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Evolution or Creationism, Where does the evidence lead?

smloeffelholz

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This thread is intended to be used by those discussing this topic on the skeptoid website. This will hopefully allow a more in depth discussion by avoiding the 1500 character limit that is enforced at skeptoid. Anyone who wishes to post is more than welcome, but please keep your comments directed at the subject and not at the posters.

I do have a couple of requests for those who wish to post on this thread. First, please keep the argument on topic. This is not a debate on the big bang, or abiogenesis, or god. This is intended to discuss the science behind evolution and creationism. Second, try to refrain from using the shotgun method of debating. Do not simply post 20 broad questions or speculations at once and expect someone to write an entire novel for you. If possible, stick to discussing only a few key topics per post so the thread remains readable. Third, if you are going to use quotes or studies, please do your best to cite them in their full context and where the information was found. Too often, people pull quotes out of text in order to prove a point the quote was never meant to make.

This being said, I look forward to this discussion and hope that everyone involved keeps it civil and informational.
 
According to my limited scientific of Genetics and anthropology I have read and have been told by the scientific community that evolution has been proven by the fossil record and by DNA comparisons. These conclusions have been proven beyond a reasonable scientific doubt.
 
I would have to agree with you there, but there are several people on the skeptoid website who are arguing against evolution. I was hoping to get some of them to post their arguments in this forum to allow a more thorough discussion of their thoughts. So far, no one has taken my invitation.
 
My biggest question, directed to creationists, they often speak of evolution as a fraud or flawed science. However there is no actual science of evolution. It is a discipline that draws heavily from other fields, such as biology, medicine geology etc

Why, when not dealing with evolution are these sciences very good at what they do, finding oil, curing people, finding better strains of wheat. Yet when applied to the question of evolution, they are flawed, or out right dishonest?
 
MG1962 said:
My biggest question, directed to creationists, they often speak of evolution as a fraud or flawed science. However there is no actual science of evolution. It is a discipline that draws heavily from other fields, such as biology, medicine geology etc

Why, when not dealing with evolution are these sciences very good at what they do, finding oil, curing people, finding better strains of wheat. Yet when applied to the question of evolution, they are flawed, or out right dishonest?
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The simple answer is that it conflicts with their ideology whereas those other scientific areas that you mention do not. They have already come to a conclusion about where people have come from and have to justify this belief. To them it is rational as they believe that the word of god is infallible and therefore they can use this rationalize their intellectual dishonesty.
 
Xiaan said:
The simple answer is that it conflicts with their ideology whereas those other scientific areas that you mention do not. They have already come to a conclusion about where people have come from and have to justify this belief. To them it is rational as they believe that the word of god is infallible and therefore they can use this rationalize their intellectual dishonesty.
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Yeah I just struggle with the hypocracy lol. I am a thesist, and have never had a problem with clashes of my faith and science. For all I know evolution is God's way of doing business. Maybe if the Bible was a science handbook I might find conflict. But it a s book about human philosophy and the interaction of man with God
 
I have to agree with the statements above about the clashing of ideals. This is not only seen in creationists but in several other groups. Take someone who strongly supports organic/natural food. If their child had a problem that was suspected to be genetic, they would trust genetic testing and perhaps even gene therapy to help their child. If you mention genetically engineered food to them, they would act as if it is the spawn of Satan himself. The science behind the two is the same, but one goes against their ideology while the other significantly helps them.
 
I was going to comment on the OP, Xiaan and MG's comments earlier but had something come up and now am pressed for time so I'll try and reduce it down to a two or three comment sauce than I'll expand on later.

1. Creationists and ideologically motivated IDers consider evolution, as MG noted, not as a theory within Biology that also encompasses subjects like biochemistry, geology and medicine, but as a single totally explanitory philosophy that covers issues as far ranging as Cosmology and Political Science, as smloeffelholz noted in the OP. This phantasm for them, under the umbrella appellation "Darwinism", does little more than try and dispose of methodilogical naturalism as the basis of science.

2. I have encountered a number of TE's over the years and they, like MG noted, don't "compartmentalize" or suffer from cognative dissonance, they see evolution as how God created. They understand there is a difference between "the Creation" and "the Creation narrative" in Genesis. They also accept methodilogical naturalism as the only way science can work and that the Earth is 4.6 billion years old, that life shares a common ancestor and that humans evolved from our fellow apes.

3. Which brings us back to one tactic I use with Creationists who try and argue against the "Darwinist" rubric... if you want to argue against atheism, do so in an appropriate context. If you want to argue against evolutionary theory, than you must be prepared to have science on your side and not go into tangents and apologetics.

As I noted above with a clarification... if any C/IDers from the other forum are willing to join this debate and discuss the evidence and science supporting evolutionary theory - in biology, in geology, in medicine... I welcome their comments.
 
Ok I am here now. Sorry it took a while, but I put in 70+ hours a week.
Before I get started, thank you for the invite. Very gracious of you all.
Just so everybody knows I am only a high school graduate and have been interested in the history of the earth for quite some time. I know only what I have read from both sides of the aisle. And be forewarned, I dont know alot of big fancy science words, but I will try to learn them as we go. I am your basic "John Q Public" if you will.
I have an open mind & very honest. I used to be a staunch believer in evolution but switched to creation about 15 years ago. I believe in god and nothing or nobody will ever change that. Nor will I ever deny him. Dont worry I am not a bible thumper or really a "practicing" religion, nor will I try to persuade any who doesnt believe in him over to my side. I think pretty much everybody who has made there choice has there reasons & that is between you & god, not me. I am here to discuss the differences between evolution and creation mainly because since I have chosen the creation over evolution I have not kept up with it.

Wanna start with carbon dating?
Is it possible that something like a huge solar flare or some cosmic storm could have engulfed the planet with something that could reset or jumble the lifes & half lifes?
 
Radiometric dating is as good a place to start as any. I do want to begin by saying that looking at carbon dating only is a big mistake when considering radiometric dating. There are over 40 dating techniques that are used and cross checked against each other. They use different radioactive isotopes with different half lives so each is accurate within different time frames. For an easy to read explanation of radiometric dating, check out the paper called "Radiometric Dating: A Christian Perspective". Just search google for the paper, and it should be one of the first links. Sorry I can't post the address until I make at least 15 posts.

One point that is not stressed enough is that when the age of something is given, (ie 65 million years old) a few different dating methods have given the same age (within an acceptable margin of error) for that item. A scientist does not just use several different techniques until he gets the age he wants. Also, if something has occurred to skew the decay of the radioactive compounds, and the dating methods don't match; the age of the item is said to be indeterminate.

As to resetting the nuclear clocks on Earth, I can't think of a way this could be done. Either vast but proportional amounts of radioactive material would need to be distributed over the earth and throughout the crust, or something would have to cause elements to "undecay" back into their radioactive elements. This is basically impossible and would make the Earth appear to be younger than it actually is.

When it comes to affecting the decay rate of radioactive materials, it happens in only very specific and rare circumstances, and only to a small degree. The article above describes this much better than I will be able to. If you still have questions after looking at the article, feel free to ask me and I will do my best to explain.
 
I did read the article already, found it very interesting. It makes sense that anyone would want to test it from as many as there is. I am not familiar with them so I cant really comment on them individually. I was just wondering if it was possible that it could occur. Something known or unknown as of this current time. I will read the article again.

As far as the idea of liquefaction. Do you think that the earth can shake violently enough to mess up the fossil record? Wouldnt that explain the creationist claim?
 
I don't see how liquefaction could cause the current fossil record. Liquefaction causes loose saturated cohesionless soils, i.e. loose sands to act like a very heavy liquid. The bones would be much less dense than the surrounding liquid-like soil and would become buoyant. Under these circumstances, bones that were once buried in the ground would float up to the surface, not sink deeper into the Earth. As an example of this, you can find pictures of concrete sewer drains that have floated over a foot out of the ground due to soil liquefaction (I believe I saw this picture on Wikipedia).
 
If it happened before major decay set in the carcasses would be more dense and sink. I'm not saying it happened to all of them at once unless we could consider a mass extinction. What if it happened several times for each strata (I believe that is the term I am looking for, layers in rock)? If it happened many times like that I think it would come close to what we see today.
 
evolution disbeliver said:
If it happened before major decay set in the carcasses would be more dense and sink. I'm not saying it happened to all of them at once unless we could consider a mass extinction. What if it happened several times for each strata (I believe that is the term I am looking for, layers in rock)? If it happened many times like that I think it would come close to what we see today.
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Evolution is tested every day in the oil industry because the evolution of microfossils allows geoscientists such as geologists to correlate sedimentary rocks and thereby better locate hydrocarbon bearing deposits.

Oil companies have spent millions of man hours and trillions of dollars drilling wells to search for hydrocarbons. They simply would not do so if creationism was correct. Could I suggest you invest a few hours reading about the science of geology as there is no reputable university teaching geology that agrees that dinosaurs were around at the same time as man as would have to happen if creationism is correct. A stratigraphy primer would be a good place to start. If you google 'stratigraphy primer' you will find many good books

Creationism only works if the bulk of the science used in the search for oil and the nuclear power industry is plain wrong.
 
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evolution disbeliver said:
Wanna start with carbon dating?
Is it possible that something like a huge solar flare or some cosmic storm could have engulfed the planet with something that could reset or jumble the lifes & half lifes?
Click to expand...

No, they would not.

  1. Where is there the slightest bit of evidence that cosmic rays or neutrinos do affect decay rates? The following show the contrary:
    • Inside standard nuclear fission power generators, neutrino radiation is intense, but the uranium that is not fissioned decays at the usual rate.
    • Some spacecraft are powered by nuclear decays. Some of them fly in very intense cosmic ray fields (like near Jupiter). If cosmic rays affected decay rates, the power generated would be different from expectations.
    • To get unweathered rocks, rocks for radiometric dating are usually taken from some depth into an outcrop, where cosmic rays have insignificant effect.
  2. Radiation high enough to affect nuclear decay rates by several orders of magnitude (a change great enough to allow young-earth timescales) would sterilize the planet.
  3. Reversals of the earth's magnetic field do not produce cosmic rays or neutrinos. They may allow more cosmic rays to reach the earth's surface, but not much beyond that, and most rocks used for dating have been buried for most of their history.
  4. Carbon-14 dating is calibrated by independent clocks.
Source: http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CD/CD004.html
Click to expand...
 
evolution disbeliver said:
I did read the article already, found it very interesting. It makes sense that anyone would want to test it from as many as there is. I am not familiar with them so I cant really comment on them individually. I was just wondering if it was possible that it could occur. Something known or unknown as of this current time. I will read the article again.

As far as the idea of liquefaction. Do you think that the earth can shake violently enough to mess up the fossil record? Wouldnt that explain the creationist claim?
Click to expand...

When a fossil is discovered, the very first thing is to determine context. When I was digging last in Kansas, we came across a fish that had actually be preserved across 3 million years of strata. We left the find in place for two days while this puzzle was examined.

Investigating the matrix the fossil was found in, it was realised the orginal deposit had been shattered and then reburied by subsquent sedimentary rock and the fossil was re-fossilised if that makes sense.

Now sure there is the claim that the deposit was made to fit into current scientific findings, but a simple chemical test would have shown that the material currently holding the fossil material was not the same as the surrounding rock
 
evolution disbeliver said:
If it happened before major decay set in the carcasses would be more dense and sink. I'm not saying it happened to all of them at once unless we could consider a mass extinction. What if it happened several times for each strata (I believe that is the term I am looking for, layers in rock)? If it happened many times like that I think it would come close to what we see today.
Click to expand...

This just isn't true. At no point would an animal body, regardless of the level of decay, be more dense than a liquid-like sand. I said in my previous post that concrete sewer drains have literally floated over a foot out of the ground during liquefaction of the ground. Are you proposing that animal bodies are more dense than concrete?

For a good visual example of this, see if you can find the Mythbusters episode about killer quicksand. In a liquid mixture of sand and water, which would be less dense than sand during liquefaction, people literally pop up out of the mixture like a cork in water. This is what would happen to an animal body in the scenario you proposed.
 
I do remember that episode, he wouldnt go down. I'm not proposing that a carcass is more dense, just trying to get all claims as they are argued. Sorry about the long time between posts. I had been up since 10pm Thursday and had to get some sleep.
What about the claim of non random & random mutations. If I am to believe an organism evolves into another organism over several generations, how can random mutations do that and it be a better organism? If it is survival of the fittest would there not be an abundance of evidence showing the different changes of the organism until it got it right? We really dont have very many different dinos and if they were succesfull one would think there would be alot more evidnce of transitions to birds. For example when we do cloning, isnt it a very low ratio? I know cloning and evolution are apple to oranges.
On the other hand non-random I can grasp. Because it could be pre-determined in the DNA. But say an ice age occurrs. It creeps up slowly over a couple of hundred years, how does, on a DNA level, a species know to change in oder to survive the changing enviroment? Like grow fur, slow metabolic rate, shorten legs, longer tail, etc
That would seem like a very strong case for a creator for me.
 
evolution disbeliver said:
I do remember that episode, he wouldnt go down. I'm not proposing that a carcass is more dense, just trying to get all claims as they are argued. Sorry about the long time between posts. I had been up since 10pm Thursday and had to get some sleep.
What about the claim of non random & random mutations. If I am to believe an organism evolves into another organism over several generations, how can random mutations do that and it be a better organism? If it is survival of the fittest would there not be an abundance of evidence showing the different changes of the organism until it got it right? We really dont have very many different dinos and if they were succesfull one would think there would be alot more evidnce of transitions to birds. For example when we do cloning, isnt it a very low ratio? I know cloning and evolution are apple to oranges.
On the other hand non-random I can grasp. Because it could be pre-determined in the DNA. But say an ice age occurrs. It creeps up slowly over a couple of hundred years, how does, on a DNA level, a species know to change in oder to survive the changing enviroment? Like grow fur, slow metabolic rate, shorten legs, longer tail, etc
That would seem like a very strong case for a creator for me.
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Lets tackle the fur. We have an elephant, in a cooling climate. from time to time, mutations are born, some with a little thicker hair than normal, some with out. The ones without die quicker than the ones with that little edge against the cold.

We only observe successful mutations in the fossil record because they led to better adaption, hence more organisms, hence a better chance to find them as fossils

Today we can see a comparrison between two very closely related animals, the Brown Bear and the Panda. At some stage the line that led to the panda bear found a niche of survival by specialising in eating bamboo. The Brown bear kept a more general diet.

Evironmental changes have affected both animals, because of a poor mutation, the panda is probably well on the way to extinction. For the Brown bear, its diet has helped it thrive by living of human refuse.

Now the brown bear could never anticipate its diet would mesh well with human interference with nature, nor was the panda able to anticipate the human interference that has greatly reduced the amount of bamboo
 
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