A barrier to macroevolution & objections to it

Hey! Look who's back and continuing to make unsupported assertions. Care to back up these claims with some evidence? Like for instance, how you know Start by operationally defining "observed diversity". That's a new one on me. Of course, what do I know?Then tackle this ridiculous statement:which you can qualify by defining "level of kinds". Even generically.

Whoa..I'm accused of unsupported assertions when the amount of diversity assumed by the ToE is much greater than that which I am calling "observed diversity". Observed diversity simply refers to the diversity of organisms that is observed to occur via speciation and normal generation.I granted the fact that while this level of diversity would the proper scope of the investigation into non-mutational processes, neither ToE nor creationism hypothesizes such a low-level of diversification.The assumptions behind ToE require the investigation to prove that all diversity can be accounted for by non-mutational processes.The assumptions behind creationism require the investigation prove that all diversity lower than the "kind" be accounted for by non-mutational processes.My working defintion of kind is as stated in other threads: delineated by an organisms ability to interbreed (including via artificial procedures) with other organisms (a.k.a all organisms that can interbreed (including artificially) comprise one kind.What's clear is that the paradigm, or the underlying assumptions rig the debate.Starting from the ToE paradigm, the requirement is that non-mutational forces account for all of life's diversity. No, creationist would claim that is possible. Nor would any creationist subscribe to such a paradigm.Starting from the creationist's paradigm, the requirement is that non-mutational forces account for all of the diversity within the kind.Creationism has a much easier task empirically validating its paradigm.ToE has a much more difficult task empirically validating its paradigm whether via non-mutational or mutational processes.

Can you please explain this and why you believe it to be true?Did you really mean to have the 'non' in 'non-mutational'? This seems contrary to what the ToE states.

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Of course, biblical creationists are committed to belief in God's written Word, the Bible, which forbids bearing false witness; --AIG (lest they forget)

I don't understand why you believe this to be the case. It's well-known that the theory of evolution explains the diversity of life on Earth as the result of random mutation and natural selection.Why would the theory of evolution be required to support something it doesn't state?

mjfloresta: This is one way you have defined kinds: at the species level, the level defined by the possibility of interbreeding. But you have also balked at this same placement when you were trying to fit pairs of each kind, including fossil forms, onto Noah's Ark. Then you tried to take your definition much higher in the taxonomic tree, approximating the Family level, while still insisting that this definition met the 'constraints' of your interbreeding criterion.Page 1 of Hypermacroevolution thread:
http://EvC Forum: Hypermacroevolution? Hypermicroevolution -->EvC Forum: Hypermacroevolution? Hypermicroevolution.

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ArcherAll species are transitional.

In that case, would you be so (ahem) kind to classify the following organisms: an amoeba, a tree-fern and a dandelion, all of which reproduce asexually? There are thousands more I could ask you about, but these three suffice for now.

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"Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge: it is those who know little, not those who know much, who so positively assert that this or that problem will never be solved by science." - Charles Darwin.

I'm sorry for the confusion. I need to clarify. I meant this statement in context of the challenge proposed to Faith. The challege to Faith was as follows: I meant to say that the claim "there is entirely too much diversity - both phenotype and genotype - etc..." is only true if you start with the ToE paradigm. But Faith, or any other Creationist is not starting with the ToE paradigm and is therefore not trying to prove that all diversity is the result of non-mutational forces, but rather that all diversity within the kind is the result of non-mutational forces. By this I mean that assuming the ToE imposes a burden of proof on Faith that neither she nor any creationist claims. Thus the claim that non-mutational forces can account for diversity (which the creationist specifies or understands to mean diversity within the kind)is denied by the ToEer who's understands diversity to mean that between all life.Edited by mjfloresta, : No reason given.

I have never defined the kind at the species level, because species are identified as populations that do not not can not reproduce. Thus my criterion of artificial breeding or insemination does not align with the notion of species.I've never balked at this placement because I never made it.. This is where I have always placed the kind; Those two criteria are not mutually exclusive for the reasons I have pointed out above..

Funny how you guys are so content with your own assumptions and conjectures but call my speculations "hand waving away." You just are incredulous at the idea that existing alleles could bring about these great changes. Argument from Incredulity don't you all call that? NO EVIDENCE, Q, NONE. ALL of what you guys are saying about how mutations are needed is PURE assumption. NO EVIDENCE.

mjfloresta: I don't see a real difference on this point. You haven't negated the statement about 'all diversity.' You have just added more detail--'within the kind'--for clarification. On this thread I think you can take the added detail as an acknowledged feature of your point of view.Creationists do have the task of explaining all the diversity that exists among living things in a scientifically testable way. This is true however you subdivide that diversity ('kinds') or rely on those subdivisions in your explanation.

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ArcherAll species are transitional.

Not incredulity, Faith - evidence. As to not providing any, I thought you said you accepted the explanation I gave on the Ensatina articles? That IS evidence - exactly the kind of evidence you asked for (although as I said they weren't talking about mutations, per se). I even offered to go further, and break out references to QTL studies that get in depth on the genetics of speciation and genetic diversity, and which do indeed cover mutation. You can deny the evidence all you wish, however it doesn't change the facts.

So basically the point of your criterion for "kinds" is to keep it so vague that you can make a "kind" as wide or as narrow as you need.For Message 262 to make sense the division must be well below the "family" level - below even the level of genus (maybe even below the level of species !). Yet you normally place "kind" at the family level, although it is far from clear that your reproductive criterion - if measured would actually produce such a result.

Sure, but that's not what the claim I was addressing is about.The implication of the claim is that non-mutational forces are incapable of accounting for diversity. But what diversity was left undefined. In that vacuum, the ToEer assumes that the creationist is claiming that all diversity is explainable by non-mutational forces. That is not the creationist's claim - which instead says that only the diversity within the kind is explainable by non-mutational forces. How creationism explains the diversity greater than the kind-level is certainly important, but it has no bearing on Faith's specific claim that's being addressed.What we're addressing now, is a misrepresentation of Faith's claim. I'm rectifying it. If you want to address YEC at greater lengths, or how it accounts for the diversity greater than the kind, feel free to start a new thread. But you must recognize that it has no bearing on the issue Faith raised.

Ridiculous. A simple examination of the genetics and a count of the different alleles in the separated populations shows unequivocally that recombination, etc, are insufficient to account for the diversity in genotype seen. This is OBSERVED, not some hypothetical, ad hoc invention. Now all you need to do is come up with a real world counter-example, and we can go from there.

I have no idea where you get this. If you would like to validate your assertion, please do so.I have established clear criteria for the kind; If you think it is somehow vague or misleading, please specify your concerns instead of making blank assertions.