Acceptance, Evolutionists vs. Creationists

quote:

---

and if design can be proven, show me the test for it

---

Theres design everywhere. The fact that humans are more than just about survival and have a soul and can reason is design. As there is no semi human line up leading up to such complexity. DNA, Non-life not being able to become life on its own. Design in animals etc. All this is evidence of design that creation scientist can look for among all the other research they do. You are truly ignorant if you think a scientist who looks for design and complexity is not science. The only reason you belive it is not science is because their theory of origins is not evolution.

quote:

---

it's not a matter of belief. it's a matter of having seen and studied it myself. creationism is not science, and never will be, because it concludes first, ignore counter evidence, and has nothing to test.

---

It does not conclude first. It bases its evidence on the Bible. Evolutionists base their evidence on an evolutionary framework. Their bible states in the beginning life evolved from natural processes. Therefore they build the evidence upon this. Creation belive their is a designer behind it all. And evidence can be built upon this. They are both science! This is a topic that preschoolers should be arguing about. Not a mature group of people such as in this board. Surely the ones with wisdom like Nosyned or Crashfrog can see this. The only thing that stops people from accepting creation as another form of science is their own willingness to accept it.

quote:

---

which is dogma? understanding, or having observed that animals change from generation to generation, or believing against all facts that they do not and that god created the world in six literal days? evolution is not dogma, it is strict scientific fact.

---

What animal in the history of mankind has changed from one specie to another?. I am talking about an undisputed claim. Nothing like bird to dinasaurs, apes to human. Give me a transitional form that has been proven by the evidence and the fossils. Evolution is not scientific fact. It is a theory. It has become the only accepted theory within the mainstream scientific community as it takes away the need of a creator.

quote:

---

the problem is that for creationism, it goes like this:
1. inference: the bible is 100% literally true.
2. conclusion: god created everything 6k years ago, in 6 days
3. research, including quote mining, and disregarding any and all facts that do not fit the conclusion (almost all of them)
4. no first hand observations
5. no testable hypothesis
6. no tests
7. publish, straight to public, not scientific journals.

---

Ok lets go through your list here. Number one goes for evolutionists also. Evolution is true and did occur. The book Teaching about Evolution & the Nature of Science states "There is no debate within the scientific community over weather evolution occured, and there is no evidence that evolution has not occured" p4. Hmm sounds awfully similar to creationists accepting the Bible as fact. Do you see a bias developing?. Or should i say developed. Number 2 well evolutionists again have concluded evolution has occured through natural processes and man has also biologically descended from a common ancestor. Once again we see the evolutionary framework that evolution must apply its evidence to. Number 3 once again evolution discards any evidence against evolution. "But it isnt evidence thats why!" Thats simply your own bias. Creation dont accept anything evolutionary either. Do you see the similaritys? they are both science and they both contradict each other. Number 4 states no first hand observations. Well thats definately not true as creation magazine shows real science in the present with real scientist using their 5 senses. Evolutionists look for old earth, creation look for young earth, creation looks for design and complexity, evolution looks for transtional forms,natural selection evolving into higher beings, creation looks for evidence consistent with the Bibles account of origins, evolution looks for evidence supporting their natural processes into life and so on. Do you see, they are both science. Both using the same method. There is one difference and that is creation are basing their evidence on a creator and evolutionists do not want a creator just natural processes. Therefore anything with a creator cannot even be considered.Number 6 states no test?. Well thats nonsense as they test all their evidence thats how they come to conclusions. They dont dogmatically cling on to the Bible if the evidence is against them, they stay with creation because they believe the evidence does fit with what Gods word says. Number 7 states no publising in journals, well many creationists have had their work published, unfortunately the mainstream secular world would never even think about publishing something against the fact of evolution. Not in school, not in journals, not in the media. Nowhere, they are not science just religion.

quote:

---

even IF it were right, which it is not, it would still be dogma and propaganda

---

Anyone else see something odd about what this states? I certainly do.

quote:

---

evolution has no doctrine, and no followers

---

Umm what about humanists?, darwinists?, atheists?, naturalist?, evolutionists?, theistic evolutionists?. Yes they do have a doctrine. Evolution gives mankind a foundation with no deity. Therefore man by himself can determine truth because we evolved through natural processes. The universe is all their is was ever will be. Man can now control their destiny. Evolution does not directly give this doctrine. But of course once man accepts evolution he comes to the conclusions such as humanistic philosophy.

quote:

---

evolution would be true even if the earth was only 6000 years old

---

The reason evolution needs billions of yrs is to give the impression that anything can happen over time. Evolution could not possibly occur in 6,000yrs. For particles-to-people evolution to have occured, the earth needs to be billions of yrs old.

quote:

---

creationism is the idea that god created the earth in 6 days, 6000 years ago. this is not science. it just isn't. it's religion

---

I dont recall reading in the What is Science textbook saying science is only dealing with an old earth. Oh yes i do remember now, that book was a secular university textbook. I stand corrected. Science can only deal with an old earth and evolution. Anything else is wrong. By the way creation find evidence to be consistent with what God says. This is science being used to prove Gods existent. If the Bible is right when it talks about a flood, design, complexity, no missing links, no evolution then the Bible is consistent therefore we can trust what God says. This is all creation is. It is not a religion, it is the science of a religion. Just as evolution is the science of a naturalist. Who thinks the world can come about without a creator but through natural processes.

Nonsense. That is so silly that it is laughable.Evolution deals with what happened. That's it. End of story.It has nothing to do with behaviour, morals or any other such things. The fact that so many Christians also understand that Evolution happened and that Creationism is simply howling at the moon, shows your conjecture is not true.You continue making the same allegations, allegations with no basis and unproven. You keep saying that Creationism is Science even though it has none of the chracteristics of a science. You sound like the little children watching Peter Pan when Tinkerbelle is dying, their eyes shut tight, clapping their little hands and repeating, "I believe in fairies. I believe in Fairies".And you keep going back over the same old things. The great wetting that never happened, the boat that didn't float and asserting, despite the fact that you have no evidence, that they are fact.What you have done, and what you do continuously, is prove the premise of this thread. You are working from Authority, you are accepting absurdities simply because you are told they are true. Time after time when asked for evidence you return to the Bible. To Authority.

---

Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Hmmm...245 posts; I'm probably wasting my time, but... No, this is not odd. The point, which you can get if you try, is that dogma and propaganda can happen to be right. Dogma and propaganda is no way to find truth, but by chance or circumstance it can be right.His point is that creation science does not involve a search for truth. So, even it happened to be true, it wouldn't be because they searched for truth and found it, because creation science is about dogma and propaganda, not looking for truth. Science deals with a method for finding truth. Creation science does not look for truth. It assumes that it has truth, from the Bible, and then it does whatever it can to make all evidence fit what it believes.Because of this creation science is net really science.Whether something is science or not has nothing to do with old or new earth. It has to do with drawing conclusions from observable, repeatable, testable evidence. Since Creation science does not draw conclusions from evidence, but draws conclusions from the Bible, it is not science. Again, this has nothing to do with old or new earth.Creation science does use evidence (I would say "abuse" evidence, but that's not the point here), but it does not draw conclusions from the evidence. It has a preset conclusion, made from religious beliefs.I hope this helps.I once heard this described (on a different topic, from Common Sense by David Bercot, published by Scroll Publishing in Tyler, Tx) as the difference between a trial and a title lawyer. A trial lawyer is not trying to obtain truth from the evidence. He is trying to use the evidence to defend his client, no matter what is really true about his client. A title lawyer, on the other hand, is given the task by his client to find out who is the real owner of a piece of property. He uses the evidence as honestly as possible, because his client wants to know who the real owner is. No false conclusion will help the client.Like it or not, creation scientists act like trial lawyers. Most other scientists act like title lawyers.Sorry.

you ignored my question. show me a test for design. i ALMOSY bought behe's book today (along with the blin watchmaker, and the origin of species) just to see if he had a test for design. irreducible complexity comes close, but the assumption that it proves design is false, as can be demonstrated by evolution algorithms (see dawkin's book. his program made some rather nice looking pictures...) and by the fossil record. no, you are GROSSLY mistaken. evidence is not BASED on anything. it's evidence. theories are based on evidence, NOT the other way around. you said creationism does not conlcude first, but then you show it tries to fit evidence in an existing framework. the theory of evolution does not do this. if something comes up that VALIDLY contracts the current framework for how things happened, the framework is revised. this is the scientific process.creationism does not do this, and does not base itself on methodological naturalism, but the supernatural. qed, it is NOT science. here's a bunch: Observed Instances of Speciation
here's some more: http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/speciation.htmland viruses and bacteria consistently speciate. where did aids come from? it didn't exist in the dark ages, in human form. (although, some studies have shown that it may be partially related to the bubonic plague) creationists like arguments from authority. so-and-so says this. evolutionary biologists do not. remember that last step in the model i posted? publish and retest? science checks itself. the fact that evolution has occured and continues to occur is not in dispute, it's a little lower on the list, under observations.darwin's original theory was not called "evolution" it was called "evolution by means of natural selection" or just "natural selection" for short, as opposed to "by design." basically, he was attempted to explain how the observed evolution takes place, and what mechanism is guiding it. show me the evidence that contradicts the principle that the frequencies of alleles change from one generation to the next?that evolution. that's what you're debating. show me that that doesn't happen, ever. no framework here, just show that, for instance, i did not inheret my father's nose and my mother's eyes. because at the basic level, that's exactly what evolution is: basic genetics.the model for how this produces the variety of life we see is always changing. there's always debate about convergent evolution, direct ancestry, slightly different branches etc. this model has been being revised since it was proposed. with the amount of evidence (taxonomical definitions based on the fossil record) the generalities of it are pretty certain. senses lie. that why we have tests. lots of thing look designed... if you squint your eyes enough. did you see lenin in the shower curtain and rasputin in the kitten's ear in the other thread where you ignored my comments about archaeopteryx? i mean, the likenesses are incredible, they must have been put there, right? what about old earth creationists? what about people who believe in theistic evolution?personal bias is not to play a role in science. and it doesn't. this is why creationists are rejected from scientific jobs, because they are (or at least by your admission) allowing a personal bias to affect their outcome. the process is simple, hypothesize, test, conclude, repeat. the conclusion is either that your hypothesis was right, or that it was wrong. there's no place for personal bias in this process, and rejecting, fudging, or cheating evidence is unacceptable.and this is exactly what creationists do repeatedly. because the evidence simply does not agree. how do you answer for john morris, phd of geological engineering and head of icr misrepresenting what a flood plain looks like, geologically? lying about erosion patterns and speed, things that can be observed easily and are elementary geology concepts? i believe in god and that he created everything. figure that one out, and come back to me. science ignores religion and god, and examines the processes. if god was behind, well, good. but that's not the area that science covers. that's complete bull.but i'll allow you the benefit of the doubt and capitulate this point... if you can demonstrate one prediction about the natural world that can be tested as either true or false, that is only true if and only if god created the world personally over 6 days, 6000 years ago.show me the claim, show me the test. this does not include poking holes in evolutionary theory, just a claim that creationism makes that can be tested.for instance, einstein's theory of relativity was accepted because it accurately predicted the precession of mercury, and the apparent position of stars on the opposite side of the sun (tested during an eclipse). yes, there's for instance a creationist at aig that publishes in a herpetology journal. i think this ruins the conspiracy argument, because they don't seem to rule out creationists, just the bad science. on any side. can i quote-mine you on that? humanists are people in favor humanity and acting humane. christians are sometimes considered religios humanists, when they act according to the teachings of jesus.darwinists? not familar with the term. if you're referring to social darwinists, those guys have very little to do with darwin or evolution at all. they borrowed the name and perverted it to gain legitimacy. the school of thought existed in a formal form before darwin ever published.atheists are simply people who lack belief in god. (a-without the-god ism-doctrine). they don't go to the church of evolution or anything. most couldn't care less about biology.naturalists are people who take the evidence, and consider it and draw natural (as opposed to supernatural) conclusions. ie: the apple fell, something must have caused it to fall, so some force must have acted upon it. anyone in the field of any scientific study is a naturalist, whether or not they believe in god.evolutionist is a word made up by creationists to make evolution sound less valid. i've only used it once, and it was meant to be derisive and insulting, because people on this side occasionally act like creationists. but, there is not such thing as an evolutionist, and that was my point. it's not a matter of belief, any more than "skybluism" is. people in science, such as EVOLUTIONARY BIOLOGISTS can check this sort of thing, even if you can't.i have seen enough fossils in person, in books, etc to know myself.and theistic or deist evolutionists are people who believes that god works through natural processes, such as evolution. what about the aforemention theistic evolutionists? evolution says nothing about god, but if you choose to believe in him, describes the way he creates. science is not in search of ultimate truth. we have philosphy and religion for that. the quantum physicists would argue differently. do you believe that faith saves? then you control your destiny, don't you? or, we could watch the apple fall from the tree, wonder why, and say "i don't know, god must have done. it has his reasons which are dark and mysterious to us" or better yet "magic"that's called a black box. aren't you curious? don't you wanna know how stuff works? it's curiousity, not evolution. evolution occurs from one generation to the next. have there been more than one generation of people? my point was that even if we were created somewhere in the middle, evolution would still occur. i'll repeat the important part of the sentance again, and weed out the confusing words.

quote:

---

creationism is the idea that god...
  —me

---

how is it science again? find me again when they prove god. of course, you know that would invalidate scripture, which says that faith saves, so you'd still be wrong. no. this is the conclusion that has been reached, not the inference. there is no compelling evidence otherwise, and tons of evidence that earth is about 4.5 billion years old, and even that universe is about 10-14 billion years old.and there's lots of areas of science that have nothing to do with evolution. like physics and chemistry. ok, here's a cunundrum for you. prove what's in the bible is actually what god says. i'll make it easy for you, just restrict it to the actual quotes where it says "and god said" etc.the bible talks about: book, chapter, and verse? book, chapter, and verse? book, chapter, and verse?don't play the "bible says" game with me. i own several. wanna see a few hundred biblical inconsistencies?

i think that was me. to lazy to check.anyhow, the point was this: creationism HAS what they feel is the truth. they seek to spread it by any means neccessary, namely lies, deceit, misrepresntation, and ignorance. that makes it propaganda.it's dogma because it is almsot entirely unsupported by the bible, and the context and intent of its authors. actually, some very prominent creationists ARE trial lawyers. kind explains a lot.

No, they simply have a different way of evaluating it. I'm not saying I agree with it, but most of them aren't ignoring anything. Agreed. But just because you don't believe in something doesn't make it not real. We should probably just drop this specific part of the discussion. Okay, fine. I may have a point of view similar to yours, but remember I'm just saying that creationists(mostly) are not trying to ignore reality; they just have a different take on it. I don't know about lying to themselves. Again, I don't agree with thier point of view, all I'm saying is that they're not in denial.
Keep in mind that they've taken on faith the literal events of the Bible, and they honestly believe in these events as facts. That's not lying to yourself. I know one that isn't. So ha! I agree, and so do Orwell and Huxley and Bradbury. But, brainwashing is a powerful force, especially considering most of the creationists were born into the doctrine. Also, you were telling me not to go all post-modern on you, but if I were to accept without question that the sky is blue then that would be questioning authority(my own senses)!
Most people don't feel a need to question this authority, though it certainly can make mistakes. I'm not saying it's right to not question authority, I'm just saying that to them that authority doesn't need questioning any more than their senses. Yeah, you kinda did. I'll post what you said as soon as I'm done."However, the fact is that believers fear death so much that they accept/manufacture an entire mythology and doctrine designed to avoid death altogether."You didn't say 'most' believers, you just said believers and gave no other alternative. If you'd like to rephrase that I won't give you a hard time about it, but that in itself was an incredibly generalizing statement. Just because people believe in everlasting life doesn't mean they fear the alternative. Some people don't like the idea of everlasting life. I think you mean death as in ceasing to exist, and not as in the act of dying(if that makes sense). If that's the case then yes, a Christian would typically disagree with the concept of ceasing to exist. But nobody denies that we all die someday at least on earth. Great verse, but again just because it's asserted that life does not end when our material shells pass does not mean we're cowering from the thought of 'shedding our skins' here.This message has been edited by Born2Preach, 06-06-2004 02:49 AMThis message has been edited by Born2Preach, 06-06-2004 03:00 AMThis message has been edited by Born2Preach, 06-06-2004 03:04 AM

---

Wanna feel God? Step onto the wrestling mat and you'd be crazy to deny the uplifting spirit.

Try to get one of them to address the patterns in the paleobotanical record, and then come back and tell me they "aren't ignoring anything."

If a Creationist believes that certain things in the bible happened exactly the way they are written, with full knowledge and acceptance that they utterly contradict the evidence, I have no objection.That kind of creationost is rare, possibly nonexistant.The only kind of Creationist I have ever known is the kind who believes that certain things in the bible happened exactly the way they are written, but is willfully ignorant of the contradictory evidence in nature, and who also claim that science actually supports their religious beliefs and or the evidence does not support an ancient Earth, biological Evolution, etc.When confronted with real scientific evidence, the mental gymnastics begin, or they simply run off.These are the vast majority of the Creationists I have encountered over the years, and these people certainly seem to be lying to themselves.

quote:

---

Also, you were telling me not to go all post-modern on you, but if I were to accept without question that the sky is blue then that would be questioning authority(my own senses)!

---

I am not sure what this means.I was trying to keep you from saying that all versions of reality have equal validity, because they do not.Some versions of the reality of nature, including those held by the majority of the Creationists I have encountered, is wrong to a greater or lesser degree. The difference is, if you get to the point where you question everything, you end up at a point where you cannot know anything.Whereas, if you question and test "authority" you put yourself in a position to know the real world better.If these people never, ever question the authority that tells them that they must believe this or that about nature, then they are either brainwashed or intellectually lazy.I don't think that most of them are brainwashed. They have been indoctrinated, which is a different thing. I am sorry, but I just don't buy this.Show me those Christians who like the whole sacrifice and trial part of their religion but really wish that they didn't have to spend eternity in paradise basking in the love of God.Come on, B2P!Humans fear death because it is a great unknown.Christianity promises eternal life in paradise after death as a major theme of the religion.People embrace Christianity in large part because it eases their fear of death, assuring them that Earthly death is not really the end, and that if they follow the rules they will get a great reward in the afterlife.Why won't you accept this when it is so obviously true? Certainly other factors affect Christians reasons for believing, but to deny that this is not a major component is pretty silly.

I have known very few of the ones you describe here. However, the willful ignorance is still not quite denial, just choosing not to know something. You might choose not to know what's in my gym bag, but does that mean you're in denial of what's in it? I was thinking of going on a shpeal about that just despite this, but I'm not that cruel. Also, I don't think all versions are equally correct. Maybe, and personally I wouldn't go that far, but that raises the question of whether or not we really can know anything for sure. But that's not relevant to the topic so I'll shut up. If they never hear any opposing viewpoint to begin with, why question it? I think it's safe to say that you can't expect someone to question something without shown an alternate point of view; it's like how questioning this plain of reality is pointless because this is the only one we know about. Why not? C'mon, all the cool kids buy it! Umm... anyway: That's not what I meant. See, if you really believe in something you believe even if you don't like it. If someone believes the Bible to be the Word of God and doesn't agree that homosexuality is a sin, they can't just shrug off the religion because they don't like it. I assume you don't like those annoying PT cruisers that look like Volkswagons with brain tumors, but you're firm in your belief that they exist so you can't un-believe them just cause you don't like them.Now to explain what that had to do with my arguement:Some people have REALLY screwed up in life. Just cause they believe in God and eternal paradise or punishment doesn't mean they remember when hot little miss tramp comes to their room and opens her legs for a dollar. After all these people have done, thier honest belief that God will judge them for their sins may find themselves upon their deathbeds wishing there wasn't a judgement after their demise. No! You can't make me! Mommy said it's BAD!! Speak for yourself. If I get shot this inst-... just kidding. But if I die this instant and find myself in a brand new world that I don't know anything about... well... HELL YEAH!! There's nothing like the unknown. If mankind were so repulsed by the unknown there wouldn't be science or rockets that fly to the moon, now would there? Almost as major as God punishes evil and that Jesus preaches kindness to all, huh? I agree, it is a PART of it. But it's not all of it like you so blatantly asserted a couple posts ago. Truth is, with the possibility of no afterlife in mind, I'd say I'm just more likely to spread kindness and make my life worth something as it's the only one I've got. And guess what Christianity tells us to do while we're down here?

---

Wanna feel God? Step onto the wrestling mat and you'd be crazy to deny the uplifting spirit.

I may be ignorant, but I am not willfully ignoring anything.
I hear evolutionists speak with great certainty and pretense authority about the fossil record.As far as I know from both creationist books and evolutionist biology textbooks, the fossil record has been constructed partly arbitrarily and partly by radiological dating. As far as I know, paleontologists find a fossil here and there and maybe a some bunched together and piece them into a record. If this is not how it is done, forgive me for swallowing lies. If this is how it is done, this is not sufficient proof for me.If there are at least two or three places such as the grand canyon where paleontologists can see the entire geologic column at once and find fossils morphing from the simplest life into today's range of phyla in the same order from bottom to top, I would be far more inclined to accept this theory. However, I know of no such place and have never heard of one. If such a fossil record exists in its entirity in one place in nature, please let me know.The simple truth is that for those who already believe in something it takes far less, sometimes nothing at all, for them to validate their beliefs. I think this is true of both creationists and evolutionists.

That doesn't sound right to me. The fossil record is constructed from the assumption that, in a system where new material is being added to the top (burial), those things on the bottom have been there longer, and are therefore older, than the things on top.Even without radiometric dating, we could infer relationships between fossil species because the order of burial gives us the relative ages. All radiometric and other kinds of dating give us is the absolute age.I'm not familiar with any part of the fossil record that would be considered "arbitrary." Well, we reconstruct species often from relatively scant fossil evidence based on the assumption that, when we find a vertebrae, or a finger joint, or a jawbone, that bone was most likely part of an entire organism. That sounds like a pretty reasonable assumption to me.Remember too that the fossil record isn't simply a record of phylogeny. The fossil record is a record of skeletons of various completeness and form sorted into definate stratiographic patterns. There's just no escaping the obvious pattern of fossils in the geologic column. Explaining that pattern is the purpose, in part, of the theory of evolution. In a world of erosion, how could you expect such a place to exist? Moreover, the geologic column is a record of events that aren't always global. The geologic column under the Great Lakes looks different than the column under the Gobi desert, because those are two different areas of the world. Why on Earth would you expect those two places to have the exact same geologic history?Honestly, the things you creationists ask for sometimes. This is what we mean by willfully ignoring things - there's no way you could be so foolish as to honestly be asking for complete, identical geologic columns everywhere on Earth. You're just asking for impossibilities in order to set the bar of evidence so high you never have to worry about any theory meeting it.

This is the beauty of the evolutionary theory. With unfathomable amounts of time and unfathomable numbers of events any discontinuity can be explained.But... If the world has been changing and eroding and upheaving at the same rate over the last couple of billion years, is it really reasonable that we see places like the grand caynon with uniform parallel layered strata and no evidence of upheaval or erosion between layers? But this is another topic.Can you see, though, that I have reasons for disbelieving the evolutionary theory. Although you do not accept my reasons, you must see that I am not simply ignoring things.Your standards of proof for evolution are much lower than mine just like my standards of proof of answered prayer are much lower than yours.This message has been edited by Hangdawg13, 06-07-2004 01:39 AM

---

"It is the glory of God to conceal a thing, but the honor of kings to search out a matter." Proverbs 25:2

Not any discontinuity. For instance there would be no evolutionary explanation for the existence of an organism based on a biochemistry radically different than the carbon chemistry we're familiar with, or for an organism with a triple helix.Evolution can't explain all possible discontinuties, because some of those discontinuities represent the falsifications that evolution must possess as a scientific theory. It's just that we've been able, so far, to explain all the discontinuities that we've observed.Now, on the other hand, what explains absolutely everything - and therefore nothing at all - is the explanation that things are the way they are because God made them that way, miraculously, just to trick us. Sure. Just because change and erosion and upheaval happen in some places, doesn't mean that they constantly happen in all places.What we should expect in a world where different regions have different geologic histories is a wide variety of strata completeness between areas. What a surprise, that's exactly what we find. Sure, you have your reasons. The problem is, none of them are good reasons for rejecting a scientific theory. The reason you reject evolution is because you don't like the conclusion, not because it's not supported by the evidence. I see you ignoring the fact that evolution is supported by the evidence because you don't like the conclusion. That's what we're talking about.If you don't believe that you're ignoring evidence, then why don't you tell me what the falsifiable creationist explanation is for the obvious pattern of increasing complexity in paleobotany?This message has been edited by crashfrog, 06-07-2004 01:39 AM

i'll bite.i'm personally not really looking forward to the afterlife. i happen to enjoy this one occassionally, and eternity is a long, long time. unless, you know, you're socrates, and view it as a sort of "undiscovered country" to explore...

yes, and no. this is not a complete understanding by far. you also have to take into account the following:different layers of rock look different, and can found and easily identified by the trained eye, all over the world. radiological dating independent confirms the age of each layer, in every test.it's not a puzzle, with the pieces all scrambled (or even complete). it's sorted according to ancestry. simple observation can show this, combined with the first fact and knowing which layer they were found in. basically, you want a diagram. like:layer one-triassic, with a complete celophysis stuck in it.
layer two-jurassic, with a complete compsagnathus stuck in it.
layer three-early cretatious, with a complete archaeopteryx stuck in it
layer four-tertiary, with a complete bird in it.that's a gross, gross, misunderstanding of the fossil record. it so improbably that a species of animal would live, evolve, and fossilize a member from each significant speciation all in the same area. for instance, that part of the world may have been underwater in the jurassic, but not cretatious. the world changes, and this is a driving force of evolution. i've seen fossil digs. skeletons. paleontology books, museums. it's not a matter of validation of beliefs. just simple recognition.