How to upset Creationist and Darwinians.

[Zep]

I have to Fess up, that's good. But I wonder if that footprint mentioned by Hyper was found in a Parker lot.

Da-boom TISH!

 

[Hyperbol 9]

Hey, Hyperbol 9, I thought you wanted a proper chat ...
Please don't be another drive-by troll, that's no fun at all.

Well, as first posts go I've done better.

Hey guys, I'm on your side, as you'll see if you read my little explanatory opening paragraph. It was a book I'd read (bits of) and stuck out as an article as I was asked to do something and it was all fresh in me head. Yep, I translated the slant of the book as presented as it wasn't the time and place for the debates such as has started here but a mag article needed in a hurry. My mistake is in presenting it in a format from a completely different environment. But perhaps you're all right in one respect. I've fed a load of plodders at work a load of unfounded twaddle, which is a bit out of order in retrospect. Was meant to be lighthearted office rag stuff only.


So, please, please,please (begging lots) don't think I'm a woo woo for a second. Anonymity here aside, that would still bother me terribly. I wrote a summary of a book I had written. I don't prescribe that any of it as true or false... just interesting.

Okay, perhaps I overloaded on stuff, I just cut and pasted the Word doc I kept. The baboon marker I do find interesting and haven't investigated. This is what forums are fore, eh? The lazy way of finding out. Any thoughts?

And I hope that as my posts go by I will relieve your troubled brows and show I am not a drive-by troll. Take a look at my stuff in FTMB as Hyperbol IX if you're still not convinced.

So, Hyperbol 9: Since you denounce both evolution AND creationism (and I would love to discuss you points - one at a time), then how DO you assume that several million different species came to exist on this planet?

Hans

I denounce or support neither. Creationism I do not subscribe to. Darwinianism (as called in my neck of the woods) has been challenged. I post so there is counter-argument. I may then wish to disagree, but I see nothing so far that I particuarly disagree with. That said, I only wished to get a debate going about 'research' gathered into an overview and stuck into a book. I've read Bible Code and all sorts of pap, doesn't mean I fall for theories, but read to broaden the mind and often to have a laugh, as we do - the weekly newsletter on this site for starters. But hey, I'm telling you grass is green. Everyone has launched into attacks (perhaps too strong a word but you get my gist) in the theories and stuck them my direction as if I have swallowed the stuff hook, line and sinker

Anyway, I'll shut up with the defence stuff and try to get on with proper debate.

There.

The book is ancient Traces by Michael Dawkins by the way.

 

[richardm]

These same marine mammals are the only other species that mate facing one another

Er, actually, no. Bonobos are a prime example of another. Also gibbons, capuchins, black spider monkeys and oran-outans. And quite a few other species of primate. And I would not be in the least bit surprised to learn that there are other non-primate examples too.

 

[Dragon]

OK - Hyperbol - I withdraw the suggestion of drive-by trolling.
Welcome to the forum.
The "Baboon Marker" it is then -

Scientists recently discovered that millennia ago a virus nearly eradicated the primate population of Africa. Initially baboons were tested and a defensive gene against the virus was found. The gene is akin to humans eventually evolving a defensive gene to say, for example, cancer. All other African primates were found to have the now redundant, but nevertheless present, gene. Primates on other continents do not have the gene, it is unique to African primates. Humans, we are told, evolved from African primates and therefore should logically possess the gene. Afterall, 97% of human DNA is junk, not used, it would still be there surely. It is not. How then could humans have evolved from African primates that to this day possess the gene?

First thoughts -
Reference or link, please!
Also, when is this virus supposed to have "nearly eradicated the primate population of Africa" ? Because if it is since we had a common ancestor with the other primates ...

 

[Ladewig]

After reading your post I can see that you are right.

You have upset creationists and Darwinists (not Darwinians).
The catch is you have not upset anyone by providing useful evidence against a well-established theory.

I am at a loss as to why you would bury a topic you wanted to seriously discuss in a post filled with unsubstantiated claims and easily discredited theories.

 

[patnray]

All anatomically modern people, Homo sapiens sapiens and groups like the Cro-Magnon’s, can trace their history back to this time through DNA found only in females.

Just one example of the glaring misstatements in the material you quote. MDNA is found in ALL humans, male and female. It is INHERITED only from the female...

 

[Hyperbol 9]

[is this virus supposed to have "nearly eradicated the primate population of Africa" ? Because if it is since we had a common ancestor with the other primates ... [/B]

Good point. I will have a look. Book and article were read/written back at Christmas so it's all long gone.

 

[Hyperbol 9]

Wow, we've slowed down at last. Right, too business.....

I have heard from somewhere that one possible explanation for the lack of findings of this missing link is that then we were living at coastal areas which now are well below water.

Yeah, but it depends on which,say for example, ice age we are talking about? The end of the last one 10,000 odd years ago is a blinking of the eye evolutionary speaking when the coastline last rose considerably. The coastline only grew by several hundred feet. But go back further to previous ages, for evolution to kick in timewise, and ask why would the animals not find higher ground as humans did?

I live on chalk and flint downland, which a whatever million years ago were the middle of an ocean, as was much of the UK. It is now land. So the reverse also applies but your theory holds. It needs to be tied in with rising and falling sea levels and timelines of evolution, but it sounds promising... the evidence of certain stages of evolution is not available because the UK at that period was ocean. The land then that holds possible evidence is underwater and so cannot be researched just now. But can that balance of sea and land be a diametrically opposed constant worldwide. Nope.

 

[Dancing David]

Hi Hyperbole9. Welcome to the forum.

What a load of unsubstantiated twddle you have dumped here, there is every piece of bogus information you could imagine and almost no MAINSTREAM science at all .
You claim to critique the theory of evolution through natural selection, but you have demonstrated a complete and total lack of knowledge of what the theory is and what evidence supposrts it.

Effort: A
Documentation of sources: F
Understanding of the material at hand: F-
Politeness:A

I highly suggest that you read up on evolutionary theory and the current debates in it. You have presented the usual creationist views of evolution and don't seem to know what the theory of evolution is about.

Your understanding of human archaelogy and archaeology is general needs to be worked upon greatly.

Very nice attempt, very poor execution.

Out of the load of misinformation presented this stands out in extreme:

Life, both flora and fauna burst into existence fully formed in what is referred to as the Cambrian Explosion, 530 million years ago.

You cite no source but where did you get this a creationist web site?

I highly suggest that you do a web search on the "Burgess shale" and "pre-cambrian life" and prehaps "abiogenesis".

Welocme to the forum but your post contains so many errors in information that it would be hard to point them all out.

 

[Dancing David]

Wow, we've slowed down at last. Right, too business.....



Yeah, but it depends on which,say, ice age we are talking about? The end of the last one 10,000 odd years ago is a blinking of the eye evolutionary speaking when the coastline last rose considerably. But go back further and ask why would the animals not find higher ground as humans did?

This is what I mean by a lack of undertsanding of the basis of archaeology there are at least three issues you need to think about in this context
1. Where is a hole dug?
2.How did the material get there?
3.Why was the material preserved?

ALL OF THE ARCHAELOGICAL RECORD is full of holes and spotty at best. It is not as though all species just went and laid down where someone was going to dig a hole and covered themselves with preservative. The nature of deposition is crucial to the preservation of remains, which is why they find mummies in dry soil.

There is a myth of the Magdelian Explosion presented by French and German archaeologists who want to say that culture arose in Europe abot 12,000 years ago. they point to fine bone tools and all this cool stuff. Well it just happens that that is also the window of preservation for those objects. They ignore the fact that there is evidence for agriculture in North Africa 60,000-40,000 BP and that the evidence points squarely at India as the cradle of civilization.

Why ? Beacause they found some materials that had beeen preserved in a cave, the same materials thatw ere created in wetter cliamtes but not preserved, the evidence for argiculture in North Africa and India is based upon stone tools because there are no wooden implements from 40,000 BP.

 

[Hyperbol 9]

Very nice attempt, very poor execution.

You cite no source but where did you get this a creationist web site?

Welocme to the forum but your post contains so many errors in information that it would be hard to point them all out.

Why not make a start rather than glory in the rhetoric? Why not read some of my secondary posts? I did in fact quote the source. As for Creationist... well you must be the first person to call me one of those in a fairly long life. Well done. A good judge of character DD. Jeez, no wonder this isn't so much a debate forum as a load of bods agreeing with one another and generally indulging in backslapping. Anyone with a degree of differing opinion has obviously been soon browbeaten away. I get called narrowminded by believers in this that and everything else on other forums by those who themselves are in fact narrowminded to the other extreme. So argue a point.

Okay, I've chucked in a load of pish. Enjoy it, knock it down, applaud it, do whatever you want. But c'mon, lighten up. I said right at the beginning it was lighthearted and tongue in cheek. But it is nevertheless a challenge to established theory and should be tackled as other posters above have more eloquently done.

And I don't see how it is creationist? Say what you will about the source material and worth of the research (or lack of) of this particular book, it merely attempts to give a third alternative to how we ended up here, one in tune with evolution but not necessarily agreeing with established viewsof the journey from A to B.

 

[Hyperbol 9]

This is what I mean by a lack of undertsanding of the basis of archaeology there are at least three issues you need to think about in this context
1. Where is a hole dug?
2.How did the material get there?
3.Why was the material preserved?

ALL OF THE ARCHAELOGICAL RECORD is full of holes and spotty at best. It is not as though all species just went and laid down where someone was going to dig a hole and covered themselves with preservative. The nature of deposition is crucial to the preservation of remains, which is why they find mummies in dry soil.

Good, we're up and running.

Your points above are valid. However, holes have been dug for a long time now. Surely someone would have got lucky. Again it comes down to probability. Yeah, the in-between species are probably there, but please explain to this poor ignorant sod how the jackpot doesn't seem to be hit? Must be a few in the dry soil.

I can't believe I'm challenging something from a 'Believers' viewpoint. What went wrong?

 

[BillHoyt]

And I don't see how it is creationist? Say what you will about the source material and worth of the research (or lack of) of this particular book, it merely attempts to give a third alternative to how we ended up here, one in tune with evolution but not necessarily agreeing with established viewsof the journey from A to B.

"Ancient Traces" Author: Michael Baigent

 

[thaiboxerken]

I think that Hyperbole did a great job of upsetting "Darwinists". Of course, he had to spout nonsense and fabrications to do so.

I don't know if you are just ignorant about evolution theory, stupid, or a liar, but you certainly aren't saying much that is true.

 

[Hyperbol 9]

Is the quote and hyperlink to suggest otherwise? Works mainly about Freemasonery as I see it. Whatever the man's religious beliefs, my statement stands with regard to the book. The chapter to which I refer does not come from a religious viewpoint. He later goes on in said book about reincarnation. I chose not to bother with that rubbish. Doesn't change the fact that the chapter to which I refer is not IMO creationist.

 

[richardm]

Thing is, I don't think it's very clear that what you're proposing is a new idea. You say:

A theory that is gathering support is one of chaos theory whereby, rather than a progressive and improving evolution, small mistakes, both good and bad, in generation after generation have resulted in the creatures we see today

I would suggest that this is exactly what most people mean when they talk about evolution. The idea that it is "improving" towards some future goal is incorrect, I think.

 

[BillHoyt]

Is the quote and hyperlink to suggest otherwise? Works mainly about Freemasonery as I see it. Whatever the man's religious beliefs, my statement stands with regard to the book. The chapter to which I refer does not come from a religious viewpoint. He later goes on in said book about reincarnation. I chose not to bother with that rubbish. Doesn't change the fact that the chapter to which I refer is not IMO creationist.

Obviously I disagree. The "facts," as you've related them, have the clear sniff of creationism. The link I provided was to provide evidence both of the author's interests and the character of the book, which is neither textbook or peer-reviewed journal article. When skeptics ask for evidence, they are looking for this primary source or close-to-primary-source evidence.

Now, would you care to discuss the evidence? Would you care to respond to the questions and counters to your claims? Baigent is not a good source for these technical questions, however interesting an author you may find him.

 

[Hellbound]

I would suggest that this is exactly what most people mean when they talk about evolution. The idea that it is "improving" towards some future goal is incorrect, I think.

Exactly.

Stephen Gould's Full House is an excellent book that touches on precisely this issue (as well as the dissappearance of .400 hitting in baseball). Mutations are as likely to go one way as another (more complex or more simple, etc). The idea that evolution has a goal or a pinnacle is nonsense. It simply develops for the specific conditions and times the species exists in...in other words, things evolve into a niche. For that matter, the most successful organisms ever produced (whether in terms of habitats, biomass, number of species, proliferation, or any other criteria) are bacteria...which don't even have a nucleus.

It seems that a lot of your article is shooting down, basically, a strawman of evolution, rather than evolution as it is actually understood by science.

 

[Hyperbol 9]

I think that Hyperbole did a great job of upsetting "Darwinists". Of course, he had to spout nonsense and fabrications to do so.

I don't know if you are just ignorant about evolution theory, stupid, or a liar, but you certainly aren't saying much that is true.

Yardy yardy yardy. It'd be good to get going here but all I see is a load (not all) of self-important bores who prefer throwing insults and not saying much else. Then you have to come back and waste time. Yes, I know all about evolution. I don't have a problem with it particuarly. YAWN. Just thought I'd get some banter going. But hell, some of you take things seriously, almost as a personal attack. I go hammer and tongs with people on other forums, yet as much as we disagree, laugh at one another and so on, it's kept civil. Should be ashamed of yourselves, did ya parents teach you no manners? Okay, I chucked some controversial and not particuarly well researched stuff in there... but to generate good conversation. Thought that was why we're here, to have a laugh, chat, etc. I entered pleasantly enough. What's the problem? Take my thread title. In the UK it's humour. Not meant to really upset or offend anyone. It's said with a smile. Obviously doesn't translate too well over the Atlantic.. Take it with the pinch of salt it is intended, think about it, learn from it. Some hope. Tiresome.

 

[Z]

Here's a question I've always had:

Let's say, hypothetically, that humankind in whatever form once had a modern technological civilization similar in advancement and technology to our own. How long would it take for every artifact trace to be destroyed through natural forces? How long before every building frame, plastic milk-bottle, and fiberglass automobile shell would be dissolved into nothingness? How long before even 'preserved' items would deteriorate and vanish? With these questions in mind, is it even vaguely possible that, millions of years ago, Mankind had steel and glass cities, aircraft, and so forth?

Now apply this thinking to civilization as we know DID exist, and let's see how long it would take for even preserved items to deteriorate beyond recognition - couldn't tech-oriented life on Earth be, therefore, near-infinitely older than we give it credit for?