100 Reasons Why Evolution Is Stupid (Part 1 of 11)

[elbe]

There appears to be a certain form of "lamarckism" that is being studied in modern genetics. Some forms of environmental factors can actually affect control genes and epigenetics of a person through their lives and these factors can actually be passed on to their progeny.

Research is still in the early stages and it may really change what we know about evolution.

I'm not too surprised. It will be interesting to see what comes of it. Evolutionary science is a wondrous thing.

 

[paximperium]

Which particular aspect of it marks it out as Lamarckian rather than Darwinian?

Sorry. The other way around.

What particular aspect marks this strawman as "Darwinian" or even close to modern evolutionary theory?

 

[paximperium]

I used to, and will again, have a collection of other sacred texts including the Koran on my website. I haven't studied them as well as I have the Bible, of course, but, although I like some of them, none of them are nearly as reliable and trustworthy as the Bible.

What is your criteria for determining "reliable" and "trustworthiness" of a book?
If you haven't studied these other texts how can you even draw this "conclusion"?

 

[Schrodinger's Cat]

no response, ah well. Guess it was asking too much for one. Why are you even on this thread, when you disregard the posts which are most informative and which address your OP the most, and instead lean towards answering posts in which you are just bickering, don't really address the OP, etc, without actually exchanging ideas?


But seriously, cut it out making it seem like evolution is an atheist idea.

 

[kerikiwi]

none of them are nearly as reliable and trustworthy as the Bible.

What evidence is there of the reliability and trustworthiness of the bible or any other religious text?

 

[elbe]

I used to, and will again, have a collection of other sacred texts including the Koran on my website. I haven't studied them as well as I have the Bible, of course, but, although I like some of them, none of them are nearly as reliable and trustworthy as the Bible.

How about the Śruti and Smriti? The book of Mormon? Dianetics? The Shinto books of lore? The legends of the greek pantheon? Are any of those reliable? How do you know?

 

[Madalch]

How about the Śruti and Smriti? The book of Mormon? Dianetics? The Shinto books of lore? The legends of the greek pantheon? Are any of those reliable? How do you know?

Obviously, they're not reliable. The contents of these books contradict the Bible, so they are clearly wrong.

 

[SOdhner]

We're really flying through these! I think we're ready for part three, right David?

1. Termites. The "little critters" in termites stomachs which digest the cellulose can't survive without the termites and the termites can't survive without the critters. Which evolved first?

Answered! (With refs.)

2. Hovind doesn't know where God comes from and says that science doesn't know where the "dirt" or matter came from as a result of the Big Bang, and since it isn't known he assumes it isn't science. It is religion.

Answered, though the question itself seems to be a little vague and more of a "God did it" statement by Hovind than an actual question or refutation.

3. Conservation of Angular Momentum - If the universe began as a swirling dot why do some planets (2) and moons (6) spin "backward"?

Answered! (With refs.)

4. Galaxies and voids - If the Big Bang were true why isn't matter evenly distributed?

Answered with links, though this is still something being studied.

5. Novas and supernovas - If stars evolve why do star deaths not equal star births? Supernova are observed every 30 years but there are less than 300 of them in billions of years. (keeping in mind that I don't believe in a YEC)

Answered! (With refs.)

6. Radio polonium halos - If the Earth formed from a hot mass 4.6 billion years ago then why would the polonium halos not have melted?

Answered with informative link.

 

[Maia]

There appears to be a certain form of "lamarckism" that is being studied in modern genetics. Some forms of environmental factors can actually affect control genes and epigenetics of a person through their lives and these factors can actually be passed on to their progeny.

Research is still in the early stages and it may really change what we know about evolution.

Wow, but this thread moves fast....

Fascinating!! PI, you should start a thread about that topic. Anyway, I'd say that Lamarckian ideas certainly have validity when applied to cultural evolution, because those rules just aren't the same as those of biological evolution. Learned and non-inherited traits can be passed down that way.

The closest thing I've found to a series of works demonstrating the evolution of religion is the whole story of higher Biblical criticism, but if you don't want to slog through over two hundred years' worth, John Shelby Spong's entire output is great. A good book is Why Christianity Must Change or Die (find it on Amazon! The trend was continued with A New Christianity for a New World: Why Traditional Faith is Dying & How a New Faith is Being Born, and summed up in Eternal Life: A New Vision: Beyond Religion, Beyond Theism, Beyond Heaven and Hell.

 

[Schrodinger's Cat]

Edit - deleted former post as to not add to thread derailment.

Let's talk about evolution!

 

[paximperium]

Let's look at the Exodus story:

This supposedly took place during the time of Rameses. Rameses was one of the longest living Pharoahs in history, and his reign was well documented both by the Egyptians and surrounding nations (as Egypt was the most powerful civilization at the time). He was an extremely prolific character. Yet there is no mention, anywhere, in any text, from Egypt, or anywhere other societies which wrote about Egypt during that time, of there being plagues, Moses, or the Exodus. There has never been any evidence uncovered which supports the claim that Egyptians ever kept Jewish slaves. Furthermore, the myth of a baby being put in a basket to escape death, being floated down a river, and adopted by the Pharaoh was an existing myth from long before Moses ever was alleged to have lived, and part of a completey different story. It was just co opted by the writers of Exodus.


The Bible has a lot of meaning, but being a reliable historical text? No.

We have great evidence of Jewish Mercenaries in Egypt, the Elaphantine garrison...who kept slaves themselves around the 6th century BCE.

 

[Schrodinger's Cat]

We have great evidence of Jewish Mercenaries in Egypt, the Elaphantine garrison...who kept slaves themselves around the 6th century BCE.

Jews in Egypt, yes. But not that Jews were routinely kept as slaves, built the pyramids, etc.

But in any event, I rather wish I hadn't posted that last point as I don't want to derail this thread. I want to keep this on topic for evolution. So I'm actually going to delete my past comment (though you've reposted it) just because I feel it's too much of a thread derail.

 

[joobz]

Which particular aspect of it marks it out as Lamarckian rather than Darwinian?

This is a perfectly succinct answer to your question.

A skill developed during a lifetime (holding one's breath longer) being passed on to the next generation. That's kind of the whole premises of lamarckism. And since lamarckism isn't true, the argument is a strawman to attack evolution with.

 

[sphenisc]

Sorry. The other way around.

I'm not sure what that's supposed to mean?

What particular aspect marks this strawman as "Darwinian" or even close to modern evolutionary theory?

That's really a question best directed at Radrook since it's his claim. I'd say it was insufficiently characterised to say where the environment is supposed to be acting directly on traits or selecting between individuals based on random variation. It seems people are inclined to assume the worst, but maybe I'm missing something. It can happen.

 

[SOdhner]

I'm not sure what that's supposed to mean?

He was just saying he felt the responsibility was yours rather than his to back up that classification.

I'd say it was insufficiently characterised to say where the environment is supposed to be acting directly on traits or selecting between individuals based on random variation. It seems people are inclined to assume the worst, but maybe I'm missing something. It can happen.

Well, let's just say this and hopefully move on: It might or might not best be categorized as Lamarkian, but either way it's a terrible misrepresentation of evolution.

 

[temporalillusion]

1. I don't agree with Hovind on much, I just think, quite possibly in my admitted ignorance, that he has raised some good points.

They only seem like good points in a context of not knowing evolution and cosmology. And that's fine, not knowing something isn't a problem, as long as one is willing to learn.

2. The subject here is, to me, more religious than it is science. I'm sorry, that is just the way I see it.

Which subject, you have to acknowledge that you're talking about different branches of science here.

And they're not religious, not because "I don't think so", but because things like big bang theory and evolution actually work. They make predictions about what we'll observe and those predictions are later verified. They explain things. If I want to know how much hydrogen and helium there are in the universe, a creationist just shrugs, but I can use BBT theory to come up with a prediction, and then do some measurements and either confirm it or invalidate it. If I want to explain why some kinds of islands lack mammals, fresh water fish, trees, and amphibians if I'm a creationist I just shrug, but evolution explains exactly why. And I can go to every island I can find and all the data will fit.

Yes god could have created the universe and created life each in its form, but if he did so he did it in a way to appear that it all evolved and developed naturally. Which raises the question of why god is manipulating the evidence.

1. Termites. The "little critters" in termites stomachs which digest the cellulose can't survive without the termites and the termites can't survive without the critters. Which evolved first?

http://en.allexperts.com/q/Evolution-3839/Termite-evolution-first.htm

2. Hovind doesn't know where God comes from and says that science doesn't know where the "dirt" or matter came from as a result of the Big Bang, and since it isn't known he assumes it isn't science. It is religion.

This is called Baryogenesis and Nucleosynthesis. "Dirt" didn't come out of the big bang, mostly only hydrogen, helium, and lithium. The rest of the elements were formed in stars, and the ones heavier than iron in nova and supernova.

Early enough during the Big Bang there was just bosons (think photons), no matter in the way of protons, neutrons, electrons. Bosons with enough energy will spontaneously decay into leptons and baryons and the rest of the particle zoo, so as the universe expanded and cooled baryogenesis and nucleosynthesis could take place.

3. Conservation of Angular Momentum - If the universe began as a swirling dot why do some planets (2) and moons (6) spin "backward"?

Well first who says the universe began as a swirling dot? The universe used to be hot and dense and now its cool and dilute, space itself expanded; that's what BBT says. So this is a case of Hovind misunderstanding BBT.

Second, things like conservation of angular momentum can mean much different things when applied to large scale things like universes, it may not even apply to universes as a whole. General Relativity can be very different than our common sense will tell us (since our common sense is derived from Newtonian type interactions).

And third, even if it was a swirling dot that expanded angular momentum can be conserved even if there are instances where things are orbiting the opposite way. Conservation means adding up all the positives and negatives and coming up with the same value, not all of them being positive. So this is also a case of Hovind not understanding what conservation of angular momentum is.

4. Galaxies and voids - If the Big Bang were true why isn't matter evenly distributed?

Gravity is attractive. Slight variations in the the surface of last scattering results in densities in the matter that precipitated out as the universe expanded meant some regions were more dense than others, denser regions have more gravity and will attract matter. This is one thing the BBT explains very well and is confirmed by small anisotropies in the cosmic microwave background radiation that correlate to observations in the structure of clumps of galaxies across the universe.

More info here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cosmic_microwave_background_radiation

So this is a case of Hovind not knowing about cosmology.

5. Novas and supernovas - If stars evolve why do star deaths not equal star births? Supernova are observed every 30 years but there are less than 300 of them in billions of years. (keeping in mind that I don't believe in a YEC)

Star deaths do equal star births. A star dies and ejects its matter out into space. Shockwaves from other nova eventually lead to matter condensing again under gravity and forming new stars.

Who said there are only 300 in billions of years? Supernova remnants disperse over time.

Here they talk about supernova remnants and how the numbers that Hovind is probably using are incorrect.

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/supernova/#BM10

If you don't believe in YEC, why is this an issue for you? You aren't trying to prove the universe is 6000 years old like Hovind is...

6. Radio polonium halos - If the Earth formed from a hot mass 4.6 billion years ago then why would the polonium halos not have melted?

Lol, is that the question Hovind actually asks? Why the halos have not melted? If so, Hovind can't even get his own creationist sources right!

It's not a question of the halos melting, the question is why they exist.

So this I can discount simply because Hovind isn't even making a coherent objection.

But the real object and a response to polonium halos can be found here:

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/po-halos/gentry.html

 

[SonOfLaertes]

Radrook, another point. It is indeed statistically improbable that humans would "re-discover" gills upon returning to a life lived mostly in the sea. However, evolution does have a way of "finding" new and novel solutions to selection pressures. For instance, while whales did not "rediscover" gills, their ancestors did develop blowholes (their nostrils migrated to the top of their head). Nature has a way of using what is already at hand to solve survival problems.

The example you sight is a textbook example of what evolution does not predict.
The people who put it together were either lazy, less than intelligent, or intentionally dishonest.

 

[temporalillusion]

Darn you paximirium!

 

[Complexity]

The lack of commitment has bothered me too. Dave believes the Bible but is not a Christian which seems contradictory since all of the NT is about Christ and his followers.

Henson doesn't want to fess up to being a xian because he thinks that will protect him from another storm of criticism. It won't.

 

[Complexity]

I used to, and will again, have a collection of other sacred texts including the Koran on my website. I haven't studied them as well as I have the Bible, of course, but, although I like some of them, none of them are nearly as reliable and trustworthy as the Bible.

In what blighted sense is the bibble at all 'reliable and trustworthy'?