The "common creator" myth

I'm simply trying to figure out what YOU are saying. So far all I see is "Insert Miracle here".

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Pretty much. The laws of nature describe what happens if there is no interference. A miracle is when something from outside of nature comes in and interferes. Just like the laws of physics describe what happens when you hit a cue ball in pool. You know where the ball will go - unless someone from outside pushes it off course.The curse was a miracle of God - he came in and interfered with our genes and a lot of other stuff.Do you believe in miracles?

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If you say there are no absolutes, I ask you, are you absolutely sure about that?

Your statement is internally inconsistent. I think you mean that if he could produce his own vitamin C, he would be a lot more independent. It is a mutation that does not affect the fitness of the organism in question. The mutation is neither advantageous nor is it deleterious. Now, I'd like to hear your answer to Ooook's question:

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"Chance is a minor ingredient in the Darwinian recipe, but the most important ingredient is cumulative selection which is quintessentially nonrandom."
--Richard Dawkins, The Blind Watchmaker

Right, but even then the physics will tell you where the ball is going now, if you know how much momentum is imparted by the finger.The physics doesn't stop working, in other words. It's not a miracle, it's just new data. What's a "miracle"? Something science can't explain? How would you propose we tell the difference between something science can't explain, and something science can't explain yet?Or is a "miracle" the intervention of the supernatural? How could the supernatural cause effects in the natural world without becoming part of the natural world? The very act of intervention by a supernatural entity makes it accessable to science and at once, no longer supernatural.

That's not what we see, though.We see "screwed up genes" that are screwed up in hierarcheally different ways, in a hierarchy that is improbably consistent with inferred relationships from taxonomy and stratiography.So, either evolution is true, or else your God went to a lot of trouble to make it look that way.

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Do you believe in miracles?

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No

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If guinea pig DNA is broken in a different way, isn't that support against common ancestry?

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It depends on one thing, which mammals have the same break. So lets look around. According to the theory of common ancestory, if humans and guinea pigs share the same mutation then all other mammals that also share a common ancestor with humans and guinea pigs would also have this break. That is, there would be a whole slew of mammals that would also have this same break. Also, given the time since we shared a common ancestor with guinea pigs we shouldn't share the same entire sequence with guinea pigs. The fact that the GLO gene overall differs between humans, and the knockout mutation is also different, would mean that other mammals between humans and guinea pigs should not have this mutation, and they don't. Common ancestory is supported.Now let's look at chimps. If the common ancestor to chimps and humans had this mutation, then both chimps and humans would have the same mutation. Also, given the recent divergence as suggested by the fossil record (4-8 million years ago) the rest of the gene should be very similar. What do we find? Both chimps and humans have the same mutation and very similar GLO genes. Common ancestory is supported.Therefore, guinea pigs serve as the control. If there was a mechanism outside of common ancestory that caused similar pseudogenes in different species then the guinea pigs should have shown this. Instead, we find major differences which we would expect if common ancestory was correct. The same mutation in chimps and humans supports recent ancestory between the two groups, which is also supported by the independent measure of the fossil record. What we find is that common ancestory is supported by two things that are not affected by each other, DNA and the fossil record. It is the correlation of these two independent variables that lends strong support to the theory of common ancestory and the theory of evolution.

General Nazort states: Correct. And so far we have found no evidence that what we see in the world around us, including living things, do not follow the laws of nature. Except that there is no evidence that there ever was a curse. Personally? Yes.But I also realize that there is no reason to suspect a miracle if there is already a reasonable explaination. What possible reason is there to suppose divine intervention to explain what we can easily explain through the TOE?

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

OK, this discussion is in danger of falling into the trap of me posting specifics and you coming up with off the cuff answers to each of them, without looking at the whole picture. This is my fault, cos I started it so I'll try and sum up what I would like from you in terms of a coherrant theory that fits with all the data.But first, a couple of things I need to clear up (or can't resist responding to): OK, my fault again - I've confused you. Cytochrome C is totally unrelated to Vit C metabollic pathways, I should have explained it better due to its' similar name. It is a protein that is involved in cellular respiration and is present at high levels in all cells (its' what is commonly known as a 'housekeeping gene'). There are two cytochrome C genes present in the human genome - and that is all that is needed!. If we had any more then it would not give us any advantage but according to your ideas then every single one of the Cytochrome C pseudogenes were all present in unbroken form in Adam's genome - for some reason.According to some estimates there are as many as 49 cytochrome C pseudogenes in the human genome, surely you can see how riddiculous this makes the 'fall hypothesis' . Even if you could imagine a use for them, as Hangdawg pointed out in reply to your first post - this would require a phenominal mutation rate because the mutations would not only have to occur, but be fixed in the whole population. Right, can't resist responding to this. Despite this being a bit off topic, it needs to be pointed out. To be a viable scientific theory something has to be based on observable evidence, be testable, and have the potential to be shown up as false. Your 'theory' doesn't count because it is not based on all of the observable data and cannot be tested without being falsified. Before the scientific method the creation story was presented as the cast iron truth, when it was examined using scientific parameters it didn't stand up on its' own.Which kinda leads me on to what you need to provide for your pseudogene idea to be taken anywhere near seriously:Provide a method for 'how' god cursed all of creation in general. How would this manifest in the molecular evidence, incorporating what we now know about inheritance and mutation? Avoid hand-wavey phrases like 'it would predict that mutations occur' - tell me exactly how you would expect this to manifest itself in the sequences of different species. Include a full explaination of shared neutral mutations. Oh yes and don't forget to factor in the effect of a global flood.More than enough to keep you busy

I don't know enough about this subject I give up... for now

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If you say there are no absolutes, I ask you, are you absolutely sure about that?

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I don't know enough about this subject

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I give up... for now

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This is not meant to be an insult, but don't you think it is intellectually dishonest to proclaim a theory is incorrect even though you can not understand the evidence that supports it? Would you say that you first judge a theory by it's conclusions instead of the evidence that supports it?

I understand the gist of this particular piece of evidence, so far it seems to help evolution. However, other pieces of evidence point me away from evolution. My overall conclusion is the same, just not as strong. So I am not being intellectually dishonest.

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If you say there are no absolutes, I ask you, are you absolutely sure about that?

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I understand the gist of this particular piece of evidence, so far it seems to help evolution. However, other pieces of evidence point me away from evolution. My overall conclusion is the same, just not as strong. So I am not being intellectually dishonest.

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Glad to hear that you are being honest about this debate.Next, could you list the positive, objective evidence that points more towards a common creator than common ancestory?That is, it is hard to prove that a negative is always a negative. For example, the claim that there are NO transitional fossils is clearly wrong, since many have been shown here on this site. Claiming that there are no transitional fossils between any two steps in an evolutionary sequence is a tough claim to check since it would require someone to look at every sedimentary rock on earth, including the ones miles beneath the surface of the ocean. Therefore, I need evidence in hand that shows that common ancestory is wrong, or that a common creator is a more accurate interpretation. Such things would include gene patterns that do not follow assumed ancestory, ERV patterns that do no follow the fossil record, or divergent organisms (eg wheat and humans) having the same exact DNA sequence.Also, could you propose potential evidence that would falsify a common creator? Without knowing how to prove a common creative force as being innacurate it is impossible to test it period.

Not really. My objections to evolution have more to do with "how" evolution happened. Frankly, the probablities involved are so huge that it seems impossible that it could have occured. For example, the probablity of the first cell forming. Then the probabilites that random mutation would create useful traits instead of messing up the organism. Then the issue of how DNA information was added, not just changed.Perhaps God used evolution to create life? That could help explain how the first cell, for example, was formed - God made it and then let evolution work... but it doesn't quite seem to square with the Bible. I dunno. Also, the sudden appearence of fully developed animals in the fossil record, with no prior ancestors, seems to argue agaisnt evolution.

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If you say there are no absolutes, I ask you, are you absolutely sure about that?

So if the issue of probabilities could be explained you'd have no problems with evolution?

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion