challenge to explain why so many animals should have increased in size and acquired shells within so short a time at the base of the Cambrian. (Richard Fortey, "The Cambrian Explosion Exploded?", Science, vol 293, No 5529, 20 July 2001, p. 438-439)
The only excuse evolutionists can give for this quote would either be Science is just another pop-press mag or Fortey is writing colorfully. And the take I have taken, is in context unless some prove otherwise
quote:
Ahmad, do you read your own cites?
You claim to have refuted my argument that the Cambrian explosion was an event taking millions of years? Your cite agrees with me.
Obviosuly, thats an pro-evolutionist site. I thought you were on the support of the rapid evolution theory. My mistake.
quote:
Nope, see above, noting lend credence to the theory that a long evolutionary fuse preceded the Cambrian explosion.
In the site I pointed out,a Crustacean was found in limestone which was dated to be about 511 million years old and the fossil preserves a great deal of detail. Scientists point out that the appendages and even other soft bodied parts are clearly visible. Now the problem with the Cambrian explosion for evolutionists is that the fossils for many complex creatures just suddenly show up (as if they were created) in the fossil record during the Cambrian time period. The only other life found in the fossil record before this time period are simple one celled bacteria, metazoans, and sponge like creatures. So there's no record of a slow gradual transition between those kinds of living organisms and complex animals like Crustaceans and others found in the Cambrian Explosion. The unfortunate thing is that finds like this don't necessarily cause evolutionists to question their theory - instead they question the data, "there must have been a period of evolution prior to this so-called Cambrian explosion." said one evolutionist. This is a clear picture of the dogmatic approach that many have.
quote:
Furthermore, it is not dated, since it has long been known that highly derived trilobites appear at the earliest strata of the CE. And, as I have noted, & you have failed to respond, metazoans pre-date the explosion by a considerable period.
The metazoans first appeared in the Cambrian era. Do you disagree with that? The trilobites, when first appeared, possessed a highly complex vision system, not characteristic of slow gradual evolution as the ToE suggests.
quote:
Wrong.
The ediacarans are multicellular animals that lived in the upper proterozoic. True, there is debate as to whether they are metazoans or parazoans, but the fact remains that multicellular animals existed in the Precambrian.
I don't think multicellular organisms existed in the precambrian, as you assume. The wide-spread arrival of multi-cellular animals first took place at the Cambrian era. Here is a site which mentions this fact at the very beginning >> Page not found - Biology Articles, Tutorials & Dictionary Online
Of course, then it goes on to explain about NS, but that is irrelevant. It attests to the fact I previously claimed. Ediacarans are not animals, in the first place. They are multicellular algae.
quote:
Shelly fossils, true metazoans, commonly called the Tommotian fauna existed in the Precambrian 570 mya, pre-dating the Cambrian by 30 million years. Also cnidarians are true metazoans & have representatives in the Precambrian.
http://www.uwsp.edu/...hefferan/Geol106/CLASS5/TOMMOTIAN.htm
What is interesting to note is that the Tommotian Age, which began about 530 million years ago, is a subdivision of the early Cambrian >> Tommotian Age
quote:
Tommotion Fauna existed at the base of the Cambrian and were marked by small shelly fossils, on the order of millimeters in scale. This fauna, which existed 570-560 Ma were fundamentally important in that they represented metazoans containing the first known hard parts and were the predecessors to the phyla of the Cambrian Explosion.
quote:
From same website: The Tommotian Age, which began about 530 million years ago, is a subdivision of the early Cambrian.
quote:
What does this remind you of? A trilobite? Would you be surprised to learn that this fossil predates the Cambrian by 20 million years plus?
I don't know what your motive is behind pointing out this fossil of spriggina. But the trilobites first dominate in the Cambrian era.
The first fossils of trilobites that emerged in the Cambrian era as a result of the cambrian explosion.
quote:
It is important to note that the Cambrian onset was 543 mya, & was recently placed at this juncture to mark the onset of the Cambrian explosion. Anything before 543 mya was before the Cambrian explosion.
But most of the complex invertebrates emereged in .......... ?
quote:
You miss the point. You are insisting on appearances of fossils as being abrupt/instant in the fossil record, so following the same logic, a new discovery of a species must mean the same thing, right? The organism was created on the day of its discovery, what else could explain the fact that it has never been seen before?
Empirical evidence relating to the fossil records and dating its origins, classifying it to an era. Thats how we can find out. There is ample evidence to suggest, that species emerged as a result of the Cambrian explosion was abrupt and sudden. Why, then, are there no transitional, no evolutionary links between them?? The species you pointed out from the Precambrian era especially Vendian era, bears no weight to your argument. Is the spriggina classified as an ancestor of the trilobites? No! The only assumption is that "it could be". But thats non sequitur. There is ample evidence for the abrupt appearance of life during the Cambrian era. One such are the fossils found in the Yunnan province in China
The Fossils previously found in Yunnan province (at sites discovered nearly 100 years ago) and in the Burgess Shale deposits of the Canadian Rockies tell us that all animal phyla (more than 70) ever to exist in Earth’s history appeared at once about 540 million years ago. (Some 40 phyla have since disappeared and not a single new one has appeared.) This burst of life is called the Cambrian Explosion, and the at once refers to an extremely narrow window of geologic time (~5-10 million years)[Richard A. Kerr, Evolution’s Big Bang Gets Even More Explosive, Science, 261 (1993), pp. 1274-1275.]
Anomalocaris, isolated frontal appendage of the largest Burgess Shale animal and perhaps the largest Cambrian animal. Such an appendage was first described and interpreted as an incomplete body of a shrimp-like arthropod. There are no evolutionary links to this organism, no transitional links either.
Marrella splendens Walcott, 1912, called the "lace crab" by Walcott. The problematic arthropod had two pairs of antennae and cannot be accomodated in any of the modern arthropod groups.
More can be found here >> Not found - Universitt Wrzburg
In the Yunnan province:
Misszhouia longicaudata, a soft-bodied trilobite.
Specimen with largely exfoliated thorax exposing preserved appendages.
Consisting of millions of honeycomb-shaped tiny particles and a double-lens system, this eye "has an optimal design which would require a well-trained and imaginative optical engineer to develop today" in the words of David Raup, a professor of geology. (David Raup, "Conflicts Between Darwin and Paleontology", Bulletin, Field Museum of Natural History, Vol 50, January 1979, p. 24.)
Regards,
Ahmad
[This message has been edited by Admin, 11-14-2002]

This message is a reply to:
 Message 62 by mark24, posted 11-11-2002 8:29 AM mark24 has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 84 by mark24, posted 11-13-2002 6:53 PM Ahmad has replied
 Message 85 by mark24, posted 11-14-2002 5:37 AM Ahmad has replied
 Message 86 by edge, posted 11-14-2002 4:16 PM Ahmad has not replied

Ahmad
Inactive Member


Message 81 of 148 (22512)
11-13-2002 1:36 PM
Reply to: Message 63 by nator
11-11-2002 8:38 AM


quote:
Popular magazines are for-profit and publish articles which are directed at a general audience.
So that makes all their articles wrong?
quote:
Professional science journals are not for profit. They are the place where scientists publish their work. They are peer-reviewed, which means that a committee of experienced scientists in the field (Evolutionary Biologists would review Evolutionary Biology papers submitted to an Evolutionary Biology Journal, for example) reviews the work submitted by scientists for methodological soundness, to see if their statistical work is good, to make sure they took into account other explanations from past research that might apply to their work, etc. Usually a paper is not accepted for publication on first submission and it is sent back along with suggestions for how to improve it, what additional experiments might need to be conducted to get better data, etc. If the revisions are relatively minor then it will be resubmitted after these are completed and probably accepted for publication.
Thats when they go deep into explaining something, scientifically. What I am asking is for example when Dawkins says that organism emerged as a result of the cambrian explosion were "placed there with no evolutionary history", is he wrong? As I know, scientists do write books in easier terms for the layman, but they elaborate their work in scinetific papers. Its not like Dawkins says something in his book but says something totally different peer-previewed papers.
quote:
It's not that they lie, it's just that they do not represent evidence from research in the same way as the professional literature does. It is not as reliable because it has been filtered through editors and writers.
So when Alex Oparin says in his book Origin of Life, "Unfortunately, the origin of the cell remains a question which is actually the darkest point of the complete evolution theory" (page 96), is he going to disprove himself by proving the oppsoite in science papers??
quote:
I hat to break it to you, but since Creation science is based upon divine revelation rather than evidence, and since most Creationists spend their time trying to tear down Evolution rather than doing their OWN research, I doubt that any Creationist has even submitted for publication in the first place.
Oh they have. Natue just don't publish them. And I believe there adequate evidence for Creationism to be qualified to be a "theory" just like the ToE.
quote:
LOL! See above for what peer-review means.
Oh so the Discover mag publishes articles by anonymous, non-legible authors and they don't check their credentials?
quote:
A "statement" is a commentary. The point remains that a statement is not evidence from a journal article.
If only you would have read, you will notice that the statement is a conlusion drawn from the research conducted by Lipson.
quote:
So? This refutes Evolution how?
So the simplest of the organisms would have had a ready made energy conversion mechanism? Are you implying that?
quote:
Since, by definition, life arose with the ability to perform this conversion, what is your point?
In order for the energy to be functional, specific energy conversion mechanisms are needed. Do you agree that the first organism, most probably HAD ALL THE NECCESARY COMPONENTS FOR ITS ENERGY CONVERTING SYSTEM??
Regards,
Ahmad

This message is a reply to:
 Message 63 by nator, posted 11-11-2002 8:38 AM nator has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 93 by nator, posted 11-15-2002 10:17 AM Ahmad has not replied

Ahmad
Inactive Member


Message 82 of 148 (22515)
11-13-2002 1:48 PM
Reply to: Message 68 by John
11-11-2002 10:41 AM


quote:
Repeating the same crap does not make for a good argument.
Or, two misunderstandings do not make an understanding.
I agree but in what way have I repeated "the same crap" and what "crap"?
quote:
Panspermia isn't an alternative to evolution. It is an alternative to abiogenesis-- sort-of.
sort of, I guess
quote:
Yup.
I'll repeat my question: Why do you classify Behe's book as "God of the Gaps" book?
quote:
None of the credentials have any bearing on whether his book is or is not an argument from ignorance. This sentence, however, does illustrate your ignorance of informal logic.
How does it illustrate that? I reckon you havn't read any of Dembski's books. One of his books, "No Free Lunch: Why Specified Complexity Cannot Be Purchased Without Intelligence" is an excellent piece of work and worth a read.
quote:
No, but the books are written for a lay ausdience and use a lot of metaphor and not many equations. Metaphor can be misleading.
Lame excuse to cover an acknowledgement. Try again.
Regards,
Ahmad

This message is a reply to:
 Message 68 by John, posted 11-11-2002 10:41 AM John has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 83 by John, posted 11-13-2002 3:32 PM Ahmad has not replied

John
Inactive Member


Message 83 of 148 (22525)
11-13-2002 3:32 PM
Reply to: Message 82 by Ahmad
11-13-2002 1:48 PM


quote:
Originally posted by Ahmad:
I agree but in what way have I repeated "the same crap" and what "crap"?
The trueorigins link you posted is creationist misrepresention of science.
quote:
I'll repeat my question: Why do you classify Behe's book as "God of the Gaps" book?
And I repeat my answer, "Yup"
quote:
How does it illustrate that?
Argument from ignorance isn't a statement about a person's general intellectual abilities. Remember, you defended him saying something like "he has this and that degree, so he isn't ignorant" Thus indicating a misunderstanding of the informal fallacy involved. Argument from ignorance is a argument along the pattern of "i don't know how it works/happend so it must be a miracle/a work of god."
quote:
Lame excuse to cover an acknowledgement. Try again.
What acknowledgement? And what excuse? Haven't you figured out the difference between a professional journal and a popular book?
------------------
http://www.hells-handmaiden.com

This message is a reply to:
 Message 82 by Ahmad, posted 11-13-2002 1:48 PM Ahmad has not replied

mark24
Member (Idle past 5194 days)
Posts: 3857
From: UK
Joined: 12-01-2001


Message 84 of 148 (22556)
11-13-2002 6:53 PM
Reply to: Message 80 by Ahmad
11-13-2002 1:17 PM


Ahmad,
Regarding IC
quote:
It has been shown again and again, how certain systems are irredubily complex. You can start by reading Behe's book.
As I have explained, I am not arguing that systems don’t exist where the removal of one component renders the system useless. They do. What I [I][b]AM[/I][/b] arguing that there is no scientific support (scientific papers published in peer reviewed journals) that supports the contention that these systems couldn’t evolve. IDists have to provide POSITIVE (that means claims that such & such couldn’t have happened are NOT acceptable) evidence that IC cannot evolve.
A scientists opinion alone counts for nought in science.
IC (creationist definition) is not science, & has NEVER had POSITIVE evidence presented in its support.
quote:
Exactly. I don't know if you have read the article also by Thornhill, R.H., Ussery, D.W. 2000. "A classification of possible routes of Darwinian evolution." J. Theor. Bio. 203: 111-116.
That was the article I meant. It provides no evidence of creationist IC. They define IC differently to Behe, & as such you shouldn’t get excited when you read the IC in this paper. In fact, they provide plausible mechanisms for the evolution of IC systems, so it seems an odd choice of literature with which to support your position.
quote:
How can an IC structure evolve, in the first place? According to Behe's definition, it is impossible.
No, it isn’t. Read your own cite. Thornhill, R.H., Ussery, D.W. 2000. "A classification of possible routes of Darwinian evolution." J. Theor. Bio. 203: 111-116.
quote:
SO the key point here is: "ALL COMPONENTS OF THE SYSTEM HAS TO BE PRESENT".
No, they don’t. Read your own cite.
quote:
http://www.arn.org/behe/mb_ic.htm << Read some examples of IC and then you'll know how it is evideny.
I don’t appear to be making myself clear. Your hypothesis suggests that IC systems (as Ussery & Thornhill define it) cannot evolve. Where is the evidence that this is so? Not in the website above, that’s for sure. A hypothesis cannot be self evident, as I have explained previously. If you have no independent positive evidence that this is so, then it is simply a baseless assertion.
The question remains; can you provide a peer reviewed paper published in a scientific journal that concludes that IC systems could not evolve? You are claiming it is impossible, please back up your claim.
Regarding the Cambrian explosion
Let me make my case quite clear (again). I in no way am denying that the CE involved relatively rapid evolution. I AM contesting your assertions that:
1/ All metazoans appeared at the same time. They didn’t. Metazoans pre-existed the CE potentially by up to 500 MILLION YEARS (certainly 250 mya). Trace fossils go back almost twice as far as the CE.
Evolution: Change: Deep Time
quote:
Mark quotes:
900 mya: Soft-bodied animals
The oldest fossil evidence of multicellular animals, or metazoans, are burrows that suggest smooth, wormlike creatures live 900 mya or more. Found in rocks in China, Canada, India, and elsewhere, the imprints of these soft-bodied creatures reveal little else besides their basic shapes.
Body fossils pre-exist the CE by tens of millions of years. The phyla Bryazoa post-dates Cambrian. This is just the metazoa. Plants are even more strung out than the animal phyla.
2/ The implicit notion that all animal complexity appeared literally overnight. Metazoans by definition are complex animals with specialised tissues & organs. As I have explained, they pre-date the Cambrian by a significant margin. Furthermore, patterns of diversity can be seen to evolve within the Cambrian.
Palaeontologists agree that the Cambrian explosion is not simply an artifact of preservation, & that remarkable diversification did take place, in a relatively short period of time. However, lagerstatten containing Cambrian fossils in good states of preservation are extremely rare. This is a FACT. Worse, we know there are metazoans in the Precambrian & the body fossil situation is even more dire. The result? Huge chunks of evolution that are simply missed, giving the appearance of abrupt appearance of organisms. Much like finding new species today. According to creationists, evenly applying their own rationale to "abrupt" appearances in the fossil record, these new living species must have been created yesterday. Why else would they not have been discovered sooner?
quote:
Mark:
Ahmad, do you read your own cites?
You claim to have refuted my argument that the Cambrian explosion was an event taking millions of years? Your cite agrees with me.
Ahmed:
Obviosuly, thats an pro-evolutionist site. I thought you were on the support of the rapid evolution theory. My mistake.
Well you made the cite!!!
Again, I have no problem that rapid evolution occurred. I do have a problem when creationists claim that all phyla appeared in one go in the CE. This is patently false.
quote:
In the site I pointed out,a Crustacean was found in limestone which was dated to be about 511 million years old and the fossil preserves a great deal of detail.
The Cambrian explosion started around 543 mya, giving 32 my for the crustacea to evolve. If you are going to make the sudden appearance argument, your best bet is to go with trilobites.
quote:
Mark: And, as I have noted, & you have failed to respond, metazoans pre-date the explosion by a considerable period.
quote:
Ahmed:The metazoans first appeared in the Cambrian era. Do you disagree with that? The trilobites, when first appeared, possessed a highly complex vision system, not characteristic of slow gradual evolution as the ToE suggests.
Ahmed, I made a statement that the metazoans pre-date the Cambrian (with plenty of supporting evidence), you then quote that statement, asking me if I agree with you that metazoans appear in the Cambrian. I appreciate you have taken the time to write this response, but please at least read my words before replying.
I DO NOT agree that the first metazoans appeared in the Cambrian, as I have stated, & even a casual read of my last post would indicate. I have provided evidence of body fossils of shelly fauna, possible molluscs, cnidarians, & ediacara, that pre-date the Cambrian by tens of millions of years. Trace fossils (burrows etc) potentially go back as far as a billion years ago, evolutionary worst case; 750 million years. The body fossils are curiously absent, which is one of the reasons the Precambrian is such a mystery. Molecular evidence agrees with the earlier date.
That metazoans existed waaaaaaaaaaay before the Cambrian began is not in contention in scientific circles. Creationist organisations don’t report them because they want to make it look like all life appeared in one hit, & that this is somehow in accordance with a one off creation event. So having developed organisms with specialised body tissues pre-dating this event is inconvenient to them. They lie by omission.
quote:
What is interesting to note is that the Tommotian Age, which began about 530 million years ago, is a subdivision of the early Cambrian >> Tommotian Age
http://www.uwsp.edu/...hefferan/Geol106/CLASS5/TOMMOTIAN.htm
Indeed it is. The tommotian fauna, however, existed back as far as 570-560 mya, the Precambrian-Cambrian transition. Tommotian fauna is basically another name for SSF (small shelly fossils), & is often used interchangeably.
Palaeos: Page not found
quote:
Mark quotes:
A distinctive assemblage of small shelly fossils, traditionally labelled the Tommotian fauna. appeared at the Precambrian-Cambrian transition; the assemblage is most extravagantly developed in the lowest Cambrian stage of the Siberian Platform, the Tommotian, which gives its name to the fauna.
More evidence of Tommotian (perhaps it would be better if I called them SSF’s from now on, to avoid confusion).
http://www.clas.ufl.edu/...pciesiel/gly3603c/ediacarian.html
quote:
Mark quotes:
PHASE I. THE VENDIAN (EDICARIAN, 575-543 Ma)
[I][b]small shelly fossils present by the end of the Vendian [/I][/b]

OK? SSF’s present before the Cambrian began. Ergo, SSF’s, ie METAZOANS, pre-date the Cambrian.
quote:
I don't know what your motive is behind pointing out this fossil of spriggina. But the trilobites first dominate in the Cambrian era.
My motive was to show a trilobite like organism that pre-dated the Cambrian by 20 million years plus.
quote:
But most of the complex invertebrates emereged in .......... ?
The Cambrian, AFTER the other simpler metazoans appeared, as evolution predicts.
quote:
Is the spriggina classified as an ancestor of the trilobites? No! The only assumption is that "it could be".
That’s right, it could be! By your own pen, a potential transitional!
quote:
The Fossils previously found in Yunnan province (at sites discovered nearly 100 years ago) and in the Burgess Shale deposits of the Canadian Rockies tell us that all animal phyla (more than 70) ever to exist in Earth’s history appeared at once about 540 million years ago.
Are you ignoring everything I write? Tell me where the first Bryozoan fossil appears. Where the first cnidarian, the first Ediacaran.
quote:
Some 40 phyla have since disappeared and not a single new one has appeared.
Yes it HAS!!!!!!!! Where did you get this crap from? The ministry of disinformation? B R Y O Z O A N B R Y O Z O A N B R Y O Z O A N B R Y O Z O A N B R Y O Z O A N B R Y O Z O A N B R Y O Z O A N B R Y O Z O A N B R Y O Z O A N B R Y O Z O A N B R Y O Z O A N B R Y O Z O A N B R Y O Z O A N B R Y O Z O A N B R Y O Z O A N
B R Y O Z O A N
One more time; B R Y O Z O A N. It is a phyla. It exists today.
There are NO Cambrian examples of it. Your cite above is incorrect.
Plants; Phylum Anthophyta, Phylum Bryophyta, Phylum Ginkgophyta, Phylum Coniferophyta, I could go on.
quote:
I don't think multicellular organisms existed in the precambrian, as you assume. The wide-spread arrival of multi-cellular animals first took place at the Cambrian era. Here is a site which mentions this fact at the very beginning >> Page not found - Biology Articles, Tutorials & Dictionary Online
The site says no such thing. It mentions the widespread arrival of multicellular life in the Cambrian, note it doesn't say, "the very first multi-cellular animals appear in the Cambrian". It also thinks arthropods appear in the Ordovician-Permian!
Secondly, below you are claiming that ediacarans are "multicellular algae", yet above you claim there are no "multicellular organisms" in the Precambrian. Which is it to be?
quote:
Of course, then it goes on to explain about NS, but that is irrelevant. It attests to the fact I previously claimed. Ediacarans are not animals, in the first place. They are multicellular algae.
Vendian Animals
quote:
Mark quotes:
What was life like 560 million years ago? The Vendian marks the first appearance of a group of large fossils collectively known as the "Vendian biota" or "Ediacara fauna." The question of what these fossils are is still not settled to everyone's satisfaction; at various times they have been considered algae, lichens, giant protozoans, or even a separate kingdom of life unrelated to anything living today. Some of these fossils are simple blobs that are hard to interpret and could represent almost anything. [i][b]Some are most like cnidarians, worms, or soft-bodied relatives of the arthropods[/i][/b] [Mark24: Spriggina, remember?]. Others are less easy to interpret and may belong to extinct phyla. But besides the fossils of soft bodies, Vendian rocks contain trace fossils, probably made by wormlike animals slithering over mud. The Vendian rocks thus give us, and YOU through our virtual museum, a good look at the first animals to live on Earth.
Multicellular algae that leaves tracks? I don’t think so. If it wasn’t the Ediacara that left the tracks, what did? Must be another Precambrian metazoan, then?
Regardless, the overwhelming consensus is that the Ediacaran organisms are animals. Unless you can point out the flaw with specifics?
Evolution: Change: Deep Time
quote:
Mark quotes:
Nearly all scientists today agree that they were soft-bodied marine-dwelling animals. Their discovery confirmed what many scientists had long hypothesized but could not prove: that skeletonized creatures of the Cambrian period, long thought by scientists to be the first multicellular animals, had predecessors.
Herein lies the basic flaw in the creationist argument regarding the Cambrian explosion.
1/ Why are there major multi-cellular taxa that pre-date the Cambrian?
2/ Why are there major multi-cellular taxa that post—date the Cambrian?
3/ Why do prokaryotes pre-date eukarotes, which in turn pre-date multicellular organisms?
4/ Why do metaphyte plant phyla appear so much later than the Cambrian, making even more of a mockery of the "all phyla at once" argument?
5/ Given that the premises in 1,2,3, & 4 are true, what is so devastating about the Cambrian explosion to evolution in general, that is explained by creationism?
Mark
------------------
Occam's razor is not for shaving with.
[This message has been edited by mark24, 11-13-2002]
[This message has been edited by mark24, 11-13-2002]
[This message has been edited by mark24, 11-14-2002]

This message is a reply to:
 Message 80 by Ahmad, posted 11-13-2002 1:17 PM Ahmad has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 87 by Ahmad, posted 11-14-2002 5:59 PM mark24 has replied

mark24
Member (Idle past 5194 days)
Posts: 3857
From: UK
Joined: 12-01-2001


Message 85 of 148 (22642)
11-14-2002 5:37 AM
Reply to: Message 80 by Ahmad
11-13-2002 1:17 PM


Ahmed,
Here's some more evidence of Precambrian multicellular life.
http://geol.queensu.ca/museum/exhibits/oldanim/oldanim.html
The term "multi-celled" when applied to a plant or animal means that the organism is made up of several different cell types. The first multi-celled animals (metazoa) evolved over 600 million years ago.
They don't look like animals. Why do scientists think they were?
Although faint, the circular impressions are very similar to more obvious animal fossils found in Proterozoic rocks that are slightly younger. This is how they were recognized in the first place. By studying these rocks, scientists can tell that they formed in fairly deep water. The water was probably deeper than the photic zone (the depths to which enough light penetrates that photosynthetic plants can survive). This, and the fact that there is no carbon preserved, implies that the impressions were not made by plants. The simplest metazoans that are living today are sea anemones and other simple cnidaria (corals, jellyfish). These are cup-shaped animals that would form fossils remarkably like the discs and rings that are preserved on these two samples. Although there are still many questions to be answered, most scientists are convinced that in this display you are seeing the oldest fossilized remains of multi-celled animals yet discovered.
900 mya Worms
Sun (1986 & 1994) reported Pararenicola & Ptotoarenicola, elongate, cylindrical, annelated worms 900 my old. Cloud, who dismissed many Precambrian fossils & traces could not do so with these two examples.
The Doushanto Formation Fossils (570 mya)
http://www-geology.ucdavis.edu/~GEL3/Precambembryos.html
All the while, palaeontologists have been able to do nothing but sit on their hands and wonder. The latest fossils will change all that. They all come from the 570-m.y.-old Doushantuo Formation of southern China, and owe their preservation to the special properties of calcium phosphate, which can preserve fossils in extremely fine detail.
The animal embryos will attract most attention. They seem to have come straight out of the pictures in a biology textbook, preserved as single fertilized cells, as two-, four- eight-cell and later stages, all preserved uncrushed and in microscopic detail.
What would these embryos have become, had they grown up? That is harder to say, and any answer will contain a measure of speculation. But details of the way the cells are arranged resemble similar arrangements in the cells of relatively complex invertebrates such as crustaceans. This suggests that relatively complex animals existed at 570 Ma, which in turn implies that the divergences between the lineages of the major animal groups must have happened much, much earlier.
These results confirm the molecular data, inasmuch as the divergences of the major animal lineages happened well before the Cambrian Explosion. But they do more than just confirm, they add flesh to the theory, providing solid evidence to support the claims made by molecular biologists. Greater and more wonderful discoveries will surely follow.
Mark
------------------
Occam's razor is not for shaving with.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 80 by Ahmad, posted 11-13-2002 1:17 PM Ahmad has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 88 by Ahmad, posted 11-14-2002 6:17 PM mark24 has not replied
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edge
Member (Idle past 1705 days)
Posts: 4696
From: Colorado, USA
Joined: 01-09-2002


Message 86 of 148 (22761)
11-14-2002 4:16 PM
Reply to: Message 80 by Ahmad
11-13-2002 1:17 PM


quote:
Originally posted by Ahmad:
But most of the complex invertebrates emereged in .......... ?
You obviously misunderstand. It is impossible to tell. We can only say that we first FIND them in.... That is why the Cambrian explosion is referred to as an explosion. Early evolutionists could not explain this phenomenon because they did not have the tools to do so. It was therefor called an 'explosion' which is a descriptive term but not accurate. It is like saying that the sun 'rises' when we know such is not the case.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 80 by Ahmad, posted 11-13-2002 1:17 PM Ahmad has not replied

Ahmad
Inactive Member


Message 87 of 148 (22784)
11-14-2002 5:59 PM
Reply to: Message 84 by mark24
11-13-2002 6:53 PM


quote:
As I have explained, I am not arguing that systems don’t exist where the removal of one component renders the system useless. They do. What I AM arguing that there is no scientific support (scientific papers published in peer reviewed journals) that supports the contention that these systems couldn’t evolve. IDists have to provide POSITIVE (that means claims that such & such couldn’t have happened are NOT acceptable) evidence that IC cannot evolve.
So in other words, you do believe in irreducibly complex systems, but what you argue about is the evidence showing that these systems could not have evolved, if I am not wrong.
If something is IC, how can it evolve? Evolution is the evolving of organisms from simple to complex by minor changes over a huge period of time caused by NS and random mutation. If a system is IC, then the question whether it evolved from a simpler system is moot. Hence then, that system is not IC in the first place!! All components are needed for a system to function effectively, so that if one of the components work, the entire system ceases to function. If a system is IC, then it should have ALL its components functionaing from the very beginning, now shouldn't it? Or are you denying that?
quote:
That was the article I meant. It provides no evidence of creationist IC. They define IC differently to Behe, & as such you shouldn’t get excited when you read the IC in this paper. In fact, they provide plausible mechanisms for the evolution of IC systems, so it seems an odd choice of literature with which to support your position.
Perhaps you might like to read a response to that article here >>http://www.arn.org/docs/behe/mb_mg1darwinianpathways.htm
quote:
The question remains; can you provide a peer reviewed paper published in a scientific journal that concludes that IC systems could not evolve? You are claiming it is impossible, please back up your claim.
You have the positive claim... that IC systems can evolve. The burden of proof is on you. Thornhill and Ussery's article has already been refuted. Go to the site I gave you.
quote:
1/ All metazoans appeared at the same time. They didn’t. Metazoans pre-existed the CE potentially by up to 500 MILLION YEARS (certainly 250 mya). Trace fossils go back almost twice as far as the CE.
Agreed. I stand corrected there. But what about the *missing links* of organisms that exploded in the Cambrian era? Is there any evidence to suggest that these organisms were descendants of metazoans in the pre-cambrian era?
quote:
The implicit notion that all animal complexity appeared literally overnight. Metazoans by definition are complex animals with specialised tissues & organs. As I have explained, they pre-date the Cambrian by a significant margin. Furthermore, patterns of diversity can be seen to evolve within the Cambrian.
Ok, so you admit that:
1) Metazoans are complex animals
2)Metazoan fossils pre-date cambrian explosion
So if metazoans appeared first in the precambrian era and they were highly complex, WHEN DID THEY EVOLVE??
quote:
Palaeontologists agree that the Cambrian explosion is not simply an artifact of preservation, & that remarkable diversification did take place, in a relatively short period of time. However, lagerstatten containing Cambrian fossils in good states of preservation are extremely rare. This is a FACT. Worse, we know there are metazoans in the Precambrian & the body fossil situation is even more dire. The result? Huge chunks of evolution that are simply missed, giving the appearance of abrupt appearance of organisms. Much like finding new species today. According to creationists, evenly applying their own rationale to "abrupt" appearances in the fossil record, these new living species must have been created yesterday. Why else would they not have been discovered sooner?
The Burgess Shale was first found by Charles Walcott in 1909, why was the story, then, not reported to the public until the late 1980's?
The answer would be obvious. What they are seeing are phyla that do not exist nowthat's more than 50 phyla compared to the 38 we have now. (Actually the number 50 was first quoted as over 100 for a while, but then the consensus became 50-plus.) But the point is, they saw something they didn't know what to do with; that's the scientifically honest position they're placed in. Later on, as they began to understand things are not the same as Darwinian expectations, they started shutting up. So its not that finding fossils relating to the Cambrian explosion is difficult or rare. They are there. The fossils found in Burgess Shale and Yunnan province are evidence of the Cambrian Explosion not Cambrian evolution.
Whats worse for evolutionists are the comparisons done between different living taxa. The results of these comparisons reveal that animal taxa considered to be "close relatives" by evolutionists until quite recently, are genetically very different, which puts the "intermediate form" hypothesis, that only exists theoretically, into an even greater quandary.
quote:
Again, I have no problem that rapid evolution occurred. I do have a problem when creationists claim that all phyla appeared in one go in the CE. This is patently false.
"Before the Cambrian period, almost all life was microscopic, except for some enigmatic soft-bodied organisms. At the start of the Cambrian, about 544 million years ago, animals burst forth in a rash of evolutionary activity never since equaled. Ocean creatures acquired the ability to grow hard shells, and a broad range of new body plans emerged within the geologically short span of 10 million years. Paleontologists have proposed many theories to explain this revolution but have agreed on none." (Monastersky, R., "When Earth Tipped, Life Went Wild," Science News, vol. 152, 1997, p. 52.)
quote:
The Cambrian explosion started around 543 mya, giving 32 my for the crustacea to evolve. If you are going to make the sudden appearance argument, your best bet is to go with trilobites.
Yes thats my best bet... the trilobites which has no known evolutianary origin. However, the evolution of Crustacea is still at question. The Jurassic period crustaceans looked pretty much like they do today. Shrimps and lobsters from the famous Solnhofen limestone are hardly distinguishable from modern forms.
quote:
My motive was to show a trilobite like organism that pre-dated the Cambrian by 20 million years plus.
Ok, so whats your point? That trilobites descended from spriggina?
quote:
That’s right, it could be! By your own pen, a potential transitional!
There is no empirical evidence for that.
quote:
One more time; B R Y O Z O A N. It is a phyla. It exists today.
There are NO Cambrian examples of it. Your cite above is incorrect.
The bryozoans were the ONLY group which were found in the fossil record a little later. However, most people think we just haven't found it yet; that group was most probably also present in the Cambrian explosion.
quote:
Plants; Phylum Anthophyta, Phylum Bryophyta, Phylum Ginkgophyta, Phylum Coniferophyta, I could go on.
What about them? I am referring to animal phylas.
quote:
Herein lies the basic flaw in the creationist argument regarding the Cambrian explosion.
The first four flaws you point out does not refute the explosion is any way. Its still cambrian explosion and not cambrian evolution. Your fourth argument has to do with plants which I don't recall mentioning. The at once refers to an extremely narrow window of geologic time (~5-10 million years).3, 4 The latest reports from the Chinese sites narrows this window to less than 3 million years.
More information can be found at Richard A. Kerr's, Evolution’s Big Bang Gets Even More Explosive, Science, 261 (1993), pp. 1274-1275.
Regarding your fifth question, the devasting thing about cambrian explosion lies in the very defintion of evolution. The theory of evolution implies that things get more and more complex and get more and more diverse from one single origin. But the whole thing turns out to be reversedwe have more diverse groups in the very beginning, and in fact more and more of them die off over time, and we have less and less now. A simple way of putting it is that currently we have about 38 phyla of different groups of animals, but the total number of phyla discovered during that period of time (including those in China, Canada, and elsewhere) adds up to over 50 phyla. That means [there are] more phyla in the very, very beginning, where we found the first fossils [of animal life], than exist now. (Paul Chien)
As may be seen, CE indicates that living things did not evolve from primitive to the advanced forms, but instead emerged all of a sudden and in a perfect state(like the trilobites). In short, living beings did not come into existence by evolution, [b][i]they were created[/b][/i].
Regards,
Ahmad

This message is a reply to:
 Message 84 by mark24, posted 11-13-2002 6:53 PM mark24 has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 90 by mark24, posted 11-14-2002 8:14 PM Ahmad has replied
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Ahmad
Inactive Member


Message 88 of 148 (22786)
11-14-2002 6:17 PM
Reply to: Message 85 by mark24
11-14-2002 5:37 AM


Furthermore, even the vertebrate phylum now extends into the Cambrian period, especially with the recent discovery of two fossil fish in China:
The two new fossils . . . from Chengjiang are the most convincing Early Cambrian vertebrates ever found.(Philippe Janvier, "Catching the First Fish," Nature[PEER-REVIEWED] (vol. 402, November 4, 1999), p. 21.)
The insects and other land invertebrates are also a very important group, and these practically all seem to be living fossils. With respect to the arthropod phylum (the largest in the animal kingdom), consider the millipedes, for example.
Indeed, the oldest fossils of land-dwelling animals are millipedes, dating to more than 425 million years ago. Incredibly, the archaic forms are nearly indistinguishable from certain groups living today.(William A. Shear, "Millipedes," American Scientist[PEER-REVIEWED] (vol. 87, May/June 1999), p. 234)
The same phenomenon holds for practically all the insects.
Compared with other life forms, insects are actually slow to evolve new familiesbut they are even slower to go extinct. Some 84 percent of the insect families alive today were alive 100 million years ago. . . .(Carl Zimmer, "Insects Ascendant," Discover (vol. 14, November 1993), p. 30.)
Whether bees or ants, cicadas or beetles, termites or cockroaches, the fossils of these and other insects are always practically identical with (though often larger than) their modern descendants. The same applies to the arachnids and myriapods.
Space does not allow discussion of modern amphibians (e.g., frogs, toads), reptiles (crocodiles, alligators, turtles), mammals (bats, squirrels, shrews, opossums, tarsiers, etc.), all of which (and many, many others) are practically identical with their fossil representatives but I'll try to get some images to prove my point.
Regards,
Ahmad

This message is a reply to:
 Message 85 by mark24, posted 11-14-2002 5:37 AM mark24 has not replied

Ahmad
Inactive Member


Message 89 of 148 (22789)
11-14-2002 6:56 PM
Reply to: Message 85 by mark24
11-14-2002 5:37 AM


Imagine a swimming slug with five eyes on the top of its head and a single arm with its jaw on the end - this is the very peculiar creature known as Opabinia. It lived about 550 million years ago and its fossils have been found in western Canada and China. It is almost as if nature was experimenting with various designs for complex life forms to determine which would work best. Opabinia was a slow swimming, 3-inch-long (8 cm) hunter. Its excellent vision would have allowed it to easily spot its prey, but it would have only been able to catch those creatures too slow to escape. This particular species has not been classified yet. Such a complex organism, the Opabinia is... nor its transition or its ancestor has been uncovered. Try linking this with evolutionary origins and see if you can do it!
Anomalocaris, Ottoia, Wiwaxia, Hallucigenia and so on and so forth are creatures that are soo complex, that if evolution were true, then these creatures would have required twice the age of earth just to evolve!! Yet, here is the real puzzle of the Cambrian Explosion for the theory of evolution. All the known phyla, except one, along with the oddities, first appear in the Cambrian period. There are no ancestors. There are no intermediates. Fossil experts used to think that the Cambrian lasted 75 million years. But even that seemed to be a pretty short time for all this evolutionary change. Eventually the Cambrian was shortened to only 30 million years. And if that wasn't bad enough, the time frame of the real work of bringing all these different creatures into existence was limited to the first five to ten million years of the Cambrian. This is extraordinarily fast! Harvard's Stephen Jay Gould says, "Fast is now a lot faster than we thought, and that is extraordinarily interesting." What an understatement! "Extraordinarily impossible" might be a better phrase!
In the Time magazine article (p. 70), paleontologist Samuel Bowring says, "We now know how fast fast is. And what I like to ask my biologist friends is, How fast can evolution get before you start feeling uncomfortable?"
Regards,
Ahmad

This message is a reply to:
 Message 85 by mark24, posted 11-14-2002 5:37 AM mark24 has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 91 by mark24, posted 11-14-2002 8:17 PM Ahmad has replied
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mark24
Member (Idle past 5194 days)
Posts: 3857
From: UK
Joined: 12-01-2001


Message 90 of 148 (22798)
11-14-2002 8:14 PM
Reply to: Message 87 by Ahmad
11-14-2002 5:59 PM


Ahmed,
Regarding IC
quote:
So in other words, you do believe in irreducibly complex systems, but what you argue about is the evidence showing that these systems could not have evolved, if I am not wrong.
Bang on the nose, my son! When I say IC, I mean a system that the removal of any one part renders the entire system useless. See your own cite for a possible explanation. Thornhill, R.H., Ussery, D.W. 2000. "A classification of possible routes of Darwinian evolution." J. Theor. Bio. 203: 111-116.
quote:
If something is IC, how can it evolve?
See above.
quote:
Evolution is the evolving of organisms from simple to complex by minor changes over a huge period of time caused by NS and random mutation.
Plus genetic drift, recombination
quote:
If a system is IC, then the question whether it evolved from a simpler system is moot. Hence then, that system is not IC in the first place!!
Ahh, this is the real point of contention. An IC system is NOT implicitly created, it CAN potentially evolve. Creationists (even if Behe doesn’t) define IC as the above definition, with cannot possibly have evolved tagged on the end. My definition, & Ussery’s & Thornhill make no such claim. Why? Because no one has positive evidence that IC systems couldn’t evolve.
http://nsmserver2.fullerton.edu/...reation/web/Thornhill.pdf
Remember, this is your cite, & it provides no less than four possible avenues for IC evolution. Namely:
2.1. SERIAL DIRECT DARWINIAN EVOLUTION complex
2.2. PARALLEL DIRECT DARWINIAN EVOLUTION
2.3. ELIMINATION OF FUNCTIONAL REDUNDANCY
2.4. ADOPTION FROM A DIFFERENT FUNCTION
quote:
Perhaps you might like to read a response to that article here >>http://www.arn.org/docs/behe/mb_mg1darwinianpathways.htm
I read it when you first cited it. They conclude that Behe's definition has made it into the scientific literature in the conclusion. It hasn’t, they even go to the lengths of pointing out how Behes & T&U’s definitions differ. Remarkable. And even if it had, Behes definition doesn’t preclude IC evolution, it’s just that Behe claimed it couldn’t happen. He never provided positive evidence that it couldn’t, however.
quote:
Mark:
The question remains; can you provide a peer reviewed paper published in a scientific journal that concludes that IC systems could not evolve? You are claiming it is impossible, please back up your claim.
Ahmed: You have the positive claim... that IC systems can evolve. The burden of proof is on you. Thornhill and Ussery's article has already been refuted. Go to the site I gave you. [/quote]
T&U’s article has not been refuted with POSITIVE EVIDENCE TO THE CONTRARY. The best that can be said is that is has been replied to. You came here claiming IC couldn’t evolve, not me. The burden of evidence therefore falls squarely upon YOUR shoulders to back up YOUR claim. My position is that IC systems may possibly be able to evolve, I am making no such absolute statements as you are.
Regarding the Cambrian explosion
quote:
Agreed. I stand corrected there. But what about the *missing links* of organisms that exploded in the Cambrian era? Is there any evidence to suggest that these organisms were descendants of metazoans in the pre-cambrian era?
Yes, but most of it molecular. The problem cladistics face is that organisms simpler than sponges & cnidarians possess no real apomorphies, by virtue of being gooey blobs (!!!!), so it becomes difficult to identify (certainly from fossil impressions) features that are common to phyla appearing in the CE. However:
http://www.bio.psu.edu/faculty/hedges/124.pdf
quote:
The divergence time for cephalochordates and vertebrates is estimated here as 751 :t 30.9 Mya {million years ago) using nine constant-rate nuclear protein-coding genes. This suggests that free-swimming animals with a notochord, neural tube, and metameric lateral muscles were present about 200 million years before the first fossil evidence of bilaterian animals. By inference, urochordates, hemichordates, and echinoderms diverged even earlier in the Proterozoic.
Note this suggests a relationship between chordates & echinoderms (there are many others). The problem I want to impress upon you is; how would we recognise an echinoderm/chordate transitional 750 mya? A starfish with a notochord? Early organisms are very amorphous. For example, what would an arthropod that never had an exoskeleton look like? Certainly, there are plenty of candidates, Spriggina for one, the SSF’s are another, but can we reduce the tentativity to an acceptable level?. Or a proto-arthropod that lacked jointed legs AND an exoskeleton? It would be almost impossible to reliably classify such a thing.
http://lsweb.la.asu.edu/skumar/pdf/prsl99.pdf
This paper has some good information too. There are plenty of other papers that provide molecular evidence of a deep Precambrian divergence. Alas, as regards the fossil record, there are plenty of candidates for intermediates, but I couldn’t foist them upon you without noting the high tentativity involved.
quote:
Ok, so you admit that:
1) Metazoans are complex animals
2)Metazoan fossils pre-date cambrian explosion
So if metazoans appeared first in the precambrian era and they were highly complex, WHEN DID THEY EVOLVE??
See above. Best molecular estimate of the earliest multicellular animal? About 1 bn years ago, this is congruent with the trace fossil estimate.
quote:
The Burgess Shale was first found by Charles Walcott in 1909, why was the story, then, not reported to the public until the late 1980's?
What? Walcott published his findings in the scientific community at the time. Perhaps you are referring to S.J. Goulds book, Wonderful Life, 1989? If you are, you will discover in its pages that Walcott published in his lifetime. You will also find some more evidence of Precambrian cladogenesis.
quote:
The answer would be obvious. What they are seeing are phyla that do not exist nowthat's more than 50 phyla compared to the 38 we have now. (Actually the number 50 was first quoted as over 100 for a while, but then the consensus became 50-plus.) But the point is, they saw something they didn't know what to do with; that's the scientifically honest position they're placed in.
Ye olde Evilutionist conspiracy. The Cambrian explosion was known in Darwins time, why would more fossils be a bad thing, to be covered up? Methinks you are judging people (erroneously) by your own standards. Walcotts first publication regarding the Burgess shale was in 1912, just 3 years after its discovery: 1912 field work in Alberta and British Columbia published Cambrian Brachiopoda (USGS Monograph 51)
Scientists aren’t scared of data. Theologians are.
quote:
Yes thats my best bet... the trilobites which has no known evolutianary origin. However, the evolution of Crustacea is still at question. The Jurassic period crustaceans looked pretty much like they do today. Shrimps and lobsters from the famous Solnhofen limestone are hardly distinguishable from modern forms.
Er.. the trilobites have evolutionary origins, Spriggina, for one. The best evidence of Precambrian relationships is molecular, not morphological.
quote:
Ok, so whats your point? That trilobites descended from spriggina?
POSSIBLY!!! As has been noted, there are a lot of soft bodied arthropod-a-like organisms in the Precambrian. Another hypothesis is that arthropods were descended from SSF’s. In fact there is debate as to whether the arthropods are a monophyletic clade or in fact polyphyletic.
quote:
The bryozoans were the ONLY group which were found in the fossil record a little later. However, most people think we just haven't found it yet; that group was most probably also present in the Cambrian explosion.
I’m glad you discovered this little prediction, which I don’t have a problem with I might add. But here lies the root of your inconsistency. Am I allowed to say that Precambrian transitionals just haven’t been found yet? No? So why are you allowed to say that Bryozoans just haven’t been found in the Cambrian yet? It’s PRECISELY what you’re doing. If Precambrian transitionals don’t exist (well, they do, but the conclusions are more tentative than vertebrate transitionals), then neither do Bryozoans. OK? Can’t have it both ways. So, by your own logic, major metazoan phyla appear in both the Precambrian, & the post-Cambrian.
quote:
What about them? I am referring to animal phylas.
I know, but what implications does the abrupt appearance of other major taxa of other kingdoms have on your creation myth/hypothesis?
quote:
The first four flaws you point out does not refute the explosion is any way.
Of course it doesn’t. I’m not refuting the Cambrian explosion. I AM pointing out to you that, if you remove your compartmentalised thinking head for one moment, the earliest fossils are single celled prokaryotes, then single celled eukaryotes, then multicellular organisms of-dubious-metazoa-ness, then true triploblastic metazoans. Furthermore, the phyla of the animal kingdom do not all appear at the same time. The phyla of other kingdoms certainly lack such a correlation with the Cambrian. In fact, & not to trivialise the Cambrian faunal diversity, there is nothing odd about the CE other than said rapid diversity. Other than the rapidity, everything is in it’s proper evolutionary order. What’s the problem? You are criticising the fossil record for its alleged gaps, yet in the case of bryozoans you are appealing for gaps!!!! Ahmed, you can’t have it both ways!
Mark
------------------
Occam's razor is not for shaving with.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 87 by Ahmad, posted 11-14-2002 5:59 PM Ahmad has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 95 by Ahmad, posted 11-16-2002 3:26 PM mark24 has replied

mark24
Member (Idle past 5194 days)
Posts: 3857
From: UK
Joined: 12-01-2001


Message 91 of 148 (22799)
11-14-2002 8:17 PM
Reply to: Message 89 by Ahmad
11-14-2002 6:56 PM


quote:
Imagine a swimming slug with five eyes on the top of its head and a single arm with its jaw on the end - this is the very peculiar creature known as Opabinia. It lived about 550 million years ago and its fossils have been found in western Canada and China.
550 mya? You provide evidence that destroys your own argument. The CAMBRIAN BEGINS 543 MYA!!!!
Mark
------------------
Occam's razor is not for shaving with.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 89 by Ahmad, posted 11-14-2002 6:56 PM Ahmad has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 96 by Ahmad, posted 11-16-2002 3:36 PM mark24 has not replied

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