So in other words, Intelligent Design is nothing more than the age old 'God of the Gaps' in which our ignorance is somehow seen as evidence for design. In case of ID however, the concept of design is far more constrained and need not even point to intelligent agency. Wesley Elsberry pointed out this major shortcoming of Intelligent Design's argument in an early review of Dembski's work. First of all Wesley recognizes how the term 'design' has little relationship to the term as used by earlier Intelligent Design proponents like Paley.Before I proceed, however, I note that Dembski makes an important concession to his critics. He refuses to make the second assumption noted above. When the EF implies that certain systems are intelligently designed, Dembski does not think it follows that there is some intelligent designer or other. He says that, "even though in practice inferring design is the first step in identifying an intelligent agent, taken by itself design does not require that such an agent be posited. The notion of design that emerges from the design inference must not be confused with intelligent agency" (TDI, 227, my emphasis).
In other words, whenever an ID proponent claims that 'design has been inferred', ID cannot even have ruled out scientific explanations like natural selection as the 'designer'. In other words, it seems that 'design' is nothing more than a position of 'ignorance' and unless the ID proponents propose their own detailed explanation, ID remains scientifically vacuous. In other words, we have so far established that the concept of 'design' as proposed by ID has little relevance to how the term is more commonly used and interpreted, and that it is a placeholder for our ignorance. We also have established that in order to establish who or what is the 'designer', we need to provide detailed explanations. So where are these detailed explanations from Intelligent Design, you may wonder? Don't hold your breath, ID is not in the business of responding to such pathetic requirements William Dembski was asked a very similar question and 'responded' thatOne may wonder what TDI was supposed to accomplish, if design no longer means what Paley meant by it and the attribution of agency no longer follows from finding design. But Dembski believes that finding design does imply agency, even though he has identified that implication as being unnecessary. In his view, because we can often find that design is found where an intelligent agent has acted, we can reliably infer that when we find design, we have also found evidence of the action of an intelligent agent. Section 2.4 gives Dembski's take on how we go from design to agency. Dembski invokes his explanatory filter as a critical piece of this justification. Dembski believes that not only design but also agency is found by his argument. This is the message being spread by various and sundry of the "intelligent design" proponents and by Dembski himself in other writings. But is it a secure inference? In his First Things article, and to a lesser extent in his section 2.3 of TDI, Dembski takes biologists to task for avoiding the conclusion of design for biological phenomena. Dembski says that to avoid a design conclusion, biologists uniformly reject one or more of the premises of his argument. But Dembski does not exclude natural selection as a possible cause for events which can be classified as being due to design. The apparent, but unstated, logic behind the move from design to agency can be given as follows: 1. There exists an attribute in common of some subset of objects known to be designed by an intelligent agent. 2. This attribute is never found in objects known not to be designed by an intelligent agent. 3. The attribute encapsulates the property of directed contingency or choice. 4. For all objects, if this attribute is found in an object, then we may conclude that the object was designed by an intelligent agent. This is an inductive argument. Notice that by the second step, one must eliminate from consideration precisely those biological phenomena which Dembski wishes to categorize. In order to conclude intelligent agency for biological examples, the possibility that intelligent agency is not operative is excluded a priori. One large problem is that directed contingency or choice is not solely an attribute of events due to the intervention of an intelligent agent. The "actualization-exclusion-specification" triad mentioned above also fits natural selection rather precisely. One might thus conclude that Dembski's argument establishes that natural selection can be recognized as an intelligent agent.
William A. Dembski Organisms using GAs vs. Organisms being built by GAs thread at ISCID 18. September 2002 All that ID has to offer are 'fundamental discontinuities'. So what are these so called fundamental discontinuities? Complex Specified Information (CSI) ? Irreducible Complexity? Nope, neither one is able to show that there are fundamental discontinuities that cannot be explained by science. So what else is there? Behe, realizing the vacuity of Intelligent Design so far, has re-attempted to define an 'edge to evolution' by taking a guestimate and turn it into a strawman against evolutionary theory. And not even evolutionary theory but just a Darwinian component of such a theory. However, as shown by scientists like ERV, Behe's comments lack foundation in reality and are largely based on ignorance. This is where we return to present day. Behe, annoyed that a mere graduate student has shown the vacuity in his position, complained about ERV's tenacity on the Christian show. Now, this show did not invite ERV for her position but did allow Behe to respond to ERV's observation that she had gotten Behe to admit that the basic premise of his book had been falsified. Around 12:00 minutes we hearAs for your example, I’m not going to take the bait. You’re asking me to play a game: “Provide as much detail in terms of possible causal mechanisms for your ID position as I do for my Darwinian position.” ID is not a mechanistic theory, and it’s not ID’s task to match your pathetic level of detail in telling mechanistic stories. If ID is correct and an intelligence is responsible and indispensable for certain structures, then it makes no sense to try to ape your method of connecting the dots. True, there may be dots to be connected. But there may also be fundamental discontinuities, and with IC systems that is what ID is discovering.
Now remember how ERV explained how Behe had claimed thatInterviewer: "Hey Jeff, I have got Behe to admit that his basic premise to his book "The Edge of Evolution" is wrong. He stated over and over and over that no new protein to protein interactions have ever evolved, ever. And I showed him that one evolved in HIV within the last few decades. And she goes on to say "in his case he is most certainly not ignorant as he admitted defeat. The only logical explanation as to why he is continuing down this current path is that he is a liar". What is she talking about and how do you respond Behe: "Oh clever, eh well uhm she eh she eh is wrong um I um um am not quite eh sure where she is getting this but eh I didn't say , as matter of fact, I didn't say that protein sites could not uh evolve, as a matter of fact, I did in my book and that is the sickle cell eh hemoglobin binding site. Now I don't know if many of your listeners know but [throat clearing sound] in [throat clearing sound] the disease sickle cell anemia eh the hemoglobin which lives in our red blood cells uh kind of gunks things up and uh turns thing into kind of a semi solid mass because the proteins, the hemoglobins stick to eachother. And that is kind of the result of a mutation which is actually useful if you live in malaria affected countries and I said that such things could happen and I said that eh the eh limit for Darwinian evolution was two connected protein-protein binding sites that is if you need three proteins to do something eh and uh each pair of proteins has to be connected by a site you need two protein binding sites, that would be something that based on the data I talked about in the book 'the edge of evolution' that is the most you could expect out of eh out of eh eh Darwinian processes. Now, this lady, eh this graduate student said well hey look we have, there's been a new binding site eh which has occurred in one protein in HIV, the virus that causes aids, hm hm. And she was right and I had not seen that so I said ok well, there is another single binding site that has come about but uh again you would expect that to happen because the odds against a single binding site popping up are not that they are not that prohibitive. But if you need two binding sites together to do something then that's what I said in my book was pro prohibited. And uh, so since most molecular machines in the cell consist of uh an aggregate of a dozen proteins or so, each of which has to bind very specifically to eachother then it that means that most of the protein machinery in the cell is well beyond Darwinian evolution. So uh so uh she uh, she misread the book uh and she's uh uh she's trying to uh she is trying well uh she misread the book. okay .. Interviewer: Well that is why we need to get the facts Behe: that's right that's right so it uh the the long the short is that most people don't understand that Aids viruses HIV viruses rather uh occur in enormous numbers like you know billions and billions and billions as Carl Sagan might say. Interviewer: hm hm Behe: And they mutate at an enormous rate, tens of thousands of times faster than the cells in our body and and ma mammalian bodies and so on. And yet, after 50 years, uh at this enormous rate uh which I show in my book is uh they have undergone about the same number of mutations as cellular organisms would undergo in billions of years. Uh you have very very little to show for very very little that is new in the HIV virus uh so in my book I try to find the line between what random Darwinian processes can do like Darwinian evolution and what needs design and so certainly there are some little things that that chance can accomplish in in things like HIV , things like malaria which I talk about in the book and and other uh things called ecoli bacteria which I talk about in the book. Some things can be done but like I say there's there's quite uh uh strict limit. to to what can happen.
As far as I can tell from Behe's 'response' he agrees with ERV that he was wrong in his book however, he claims that well, a single such binding site might still be probable but two of these are outside the realm of Darwinian evolution. Read the whole story here where Ian Musgrave hold Behe to the task at hand“Like malaria, HIV is a microbe that occurs in astronomical numbers. What’s more, its mutation rate is 10,000 times greater than that of most other organisms. So in just the past few decades HIV has actually undergone more of certain kinds of mutations than all cells have endured since the beginning of the world. Yet all those mutations, while medically important, have changed the functioning virus very little. It still has the same number of genes that work in the same way. There is no new molecular machinery. If we see that Darwin’s mechanism can only do so little even when given its best opportunities, we can decisively conclude that random mutation did not build the machinery of life.”
However Ian does not end it here and shows how science does explain how multiple binding sites evolveIt is good to see that you agree that the Golgi targeting sequence is an example of a binding site. However, you don’t get to ignore it because “viral proteins are special”. As I showed in the post you are supposed to be replying to, this is nonsense. In your book you categorically state HIV has developed no new binding sites, the diagram on page 145 of “Edge of Evolution” has a big zero on it. Yet your own example of a binding site is the haemoglobin S mutation, a single amino acid mutation that just clumps up proteins. You don’t write in your book “HIV has evolved several binding sites, but they don’t count because they are viral-protein-host protein interactions” or “HIV has evolved several binding sites, but they don’t count because they are equivalent to the HbS mutation”, you just write zero
Ian also thanks Behe for admitting that he was wrong and how he should apologize for how he treated ERVNow, if you only looked at AII and the related hormone AIII, you would believe that three binding sites RYF, were required for binding. You might puzzle over how you could simultaneously get three replacements in an ancestral, non-binding peptide so that it would bind to this site. But as we look at SarIle and SarAsp, we can see a way. These have only two of the three binding amino acids present in AII and AIII, yet they bind very well indeed. Maybe only binding to the the DN part of the DNKH motif in the AT-1R is critical. However, AIV, which dones not have a D binding amino acid, still binds (not as well as the others, but it still binds enough to be selected), so we can see selectable binding can come about more simply, and via different pathways. It can be even simpler than that. The hormone CGP binds to completely different amino acid’s in the ligand binding cleft, not DNKH at all, so there more than one way to get to bind specifically to a something as highly selective as a hormone receptor binding site. In terms of the lock and key mechanism, your claim, Dr. Behe, is that all tines of the “key” must be in place simultaneously to fit in the lock. But as we have seen above, this is not correct, even a very simple “key” will fit into the lock (keeping in mind both the lock and key are “floppy”). All we need to get Darwinian selection of binding sites is to have weak but selectable binding. This can be accomplished with very simple changes, and a variety of unrelated structures, even for very highly restricted structures. Note again, while this example is small peptides binding to a receptor, a small peptide is in principle the same as a surface loop of a protein binging to another protein. Your model of highly restricted sequences which have to be in position simultaneously is just wrong.
So Behe was given the opportunity to not only debate his side of the story but also apologize to ERV (Abigail Smith). What happened? Infidel Guy, decided to correct this oversight and invited both ERV and Behe to present their position on his show.I am pleased that you have acknowledged Vpu viroporin represents a real, de novo binding site. Now if you had engaged with this in your response to Ms Smith, my respect for you would have risen immeasurably. To those of you not familiar with graduate and post graduate education, we actually want graduate students to disagree with us, robustly. After all, they are the ones carrying the torch of critical enquiry when we are gone. We don’t want them to accept our say so, “just because”. As scientists and educators our brief goes beyond just those PhD students we supervise, but to all engaged in critical enquiry, regardless of how we feel about their actual mode of delivery [1]. By “playing the man”[2] Dr. Behe, rather than engaging with Ms Smith’s arguments, you abrogated our responsibility as mentors and educators. Imagine the difference if you had dealt with Vpu Viroporin straight up. How about apologizing to Ms Smith now?
The response:Unlike the Christian show that let Behe dog me while they didnt even attempt to get me on their show, IG did not want his show to be me smacking on Behe behind his back, so they sent a second email.
Hi Dr. Behe- I apologize for sending a second request but I wanted to give you the opportunity to respond. Abbie Smith has agreed to be our guest on show to discuss ID and the arguments you have made for it. I believe you have had an ongoing dialogue with her in the cyber world and we wanted to get the two of you together to discuss these issues in real time. Abbie is scheduled to be on Thursday, February 7th at 8pm EST. However, if you wanted to be on we could re-schedule for a date that is convenient for both of you. Let us know of your interest and we will schedule you accordingly. Regards,
'Not interested.' Well, I kinda figured you were 'not interested' in HIV research, LiLo, cause you didnt even Google 'HIV' before you decided to write a whole book on what it can and cannot do. Kinda figured you were 'not interested' in HIV research because your response to my essays was that the hard work of hundreds of scientists was 'pathetic'. OH LOOK! More PATHETIC RESEARCH on Vpu in that PATHETIC journal, NATURE! Yeah. Its the *research* thats pathetic, Behe. Remind me to never anger ERV, she is a mighty force of science. And that's another day in the life of a DI fellow. Focus on Christian Apologetics and avoid any venues in which you will be confronted by real scientists. Is it not ironic that when ID talks about teaching the so-called controversy, it somehow seems to exclude itself? Now how dogmatic is that? A final note is the following comment by Behe to Mark Chu-CarrollHi, ___, sorry for not replying earlier. I appreciate your asking me, but I'm not interested in doing the show. Best wishes. Mike Behe
However this seems to be at odds with what the scientific papers do show. For instanceCarroll cites several instances where multiple changes do accumulate gradually in proteins. (So do I. I discuss gradual evolution of antifreeze resistance, resistance to some insecticides by “tiny, incremental steps — amino acid by amino acid — leading from one biological level to another”, hemoglobin C-Harlem, and other examples, in order to make the critically important distinction between beneficial intermediate mutations and detrimental intermediate ones.) But, as Carroll might say, it is a non sequitur to leap to the conclusion that all biological features therefore can gradually accumulate. Incredibly, he ignores the book’s centerpiece example of chloroquine resistance, where beneficial changes do not accumulate gradually.
But this is hardly the only relevant paper, in "Progressive Increase in Point Mutations Associated with Chloroquine Resistance in Plasmodium falciparum Isolates from India", Pooja Mittra et al concludeHastings, Bray and Ward (2002), writing in the journal Science, go into a little more detail. They note that sequential accumulation of mutations is the best explanation for chloroquine resistance:
The first mutations spread because they confer increased tolerance to CQ on parasites, enabling them to infect humans sooner after drug treatment — for example, mutation 4 allows parasites to infect people 6 days after treatment rather than 7 days. The relatively rapid elimination of CQ means that these are rather weak selective forces (6) and that the spread of these first mutations will be slow. Eventually, mutation 8 arises, which allows the parasite to survive therapeutic levels of CQ. Once above this threshold, the selective advantage conferred by this mutation becomes enormous and the pfcrt haplotype (now containing several sequentially acquired mutations) spreads rapidly across geographic regions where CQ is in common use. This appears to have occurred four times for CQ resistance: twice in South America, once in southeast Asia, and once in Papua New Guinea (see the viewpoint by Wellems on page 124) (10).
How long will it take for Behe to claim that what he said in his book, he did not really mean to say and that critics are once again misreading his book?Eight of our isolates also contained intermediate mutatedgene forms (7 isolates with the CMNTA genotype and 1 isolate with the SMNTA genotype), wherein a mutation was found at codon 76, whereas codon 220 had the wt allele (figure 1A). A study has shown that isolates with this intermediate form (the CMNTA genotype) show slightly higher IC50 values for CQ than do isolates with the wt allele [16]. Therefore, it has been proposed that acquisition of CQR is a stepwise process, and that association with additional mutations would give rise to a higher level of CQR.
Blake Stacey's collection of links (corrected)
248 Comments
ERV · 27 January 2008
Wow!!
I didnt know exactly what happened on that radio show until just now (I just heard Behe talked some smack). That interviewer got my comment straight from PZ's thread on KKMS!
Never contacted me. Never said boo.
What a jerk.
PvM · 27 January 2008
thread in question
wow... sleezy at best
PvM · 27 January 2008
Tyler DiPietro · 27 January 2008
I sure as hell hope Behe has a lot of fun pandering to credulous followers who lap up every attempt to reinforce their belief system, no matter how badly. A lot less work than science, I suppose. Probably better pay too.
BTW guys, in your link to "Mark Chu-Carroll's collection of links", you mistake Mark CC for Blake Stacey.
PvM · 27 January 2008
Corrected thanks
k.e.. · 27 January 2008
No designer/gapper? Heck WAD is an adesigner/agapper or more correctly agnostical gapper. He doesn't seem rock solid sure does he? Does he like men in tights? (not that there is anything wrong with that, maybe he is metrotheistical)
WAD if you do happen to be reading this, or you; you mealy mouthed ID minion aka WADist, have a good hard think about that, you are an atheist or an Episcopalian which is pretty much the same thing really.
I suggest a visit to your nearest shrine to Ecce Homo and a period of fasting, self flagellation and question begging. Abstinence is highly recommended ….no not from horizontal dancing…thinking. Clearly your ‘gifts’ are of no more use than the vegetative receptical of daytime TV.
X almighty.
Jeff Shell · 27 January 2008
ERV,
I was just made aware of your comment. I didn't think I was being a jerk for posing your comments to M Behe since you had addressed them to me on PZ's site. I would think you would be appreciative to get a response from Behe.
Is there some type of protocol that one must contact a person if you pass along their question to a guest?
PvM,
What do you mean by "sleezy at best"?
Jeff
Tyler DiPietro · 27 January 2008
"I would think you would be appreciative to get a response from Behe."
Yes, because as we all know, the best kind of response always comes in a setting where someone is allowed to bloviate unchallenged and is automatically congratulated on supposedly having "the facts".
ERV · 27 January 2008
Jeff--
I think you just tripped and fell into a pile of manure. I have no reason to believe you have been following the Behe-HIV story for the past six months to have done this on purpose, and I honestly believe you have no idea what you did and why we think its sleezy.
Im sure you are totally confused, so just to catch you up-- I would have 'appreciated' a response from Behe six months ago. I would have 'appreciated' not having Dembskis attack rats harass me. I would have 'appreciated' a real response from Behe, not the 'shes just a stupid little mean girl' response he gave me on his Amazon blog. I would have appreciated Behe engaging in a 'debate' with me on this topic on neutral ground, as Ian Musgrave suggested immediately.
I dont 'appreciate' a BS response from Behe on a radical Christian radio show, especially when I was not invited to give the pro-science stance on that particular topic. That Behe was allowed to publicize his completely incorrect opinions on HIV-1 evolution on your show, unrefuted, is sleezy, predictable, radical Christian radio.
Search this site for 'Vpu' and Im sure you will figure out why we are all so irritated over your little poo-dive.
pvm · 27 January 2008
Mercurious · 27 January 2008
In all reality I think Behe is the perfect spokesman for ID. He can state his point well enough to fool the gullible, but when it comes time to actually defend his points to criticism he sounds like a blundering moron. Lets all be nice to Behe. Do we really want one of the front men for ID to sound like he knows what he's talking about, or someone we can just roll our eyes to. We can just treat him like that annoying neighborhood dog that likes to yap constantly right up until you take a step towards him, then he runs away yipping.
Jim Wynne · 27 January 2008
Gary · 27 January 2008
I think we should coin a new word, "sleezy", and define it in the dictionary as "sleazy at best". And, of course, include a picure of Behe as an illustration.
Keith Eaton · 27 January 2008
ERV,
One fact of life you may have to accept is that superior minds like Behe don't have an obligation to be put on equal footing with a little grad student weeny who in all likelihood was given the argumentative insight and when no one else felt it was worth a whisper decided to get her 15 minutes of fame by posting and weeping and doing some sort of Hillery like wounded little woman routine.
Now go back to your pitiful little life as a lab rat and wallow in obscurity until maybe in the next 40 years you have another brilliant idea.
Do you realize that you and this tribe of mental pygmies posting here are just a part of the laughing stock of perhaps 100 evo true believers that are required to plug the holes in the Darwin dike that the DI people (perhaps a dozen principals) continue to elucidate. 100 to 12 ..that seems about even.
And all the while the ID and IC concepts are being accepted, amplified, popularized, and championed worldwide by a constantly growing audience.
Oh! And that shudder you felt was an enormous ice-burg ripping the majority of your substructure below the waterline.
Here's a handkerchief honey!
David Stanton · 27 January 2008
Way to address the issues Keith. We can all see you learned from the best. Birds of a feather and all that.
386sx · 27 January 2008
One fact of life you may have to accept is that superior minds like Behe
Yaahh... Well he should do some more reading or something. Maybe he could try google. Give it a try Mr. Behe it's pretty cool!!
H. Humbert · 27 January 2008
Mercurious · 27 January 2008
vhut · 27 January 2008
Who is this Keith Eaton? Is this the same Keith Eaton that called for 'a civil discourse' in the controversy in posts one can find on Google?
Stanton · 27 January 2008
txjak · 27 January 2008
Well, it was Behe who equated ID with astrology in the Dover trial, so perhaps his mind is superior to the rest of the IDists anyway.
I'm sure Abbie has no aspirations in that regard.
It's fun to see assholes like Keith rant in frustration.
waldteufel · 27 January 2008
Keith, honey, the word is "iceberg". If you are attempting to spar with adults, please learn a little more about proper spelling and grammar.
Oh, and Keith, honey, don't forget to take your medication.
Sorry, Keith, honey . . .one more thing. If you were referring to Mrs. Clinton in your first nearly illiterate run-on sentence, her name is spelled "H I L L A R Y".
There's a good boy.
Stanton · 27 January 2008
pvm · 27 January 2008
Keith, this is a great parody of ID. Well done... You almost sounded like a real live one. Of course it would be more fun if it came from an ID proponent. But that seems to be too much to hope for. ID proponents typically avoid science websites
Ian Musgrave · 28 January 2008
Doc Bill · 28 January 2008
Given the choice of messing with a graduate student or messing with a professor I'd pick the professor every time.
Why? Easy!
Grad students are at the very top of their game. They are on top of the latest research, constantly studying and at the height of their expertise in research. Grad students are not to be trifled with. They are the carnivores of science departments constantly on the prowl for fresh meat.
I have the highest respect for graduate students, their intellect and their potential.
Behe, who obviously has forgotten what academic excellence is all about, seriously miscalculated when he played the Professor Card against a capable graduate student. Mmmmmmmm, professor-meat.
Nomad · 28 January 2008
If I'm ever in legal trouble and find myself in court, I hope it's an area that ERV deals with so I can get her on my side as an expert witness. Except I would have find it difficult to not snicker with glee as she tears apart the opposition, that might irritate the judge.
Frank J · 28 January 2008
Frank J · 28 January 2008
After clicking the link in Comment 141,426, scroll to Comment 87,042.
Nigel D · 28 January 2008
Do you agree with Behe that the evidence for common descent is overwhelming?
Do you agree with Behe that the Earth is over 4 billion years old?
Do you agree with Behe that much of the diversity we observe in nature is due to evolution? (He just claims that it cannot all be due to natural processes).
Ravilyn Sanders · 28 January 2008
Olorin · 28 January 2008
PvM quoted Dembski's ISCID outburst to show his dismissal of a "mechanism" for ID. This one gets tossed around a lot. But there is a better exposition of this point in Dembski, “Intelligent Design Coming Clean” papers on Metanexus Network (indirectly dated to 2002). The nub, in italics in the original, is: "Intelligent design is not a mechanistic theory!"
Just to avoid charges of the dreaded QM, and to show that he really means that no possible mechanism can explain his specified complexity, here is the context:
“Repeatedly, critics of design have asked design theorists to provide a causal mechanism whereby a non-natural designer inputs specified complexity into the world. This question presupposes a self-defeating conception of design and tries to force design onto a Procrustean bed sure to kill it. Intelligent design is not a mechanistic theory!... To ask for a mechanism to explain the effect of an intelligence (leaving aside derived intentionality) is like Aristotelians asking Newton what it is that keeps bodies in rectilinear motion at a constant velocity...
Intelligent design is fully capable of accommodating mechanistic explanations. Intelligent design has no interest in dismissing mechanistic explanations. Such explanations are wonderful as far as they go. But they only go so far, and they are incapable of accounting for specified complexity.”
Olorin · 28 January 2008
Rereading Dembski's quote above, I realized that there is an answer to his hypothetical question "Aristotelians asking Newton what it is that keeps bodies in rectilinear motion at a constant velocity…"
It's inertia, Aristotle. Inertia.
===================
PC: this answer is less flippant than it sounds. Prior to Newton, physicists believed along with Aristotle that "forces" were a property of material bodies themselves. Newton turned that on its head with the concept of inertia---the resistance to force---being the property, and that forces were externally imposed on the bodies.
Now we need someone to turn Dembski on his head.
Maya · 28 January 2008
PvM · 28 January 2008
PvM · 28 January 2008
raven · 28 January 2008
Frank J · 28 January 2008
Steve · 28 January 2008
CJO · 28 January 2008
Reality Check · 28 January 2008
Henry J · 28 January 2008
Tyler DiPietro · 28 January 2008
"One fact of life you may have to accept is that superior minds like Behe don’t have an obligation to be put on equal footing with a little grad student weeny who in all likelihood was given the argumentative insight and when no one else felt it was worth a whisper decided to get her 15 minutes of fame by posting and weeping and doing some sort of Hillery like wounded little woman routine."
Actually, if you were paying attention during that whole debacle, Behe has to concede that she was right. This means you are officially obligated to eat shit, loser.
Keith Eaton · 28 January 2008
Darwin's Day in America by John West is another highly revelatory book that many Americans will read and profit from.
It is largely agreement with the conclusions of Applby, Hunt, & Jacob as developed in "Telling the Truth About History", Chapter 2 pgs 68-90. Norton 1995
An appropriate subtitle is, the terrible and often unintended consequences of terrible ideas.
As to Behe: His response to TO posts.
In this group of posts I am repeatedly said to be "ignorant." That may be true, but I think there is reason to give me the benefit of the doubt. I have a PhD. D. in biochemistry from the University of Pennsylvania (received an award from Sigma Xi for "Best Thesis), postdoc for four years at the National Institutes of Health (as a Jane Coffin Childs Fund postdoctoral fellow), have been an academic biochemist for 14 years, have gained tenure at a reasonably rigorous university, have published a fair amount in the biochemical literature, and have continuously had my research funded by national agencies (including a five-year Research Career Development Award from the National Institutes of Health) and currently have research funds.
So the conclusion is that Lehigh, U of Penn, NIH, etc. are incompetent institutions because they granted degrees, postdoc work, and employment to Dr. Behe, including tenure.
Of course the eleven responses to his critics remain at the DI site to be read by interested parties. I read them and I was a little embarrassed for the evos being intellectually pistol whipped into utter submission in such clear terms.
It would be better for the evolanders to start playing backgammon on the net against Russian 3rd graders than to continue to debate ID scientists.
raven · 28 January 2008
Frank J · 28 January 2008
raven · 28 January 2008
pvm · 28 January 2008
raven · 28 January 2008
Henry J · 28 January 2008
mplavcan · 28 January 2008
Eaton:
Very impressive credentials that Behe posts -- they might seem almost ordinary for a biochemist. But more to the point, do you buy your breakfast cereal on the basis of the batting average of the face on the box? This might come as a shock, but those of us in science judge an argument on the basis of the argument, not the letters after the name.
Tyler DiPietro · 28 January 2008
So Keith, how about informing us about Behe's research output over the past 10 years?
Stanton · 29 January 2008
Nigel D · 29 January 2008
Do you agree with Behe that the evidence for common descent is overwhelming?
Do you agree with Behe that the Earth is over 4 billion years old?
Do you agree with Behe that much of the diversity we observe in nature is due to evolution? (He just claims that it cannot all be due to natural processes).
Nigel D · 29 January 2008
Keith Eaton · 29 January 2008
Evolution is a Ponzi scheme that requires more taxpayer dollars, a tighter authoritarian control, a brain-dead cult of sycophantic true believers, a large paid lobbyist staff promoting members of congress and an ever increasing list of "investment" opportunities that flop out reams of papers, 99% of which lead to zippo practical results.
Your hubris is unparalleled outside Hollywood and D. C. and people are actually quite bored and rather weary of it all.
I have no issue with the 99% of scientists, their research, results, and applications who have nada to do with evolution because they actually accomplish useful goals.
See even most life scientists and medical workers don't even think about evolution because its a very impractical aspect of their work.
It's so revealing of evolander mass psychosis when you spend 90% of every essay railing against DI people or any opponent and then claim that there is no persecution of same.
Remember Barbara McClintock, the early pioneer in what Shapiro now calls natural genetic engineering, the lady who was attacked viciously for her intrusion into the bigoted, male evolander world of the 40-60 era? Remember that her publishing was nil for years because she went totally private and only shared results with a handful of peers in close company.
Of course inevitably the truth won out and years later she was awarded a Nobel prize.
Gee I study the History of Science a lot and I am still unconvinced that all scientific progress for mankind was accomplished by evos and atheists. I guess I missed the part about how we were all living in holes in the ground prior to to 1860.
Evoland: The subculture of Newspeak, historical revisionism, big science brotherhood, and control freaks.
pvm · 29 January 2008
David Stanton · 29 January 2008
Keith,
Remember Charles Darwin, the early pioneer in what we now call natural selection, the man who was attacked viciously for his intrusion into the bigoted, rich white male world of the mid 1800s? Remember that he didn't publish for years for fear of the consequences and then he finally published his own book.
Of course inevitably the truth won out and years later he was recognized as the founder of an entire new field of science.
Look, science is not perfect and scientists are not perfect. Sure there are lots of egos and lots of turf wars. But, as you say, eventually the truth wins out. That's the way science works. And if it didn't work that way it would be worthless. So what do you say, do you think science is worthtless? Or is it just the evil eviloutionists who behave this way? It might not be perfect, but it does seem to be the best humans are capable of.
By the way, do you think it is better to just sit on the side lines and call scientists names, refuse to believe their conclusions and yet reap the benefits of all their hard work? That't what most creationists do you know. Creationism: The subculture of Newspeak, historical revisionism, anti-science brotherhood, and control freaks.
If your comments are indeed intended as parody, good job.
Mercurious · 29 January 2008
So just curious Keith. Is this you?
http://grants.cureadvocacy.com/tag/keith-d-eaton/
minimalist · 29 January 2008
Oh boy, another ignorant bloviating troll with made-up credentials. Yawn.
This guy just isn't as fun as the "Michael Martin" troll. At least MM latched on to someone who actually existed. I can't find a single publication attributed to a "Keith Eaton" in the last 20 years.
Maybe he'd ratchet up the entertainment value a notch if he'd try to make up a "Ph.D.D." thesis like the MM-troll. I enjoyed his word salads.
Brian · 29 January 2008
Slightly off topic. Does anyone have the video links to Dembski at OU? Where he just gets slaughtered and starts talking about gremlins bowling in your attic? I searched youtube and erv's blog, and didn't find those links.
Thanks.
Brian
minimalist · 29 January 2008
Mercurious,
I doubt it. That Keith Eaton is an MD/Ph.D. in medical research, not academic biochemistry, and has exactly two second-author publications in the last year -- nothing prior that I could find. Doesn't match the KE-troll's grandiose claims, anyway.
raven · 29 January 2008
raven · 29 January 2008
Stanton · 29 January 2008
Stanton · 29 January 2008
JohnK · 29 January 2008
Jackelope King · 29 January 2008
Keith Eaton · 29 January 2008
Just when I think evolander stupidity has reached its zenith, a new band of true believers tops the record.
I don't have a brother, my two degrees are in engineering and I admire real science.
Let's get a few facts on the table:
Micro-evolution is accepted science by everyone I know.
Touting the fact that viruses change by mutation has nada to do with the wide claims of macro-evolution, etc. and it has zero to do with differentiating between ID and evolution since all parties agree.
Likewise for flu epidemics, new strains of flu virus, moths glued to trees, treatments for cancer, blah blah blah.
Heck I acquired Herceptin for my late wife before it was FDA approved under a special program.
If anyone can show a definitive set of experiments showing:
A natural, non-intelligent, segregation of chiral amino acids in levo and dextro forms ( not some dumb 0.5% statistical aberration in a meteor)
spontaneously formed under primal conditions sufficient to support the construction of abiogenic life , please let me know by citation.
If there is a current hands off , primal condition, successful spontaneous generation of a first flawed replicator that RM and NS can act on in an evolutionary sense...please post the citation.
You won't, you can't, you just bloviate and that's laughable.
Quit taking credit as evos for simple micro changes as though everyone didn't accept such limited change.
Challenge repeated:
Provide the molecular,detailed description of the first flawed replicator that enabled evolution...not how, not even when, not even where...just precisely what was it molecularly speaking that could reliably replicate though flawed.
Remember this is the very first, simplest, de novo organism absolutely critical to the evolander hypothesis.
Tick tock tick tock
Pvm · 29 January 2008
Bill Gascoyne · 29 January 2008
Keith Eaton · 29 January 2008
PVM,
Just so I'm clear, the molecular description of the first flawed but absolutely critical and necessary replicating organism from which all life evolved cannot be elucidated.
Now abiogenesis is the mechanism as to how it occurred..skip that, the evolanders defined that as a non-problem a decade or so back.
But surely there is a precise description of what it was molecularly, one celled bacteria, cell wall, rna, dna, ribosomes, enzymes. Surely the critial life-form can be described sufficiently to see clearly how it could be the parent of all life via RM and NS. Even if it was found in a clay Gumby, so what, don't worry about the process, just describe the result.
raven · 29 January 2008
Pvm · 29 January 2008
Keith Eaton · 29 January 2008
Fiddly Dee!
IDers, creationists anyone understands micro evolution even simple lememts of decent in a strain of viral relationships.
So what!
If evos thought that was the entirity of their theory all would be peace and harmony.
But of course it's not with all that common ancestry back to the first replicator than no on can describe in any respect, demonstrate, elucidate or otherwise make plausible.
MememicBottleneck · 29 January 2008
When I read KeithE's 1st posting to this thread, I thought someone was having a good satirical laugh at the creos' expense. To find out this guy is serious, really makes it funny. What's more, he seems to have a very limited number of large verbs (elucidate, bloviate, etc.) and adjectives that he uses over and over again. I can only assume that these big words make him feel smarter. It sure doesn't make him look very bright.
Keep posting Keith, I can use more laughter.
ben · 29 January 2008
Tyler DiPietro · 29 January 2008
"But of course it’s not with all that common ancestry back to the first replicator than no on can describe in any respect, demonstrate, elucidate or otherwise make plausible."
Wow, this guy is in la-la land, more so than most creos I see posting around the interwebs.
prof weird · 29 January 2008
GODINTELLIGENT DESIGNER DIDIT !!1!!!!1!!!") Translation : "There is no evidence of the process of evolution that I cannot weasel away from !!!" How, EXACTLY, did you 'determine' that a 'measly 0.5% abberation' is actually measly ? How, EXACTLY, is invoking the whim of an unknowable being a 'better' answer ? Or an answer at all ? "The simplest 'enzyme'", Movoassaghi M, Jacobsen EN, Science 298 (5600): 1904-5, Dec 2002. Proline as a catalyst in a series of reactions imparts its chirality on the final product. "Chiral-selective aminoacylation of an RNA minihelix", Tamura K, Schimmel P, Science 305(5688): 1253, August 2004 "A chiroselective peptide replicator", Saghatelian A, Yokobayashi Y, Soltani K, Ghadiri MR, Nature 409: 797-51, Feb 2001. "On the origins of cells : a hypothesis for the evolutionary transitions from abiotic geochemistry to chemoautotrophic prokaryotes, and from prokaryotes to nucleated cells.", Martin W, Russell MJ, Phil Trans Royal Soc London B (2003) 358: 59-85 If there is a current hands off, primal condition, succesful spontaneous generation of a replicator DUE TO THE INTERVENTION OF AMAGICAL SKY PIXIEINTELLIGENT DESIGNER, please post the citation. Magical Skymanism/'Intelligent' Design/creationism does NOT get to be the default answer. And you can, of course, provide a citation showing that aMagical Sky PixieIntelligent Designer actually exists, and did what you ASSERT he/she/it/they did, right ? "Science can't explain X to my satisfaction; therefore, DESIGNERDIDIT !!!!!" is the festering God of the Gaps argument. And the EVIDENCE that a lot of small 'limited' changes CAN'T add up to a big change is what again ? You 'determined' the changes are limited HOW ? Oh yes - you decree it so !! And, if someone did that, you'd drag the goalposts back another fifty yards and demand to know the EXACT sequence of the first replicator. The first replicator was most likely a string of ribonucleotides bound to minerals, possibly near a thermal vent. This provides access to thermal and chemical gradients useful for generation of complex organic compounds. Free living membrane-bound forms came about later. And invoking the unknowable whim of an unknowable magical being qualifies as a useful or scientific answer WHY ?Stanton · 29 January 2008
Stanton · 29 January 2008
Frank J · 29 January 2008
Keith,
Nigel asked you a few simple questions twice. Have you answered them yet? I hope so, because if not, fence-sitting lurkers would get a bad impression of anti-evolutionists.
Richard Simons · 29 January 2008
I've been reading Keith Eaton's comments trying to find the substance of his complaint about evolution. Despite braving the mangled English about people elucidating holes in dikes and being awestruck by images of cities of ice crashing into ERV's substructure below the waterline I was unable to make out just what constitutes his objections.
Keith, could you rein in your abuse and hyperbole and lay out clearly, in point form, your objections to the theory of evolution? You would be doing a favour both to us and to your arguments.
Stanton · 29 January 2008
David G · 29 January 2008
Having worked with camels, I can say they are often incorrigible, flighty, and have difficulty with long lessons. When frustrated they will spit gastric awfulness on you. They lack proper lips and thumbs for thread straightening or needle holding. There's really no wrist for this job and the elbow's all wrong. Say, wait a minute, Keith, this really would be a difficult job. Ever take a walk in the desert? On sand? Get thirsty? David G
waldteufel · 29 January 2008
Keith is drunk. No other explanation. I can smell the booze.
Why waste your time trying to reason with a sot, guys.
Nigel D · 30 January 2008
Keith, I have been unable to parse, out of your comments, the answers to the questions I posed. I will go through your more recent comments in detail when I have the time. Meanwhile, I shall post the questions again so that you can answer them simply by clicking the "quote" link that will appear with this comment.
What, to your mind, is the scientific theory of ID?
Do you agree with Behe that the evidence for common descent is overwhelming?
Do you agree with Behe that the Earth is over 4 billion years old?
Do you agree with Behe that much of the diversity we observe in nature is due to evolution? (He just claims that it cannot all be due to natural processes).
Torbjörn Larsson, OM · 30 January 2008
Stuart Weinstein · 30 January 2008
"
KyCobb,
Before I get pelted by the one who thinks that my memory is playing tricks on me, I have been looking for the reference. I haven’t found the one I had in mind, but this summarizes Dembski’s sentiments:
“Despite my disagreements with Morris and young earth creationism, I regard those disagreements as far less serious than my disagreements with the Darwinian materialists. If you will, young earth creationism is at worst off by a few orders of magnitude in misestimating the age of the earth."
Yeah, whats a few zeros between friends?
Nigel D · 30 January 2008
(1) You clearly have no idea how science progresses;
(2) You have never made an honest attempt to understand what evolutionary theory is and what it actually claims;
(3) You are closed-minded, preferring to remain ignorant rather than educate yourself (or even to be open to opportunities to be educated by others);
(4) You seem quite happy to commit libel to stay in your comfortable little bubble of fantasy. Hypocrite. In truth, it is the IDcreationists and their followers who rely on PR over substance. Really? Well, you've obviously not been listening to anyone who knows what they are talking about. The situation is truly the converse of your accusation - scientists and educators are fed up and weary of reality-deniers such as yourself. Bovine faecal matter. Nothing in modern biology makes any sense except when illuminated by being placed in the relevant evolutionary context. Without the evolutionary framework to unify disparate observations, biology would be no more than stamp-collecting. Liar. You are oblivious to the substance of what is published. Either that or you are lying again. Scientists, educators and rational people everywhere "rail against" the DI et al., for these reasons:
(1) ID is a political strategy, not science.
(2) ID proponents publish pathetically feeble attempts to critique evolutionary theory, all of which involve strawman attacks on and egregious mesrepresentations of the actual science. No-one has ever been persecuted for speaking out in favour of ID. Some have been ridiculed, because what they claim is ridiculous, or because their misrepresentations of the actual science are ridiculous. On the other hand, people (particularly schoolteachers and university lecturers) are being threatened with bodily harm for teaching evolution (a.k.a. good science). Irrelevant. I don't believe you. Give me a reason why I should. Well, it wasn't. Many scientists are Christian, Moslem, Hindu, Jewish and so forth. Contrary to what you have chosen to believe, atheism does not go hand in hand with science. Ask PvM about that if you don't believe me. Well, obviously this does not apply to you, personally. If you would like to come out of your hole in the ground, I am sure we would all welcome you.
Nigel D · 30 January 2008
(2) My two degrees are in chemistry and biochemistry (rather like Michael Behe's). What I do daily IS real science. You have thus far demonstrated no ability to discern real, good science from fantasy. What you admire is irrelevant. Oh, do let's. BTW, do you have any idea what a "fact" actually is? Right, but what qualifies any of them to judge good science from nonsense? Oh. You've let me down already. Maybe you should look up the word "fact" in a dictionary. There is nothing to distinguish micro-evolution from macro-evolution. Same things, different scale. No IDcreationist has ever yet even tried to propose a mechanism by which micro-evolution could be prevented from becoming macro-evolution given enough time. Not so. Behe's claim was that HIV had not evolved new biochemical functions. ERV, who works with HIV and whom you so arrogantly denigrated in an earlier comment, quite rightly took him to the cleaners. Eh? And this is you "laying facts on the table", is it? You are being incoherent. Do you need to lie down for a while? Erm ... relevance? To anything at all? This has nothing to do with evolution (as mentioned in one of my previous comments). Evolution describes how life changes over time. How life started is irrelevant to it. What is laughable, dimwit, is how you lie and bluster and clearly do not understand any part of evolutionary theory. You set irrelevant challenges and then claim triumph when no-one delivers. Well, here's some news for you: in science, what you think doesn't matter. In science only facts, and logical inferences from known facts, matter. If you consider evolutionary theory to be an inadequate explanation for the present diversity of life, then the only way to challenge this is to propose a better theory. One that fits the facts better than does modern evolutionary theory (MET). The first step in doing this is to understand MET. No. If you understood evolution, you would know that the first replicator is almost irrelevant. All evolution requires is that there was one. I repeat: MET is about how life changes over time, not about how life began. It doesn't matter how life began, as long as it did. All your challenge illustrates is your own ignorance of the science.
Nigel D · 30 January 2008
Frank J · 30 January 2008
Nigel,
I might have to hire Casey Luskin to sue you for stealing my questions. ;-)
I hope you do realize that they serve no purpose other then to show lurkers how Keith will evade them. I'm still not sure if he's a troll, but even the ones who seem legitimate only answer them less than half the time. Often it takes 2-3 tries to get an answer, and sometimes they answer a different question instead (e.g. the age of the Earth, when the age of life was asked). And in every case they add unsolicited, irrelevant information about their real or pretend problems with "Darwinism."
Let's all remind ourselves that a real YEC in the Henry Morris mold, or a real OEC in the Hugh Ross mold, would have no problem answering the questions directly and on the first try. Of course you can set your watch on them too adding unsolicited comments about "Darwinism."
Frank J · 30 January 2008
Nigel D · 30 January 2008
Nigel D · 30 January 2008
Nigel D · 30 January 2008
Nigel D · 30 January 2008
HDX · 30 January 2008
Stacy S. · 30 January 2008
NIGEL SAID: - "There is nothing to distinguish micro-evolution from macro-evolution. Same things, different scale. No IDcreationist has ever yet even tried to propose a mechanism by which micro-evolution could be prevented from becoming macro-evolution given enough time."
Nigel, every once in a while smeone here really helps me "GET" something. Today it was you! :-)
I don't know much about science, and all this business about "Micro" and "Macro" was going right over my head.
So, THANK YOU for my "light bulb moment" for the day!
raven · 30 January 2008
Stanton · 30 January 2008
Jackelope King · 30 January 2008
Torbjörn Larsson, OM · 30 January 2008
Jackelope King · 30 January 2008
Ravilyn Sanders · 30 January 2008
Stacy S. · 30 January 2008
Frank J · 30 January 2008
Bill Gascoyne · 30 January 2008
Stacy S. · 30 January 2008
Stacy S. · 30 January 2008
Bill Gascoyne · 30 January 2008
Flint · 30 January 2008
WW. H. Heydt · 30 January 2008
Jackelope King · 30 January 2008
Nigel D · 30 January 2008
Keith Eaton · 30 January 2008
Of course every single post on the micro/macro topic is a bold faced lie and further strain the credibility of the entire evolander community.
Since wikipedia is so popular among evos:
Microevolution is the occurrence of small-scale changes in allele frequencies in a population, over a few generations, also known as change at or below the species level [1].
These changes may be due to several processes: mutation, natural selection, gene flow, genetic drift and nonrandom mating.
Population genetics is the branch of biology that provides the mathematical structure for the study of the process of microevolution. Ecological genetics concerns itself with observing microevolution in the wild. Typically, observable instances of evolution are examples of microevolution; for example, bacterial strains that have antibiotic resistance.
Microevolution can be contrasted with macroevolution, which is the occurrence of large-scale changes in gene frequencies in a population over a geological time period (i.e. consisting of extended microevolution). The difference is largely one of approach. Microevolution is reductionist, but macroevolution is holistic. Each approach offers different insights into the evolution process.
Russian Entomologist Yuri Filipchenko (or Philipchenko, depending on the transliteration) first coined the terms "macroevolution" and "microevolution" in 1927 in his German language work, "Variabilität und Variation". The term was brought into English-speaking by Theodosius Dobzhansky in his book Genetics and the Origin of Species (1937)[1].
Thus the there is no difference blather is shown to be a lie and the statements that non-evolutionistst coined the terms in some state of agitation are shown to be overt lies.
Microevolution happens on a small scale (within a single population), while macroevolution happens on a scale that transcends the boundaries of a single species. Despite their differences, evolution at both of these levels relies on the same, established mechanisms of evolutionary change:
Microevolution is evolution on a small scale—within a single population. That means narrowing our focus to one branch of the tree of life. http://evolution.berkeley.edu/evosite/evo101/IVADefinition.shtml
Macroevolution generally refers to evolution above the species level. So instead of focusing on an individual beetle species, a macroevolutionary lens might require that we zoom out on the tree of life, to assess the diversity of the entire beetle clade and its position on the tree.
Microevolution and macroevolution are different things, but they involve mostly the same processes. Microevolution is defined as the change of allele frequencies (that is, genetic variation due to processes such as selection, mutation, genetic drift, or even migration) within a population. There is no argument that microevolution happens (although some creationists, such as Wallace, deny that mutations happen). Macroevolution is defined as evolutionary change at the species level or higher, that is, the formation of new species, new genera, and so forth. Speciation has also been observed. http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CB/CB902.html
Wouldn't you think the word DIFFERENT would be clear to evolanders especially taken from their own bible, TO, and other evo sources.
http://library.thinkquest.org/27407/micro.htm to illustrate the boundary between the terms where NEW genes are necessary and where theory are not, simple allele changes in a species.
Exposing BS is one of my specialties.
I guess evo GPS directs them to drive from the South rim of the grand canyon to the North rim in a straight line with only a small air lift. You know some new genes to make their car fly (macro). After all it got us from Brooklyn to Williams (micro).
Wolfhound · 30 January 2008
Gosh, Keith, you're right! All of those evil, filthy, lying scientists have been hornswoggling us since Darwin published his filth! Praise Jesus! [/snark]
prof weird · 30 January 2008
Stanton · 30 January 2008
Stanton · 30 January 2008
mplavcan · 30 January 2008
Keith, you're starting to foam at the mouth. Perhaps someone should put you back in your cage until you calm down a bit.
After that, maybe you could give an actual concrete example of how microevolutionary processes did not, do not, or cannot translate into long-term, larger-scale evolutionary changes. There certainly is a large and rapidly growing literature carefully documenting how such things can, do, and did happen, none of which indicates the constraints to which you allude. You seem to be unaware of this.
Stanton · 30 January 2008
So, in other words, Keith, you're boring, and you're terribly, terribly stupid, and you're boring, and you're psychotic, and if you aren't going to do anything besides bitch and moan and froth, please take your medication, or go away.
Pvm · 30 January 2008
Keith Eaton · 30 January 2008
Yeah I've had a good time showing your lies and ignorant posts for what they are, using your sources, precise language directly opposing your statements like black and white.
Do I expect egomaniac wire-heads to acknowledge when they've been exposed publicly as dead wrong? Oh,of course not that's why they run in packs, sucking up to each other, and leaping to each others defense no matter what lies are necessary.
I kicked you butts , pistol whipped your heads and illustrated your group psychosis..and that's good enough for me.
The rest I'll leave up to Ben Stein and the public after he further exposes for millions your arrogance.
Oh and Dr. Jerry Bergman obliterated all those abiogenesis BS stories about deep vent replicators a decade ago.
Go Ben Go!!
mplavcan · 30 January 2008
Kieth declares victory and withdraws.
Keith Eaton · 30 January 2008
Oh and for the casual reader, I recommend "trueorigins" if you prefer truth, real science, ethical posters and contributors, and suburb articulate articles.
Evos always talk about macro evolution requiring millions of years to produce the accumulated micro changes and effecting new groups and phylum, so that's why we don't see it.
Ever stop to consider that with every second that goes by there must have been a time exactly a million years ago, heck 5 million, 10 million and during all those eons microevolution in millions of species have been at work, so in reality new phylum, new groups have always and forever had all the time necessary to be showing up like mushrooms in a wetland.. And by golly looking backward the same is true 100 years ago there was a period 100 years and a million years earlier.
Why not, plenty of environmental changes with ice ages, tectonics, floods, mountain raising, volcanoes, meteors,predation, drift, RM and NS, disease, all the ingredients and all the time ...yet not one such macro-event to show us in the recorded history of man.
Heck I would think maybe a carrot would have turned into a flying dog by now.
What's missing in all those eons since the last supposed new phylum or group...Hmmmmm!
By golly, maybe it never occurred after all.
soteos · 30 January 2008
This is more entertaining than television! Great job to all the people pointing out this guy's craziness.
Stanton · 30 January 2008
Stanton · 30 January 2008
Stanton · 30 January 2008
Pvm · 30 January 2008
yiela · 31 January 2008
Keith said:
A natural, non-intelligent, segregation of chiral amino acids in levo and dextro forms ( not some dumb 0.5% statistical aberration in a meteor) spontaneously formed under primal conditions sufficient to support the construction of abiogenic life , please let me know by citation.
If there is a current hands off , primal condition, successful spontaneous generation of a first flawed replicator that RM and NS can act on in an evolutionary sense…please post the citation.
You won’t, you can’t, you just bloviate and that’s laughable.
Yiela (sorry, don't know how to block quote) says:
While I think that there have been some great replies to this I also think Keith asks an interesting question. I'm not a scientist and I don't really know that much about evolution other than that I am interested in it. I doubt that an exact answer to Keith's question has been found or ever will be due to the huge amount of time that has passed and how unlikely it is that such evidence would be fossilized in some way. I do know that interesting questions that may never be answered fully are not devastating to science and this one is not devastating for evolution. It's not laughable for scientists to acknowledge that they don't know the answer to every question or even the answers to very basic and important questions. The search to these answers is the what science is about and the lack of total understanding is not evidence against that which is understood. The day science has all the answers we will know that it has become a religion.
Pvm · 31 January 2008
Nigel D · 31 January 2008
Microevolution and macroevolution are the same process, occurring over different scales. The methods used to study them are different because the nature of the evidence is different, but there is no qualitative difference.
Nigel D · 31 January 2008
Nigel D · 31 January 2008
Nigel D · 31 January 2008
Nigel D · 31 January 2008
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/comdesc/
http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CB/CB901.html
http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CB/CB902.html
Stanton · 31 January 2008
Nigel D · 31 January 2008
Stanton · 31 January 2008
raven · 31 January 2008
Frank J · 31 January 2008
Rolf Aalberg · 31 January 2008
Eo Raptor · 31 January 2008
Keith Eaton · 31 January 2008
I am learning some neat things here:
" We always BS our undergrads because anyone majoring in biology is not too bright and most things have to be dumbed down and misrepresented. The 1-2% smarter than a guppy can be straightened out later once they have been indoctrinated and brainwashed sufficiently to believe any fairy tale we might construct."
http://www.fossilmuseum.net/Paleobiology/CambrianExplosion.htm
The Cambrian explosion in which the vast majority(some evos say all) of phylum and groups show up without any earlier identifiable ancestral forms all happened in about 10 million years supposedly.
Since that was 600 million years ago there would be a lot of such periods for additional explosions such as is affirmed universally. Yet how many such, NADA, how many lesser but significant events NADA, how many highly identifiable new phylum or groups , NADA.
All that smooth transitioning from species to phylum to group blah, wonder why in the clearest record available THEY ALL SHOW UP IN 10 MILLION YEARS and are classified as such, new phylum and groups.
Just so the uninitiated new reader can quickly learn to distinguish the wishful thinking of the evo BS crowd from real science feel free to read the referenced factual analysis of the great hot hydro vent abiogenesis charade.
http://www.trueorigin.org/hydrothermal.asp
and in general
http://www.trueorigin.org/abio.asp
Any young person who agrees to major in a useful discipline in college (anything except evolutionary biology or the law) that the world needs can write me for a free voucher to Pizza Hut.
Lastly, anyone have an explanation yet for the ABSENSE of a single reference to evolution, RM or NS in the widely adopted textbook, Basic Medical Microbiology fourth ed. Little Brown & CO. by Boyd and Hoerl. I mean since according to the evolanders the entire medical community spends their days thinking about phenograms, funny evolution is not even whispered in the textbook.....period. Not in the content, not in the index...nowhere. Maybe its like biology where we BS and lie and spring out the real facts later.
It's 911 if you can't stop the bleeding.
Stanton · 31 January 2008
Stanton · 31 January 2008
Can we ban Keith already?
He's become everso boring in his rantings, and he makes it clear that a) all he wants to do is rant and froth, and b) his broken little troll mind is physically incapable of learning anything, let alone learning what actual Biologists do.
Glen Davidson · 31 January 2008
http://tinyurl.com/3yyvfg
Torbjörn Larsson, OM · 31 January 2008
Pvm · 31 January 2008
It's encouraging to see Keith attempting to familiarize himself with evolutionary science.
Of course, he conveniently ignored my references to homochirality as well as phylum level evolution.
It's a start though.
Stanton · 31 January 2008
Keith Eaton · 31 January 2008
I'll save you the trouble of banning me. I don't want to unnecessarily frustrate the inferior intellects and 3rd tier wannabee pseudo-scientists, underpaid postdocs, aging or retired true believers, scratching and clawing grad-assistants, etc. who are biting their nails trying to figure out how to confront someone who continually embarrasses them in their peer group.
It's just fun to come back every year or two and kick a little evolander butt and listen to the sputtering and spewing, the latest fairy tales about macro evolution, the distancing from abiogenesis and the associated cognitive dissonance, and of course, the fear and panic arising fron the DI, ID, IC and the increasing public awareness of the arrogance, elitism, and censorship of the evolander community.
You'll be ok now and quit crying, it's so immature.
Torbjörn Larsson, OM · 31 January 2008
Pvm · 31 January 2008
Glen Davidson · 31 January 2008
soteos · 31 January 2008
Keith: 2 + 2 = 5
Commenters: No, 2 + 2 = 4.
Keith: I declare victory!
Flint · 31 January 2008
What surprises me is the number of people here willing to act as puppets for a frustrated adolescent who can't figure out why the girls don't like him. It's not like he's made a single substantive point that anyone could educate a lurker by answering.
Torbjörn Larsson, OM · 31 January 2008
Mike Elzinga · 31 January 2008
Science Avenger · 31 January 2008
Keith needs to get laid really, really, badly.
Nigel D · 1 February 2008
(2) You are about 12 years old, and are failing to cope with the sudden surge of hormones. In some strange twisted way, ranting at your intellectual superiors makes you feel less insecure.
(3) You are a true-believer creationist, and you genuinely believe that evolution is wrong, even though you have no idea what evolution actually is. In the which case, until you wake up and realise that your creo leaders have been lying to you for years, there is nothing that can be done.
(4) You seek to parody the creationists, and ridicule them by taking their arguments and posturing to extremes. Sadly, you did not realise that no creationist parody can be too extreme to actually seem to be the ravings of a genuine creationist.
I fear that, from your comments in this thread, there is no way to choose between these options. The only way is for you to answer the questions that I have posed (at least three times so far). I post them again here for your convenience:
David Stanton · 1 February 2008
Keith wrote:
"Since that was 600 million years ago there would be a lot of such periods for additional explosions such as is affirmed universally. Yet how many such, NADA, how many lesser but significant events NADA, how many highly identifiable new phylum or groups , NADA."
OK Keith, I'll bite. Exactly why do you think that this is a problem for modern evolutionary theory? If you don't answer, I declare victory and will disparage your ancestry and intelligence. Boy, not being banned sure sucks don't it.
Keith Eaton · 1 February 2008
All the conditions necessary to see the phenomenon of accumulated changes in allele frequencies result in entirely new groups and phylum, including the million year periods, evolanders use as excuse for not seeing same.
All the mechanisms including selective pressures, new niches, etc. have certainly been there according to the paleontological,geological,and geographical records.
Evolanders certainly predict that the micro to macro process has always been in play and continues in play without cessation.
Yet the record shows essentially all of the major groups and phylum came into being suddenly and supposedly 600 million years ago and in a period of 10 million years.
Thus the supposed mechanism has never delivered on its prediction, change is limited and that is precisely what is observed.
====================================================
Of course the argument for the truly logical thinker begins with origins, ultimate beginnings, and for me the scientific answer is God of the bible. All of the evidence whether cosmological, mathematical, physical, spiritual, etc. overwhelmingly points to a finite beginning, a finite life, an ordered and complex arrangement of mass and energy,
a set of immutable physical laws, and a design including the creation of life capable of appreciating the creation, themselves and Him.
One of the faults with the methodological naturalism which dominates evolutionary thought is that in the attempt to understand life in its fullness, particularly mankind, is it ignores what we have learned from our religious experience, our spirituality, and our faith, out of hand.
Such has been explained more completely and accurately in the essays at: http://www.arn.org/docs/odesign/od181/methnat181.htm
http://www.arn.org/docs/odesign/od182/methnat182.htm
Alvin Planting of Notre Dame University
As regards life there is no scientifically reasonable explanation for abiogenesis by natural means, after 100 years of concentrated effort and many millions of dollars.
The so called God of the Gaps argument is a strawman and is in no way representative of ID and modern creationist thought, indeed the gap of atheism is more to be considered in that the more we learn about life as it is extant and at the molecular level the complexity, integration, and information aspects indicate and illustrate cognitive thought and design in the smallest detail, indicators entirely consistent with our own experience in our own design and implementation experiences.
The advantage of the design inference is that it has no bias as to how one should conduct an investigation of a physical observation including the possibility that at the most detailed level there are design principles which if excepted as such, understood as such, adopted as such can impact the way we attack problems where the observations have real application across abroad arena.
Where there is a purely natural explanation for an observation which arose and is foundationed by random processes and fixed by a mixed bag of random and deterministic pressures, there are no design elements or approaches indicated, how could there be when to implement them would require capturing a predictive methodology for purely random events and reconstructing the required NS landscape...strictly an impossibility.
=====================================================
Oh and yes I did respond to the hydro-vent theories and experiments via the references I posted essentially showing the fact that the results do not address concentration, real life chiral form molecules consistent with amino acids, and free energy issues for biomer to polymer spontaneous formation under primal conditions that could be sustained in high temperature, hot water, environments for other than short time periods.
Stacy S. · 1 February 2008
Keith - Please read the "Does science disprove religion" thread. (I think you will enjoy it - no joke)
Jackelope King · 1 February 2008
Wolfhound · 1 February 2008
Keith: "God + Bible = Science"
Everybody With Functional Brain: "Bwah-hah-hah-hah <*snork*> Bwah-hah-hah-hah!!!!"
Wolfhound · 1 February 2008
Stupid errors! Ahem. Here it is again:
Keith: "God + Bible = SCIENCE!"
Everybody With A Functional Brain: "Bwah-hah-hah-HAAAAA!!! Chortle, snicker, guffaw!"
Wolfhound · 1 February 2008
"The advantage of the design inference is that it has no bias as to how one should conduct an investigation of a physical observation including the possibility that at the most detailed level there are design principles which if excepted as such, understood as such, adopted as such can impact the way we attack problems where the observations have real application across abroad arena."
Um, so the fact that "design inference" is a bunch of faith-based crap that cannot be proven empirically is an "advantage"? I swear, with the way their brains are defectively wired, creationists are like a whole different species. Would that be micro or macro evolution?
I really liked these idiots better back when they were honest enough to admit that they believe what they do due to faith in their religious dogma.
fnxtr · 1 February 2008
fnxtr · 1 February 2008
Mike Z · 1 February 2008
Keith cites Alvin Plantinga above, so...
Plantinga is very clear about his Christian starting point, but he does not use that to deny scientific explanations when they are backed up by good evidence. For any particular question, he considers the case open (natural causes vs. divine intervention) until one side gathers enough evidence to tip the scales in their direction. Further, Plantinga recognizes that (in general) the scientific experts are better able to judge the quality of the evidence and the proposed naturalistic explanations than he is. His main beef is with scientists who (according to Plantinga) claim that science has shown that God is absent from all of nature and always has been. He especially dislikes Dawkins.
I don't agree with Plantinga's overall approach -- I just wanted to point out that he is not quite the creationist supporter that Keith and others may want him to be.
Eo Raptor · 1 February 2008
Stanton · 1 February 2008
Frank J · 1 February 2008
pvm · 1 February 2008
pvm · 1 February 2008
pvm · 1 February 2008
pvm · 1 February 2008
Stanton · 1 February 2008
Keith Eaton · 1 February 2008
Please tell me the idiots who post here are not truly representative of the best your evo science has to offer,, that's too discouraging for those of us still hopeful that science has a bright and robust future of open inquiry.
One thing has always been apparent to anyone who opposes the evolanders is that if you provide details you're a quote miner and if you don't you're speculating.
Since my purposes are to insure that casual readers have access to truth and reason from ethical sources it is important that I provide those references. But to overcome the distortions concerning the sources as promulgated by the evolanders I will submit the precise details of the total destruction of the hydro-vent theory of abiogenesis.
This is a nice way of saying that I certainly don't assume anything can dissuade the evolander true believers from their dogma......further I actually could care less whether you could be persuaded. Its the newcomers who deserve a shot at reality and true science.
From the Trueorigins site:
Some Japanese researchers have claimed to prove that life could have arisen in a submarine hydrothermal vent. However, the most complex molecule their ‘simulation’ produced was hexaglycine, in the microscopic yield of 0.001%. Compared to the complexity of even the simplest living cell, hexaglycine is extremely simple. High temperatures would degrade any complex molecules over the alleged geological time
Five researchers in Nagaoka, Japan, claimed to have simulated such conditions in a flow reactor.[3] They circulated 500 ml of a strong solution of glycine (0.1 M) through several chambers at a high pressure of 24.0 MPa. The first chamber was heated mainly to 200–250 ° C; from there, the liquid was injected at the rate of 8–12 ml/min into a cooling chamber kept at 0 ° C. Then the liquid was depressurized before samples were extracted at various intervals. The whole cycle was completed in 1–1.3 hours. In some of the runs, 0.01 M CuCl2 was added to the 0.1 M glycine solution, which was also acidified to pH 2.5 by HCl at room temperature.
The most spectacular results occurred in the runs with the extra CuCl2 and HCl. The Cu2+ ions catalyzed the formation of tetraglycine (yield 0.1%). Even some hexaglycine formed (yield 0.001%). But the product with the highest yield was the cyclic dimer, diketopiperazine, which peaked at about 1% yield, then dropped. The reader is not informed as to how much effort was invested in optimizing the conditions to maximize the amount of larger polyglycines
The concentration of glycine of 0.1 M was far higher than could be expected in a real primordial soup. In reality, prebiotic simulations of glycine production produce far lower yields. Also, any glycine produced would be subject to oxidative degradation in an oxygenic atmosphere. Or else, if there was a primitive oxygen-free atmosphere,[5] the lack of an ozone layer would result in destruction by ultraviolet radiation. Also, adsorption by clays, precipitation or complexation by metal ions, or reactions with other organic molecules would reduce the concentration still further. A more realistic concentration would be 10–7 M.[6]
While the hydrothermal conditions might be right for this experiment, overall, they would be harmful in the long term to other vital components of life. For example, the famous pioneer of evolutionary origin-of-life experiments, Stanley Miller, points out that polymers are ‘too unstable to exist in a hot prebiotic environment’.[7] Miller has also pointed out that the RNA bases are destroyed very quickly in water at 100 ° C — adenine and guanine have half lives of about a year, uracil about 12 years, and cytosine only 19 days.[8] Intense heating also readily destroys many of the complex amino acids such as serine and threonine.[9] Another problem is that the exclusive ‘left-handedness’ required for life is destroyed by heating, i.e. the amino acids are racemized.[10] But this was not put to the test because the Japanese team used the simplest amino acid, glycine, which is the only achiral amino acid used in living systems. It seems incomprehensible that after designing this experiment with such care other amino acids would not have been tested. The fact that they are all known to undergo various non-peptide bond reactions has surely not escaped the researchers’ attention.
The longest polymer (or rather, oligomer) formed was hexaglycine. Most enzymes, however, have far more than six amino acid residues — usually hundreds. And even the hexaglycine produced was found only in minuscule amounts.
This experiment gave a simple homo-oligomer, i.e. all monomers are the same. But life requires many polymers in precise sequences of 20 different types of amino acids. Thus Matsuno’s experiments offer not the slightest explanation for the complex, high-information polymers of living organisms.
See newcomers you can expect every time to see the BS when you remove the covers from evolander claims. IN this case a team of bright , qualified scientists constructed a scenario so simplistic and unrelated to the necessary abiogenesis and chirality issue in the 20 useful amino acid molecules used in real life as to be congruent with claiming that playing a game of Monopoly has demonstrated completely the mechanics of the U.S. economy, capitalism, and free market dynamics.
===========================
Now to expose the next BS on cambrian explosion realities.
Among all those quite similar organisms was teh Hallucigensia which propelled itself on seven pointy legs, had seven tenacles on its back with pincers. And howabout that Opabinia with five eyes and a grasping mechanism on its head with a bifugated pincer to catch prey. Or the oft mentioned Tibrachidium with three arms radiating from a platelike body.
Anyone who thinks these are quite similar to trilobytes, jellyfish, and sponges must be on some heavy drugs.
Gould and others have repeatedly testified that essentially all the complex designs and major groups appeared suddenly in the cambrian explosion period of about 10 million years, roughly 600 millionm years ago.
Thus the argument is unrefuted, macroevolution in the writ large sense of new genes bringing about entirely new novel forms and groups apparently happened once and last and despite every parameter being abvailable since then, it has never again occurred.
Please refrain from stupid red herrings such as claiming design by God of malaria, or any other genetic mutation related disease. That has nada to do with the original creation and design arguments. How dumb!!
Stacy S. · 1 February 2008
Hey Keith! I'm a newcomer - you didn't answer Nigel's questions. That's what I've been waiting for.
Jackelope King · 1 February 2008
Jackelope King · 1 February 2008
David Stanton · 1 February 2008
Keith,
Well at least you tried to answer my question. Just exactly why do you think that every "evolander" believes that new phyla must continually arise? This is nothing more than a straw-man characterization. Evolution is simply what happened. There is no reason whatsoever to suppose that new phyla must arise at a constant rate.
One of the main reasons for the pattern observed is historical cintingency. If the basic toolkit for animal development arose very early in the evolution of life, and random mutations quickly explored the easily assessible adaptive varitations on the common theme, then the pattern would be exactly as observed. In fact, that is why they call it the tree of life. Look at a maple tree sometime. Why do all of the main branches arise near the base of the tree? Why are all of the terminal twigs attached to the major branches?
Of course evolution didn't have to happen this way. It could have been otherwise. Can you explain the observed pattern better by invoking an invisiblle designer? Did she run out of ideas 600 million years ago? Where has she been since then? Seems to me the pattern falsifies creationism more convincingly that it does evolution.
And by the way, Keith is spectacularly wrong about no macroevolution occuring in the last 600 million years. As PvM pointed out, all the major extant lineages of vertebrates evolved during that time. Indeed, the largest, most successful, most species rich clade ever to exist arose and radiated during that time. That is of course the insects, including the beetles. In fact, over one hundred large and successful lineages of beetles have arisen and radiated in the period between 250 and 150 million years ago (Science 318:1913-1916). Macroevolution continues, as always. Just because we already have names for all of the major lineages on the tree of life, doesn't mean that they have stopped evolving.
Torbjörn Larsson, OM · 1 February 2008
Henry J · 1 February 2008
Keith Eaton · 1 February 2008
Evolution is simply what happened. Heh!
Interpretation: No matter what , when, where or how any physical observation of nature and life is made it will be perfectly in accord with evolution because evolution is whatever happened.
A hypothesis that can encompass any possible observable outcome is a dogmatic, metaphysical set of beliefs, it is not a scientific theory.
Thus the continuous step by step micro-evolution events (RM & NS) that are continually happening and accumulating step by step until a threshold degree of absolute separation by any measure has occurred and a new group or phylum is declared.....actually doesn't happen for reasons unstated, except once in a blue moon for reasons undisclosed, but when it does it's going to be really big and highly visible and recognizable.
Sounds like the definition of pornography, "I know it when I see it."
Remember that suite of posts about how micro-evolution was a creationist dreamed up term...remember the historical evidence that demonstrated all that BS was a bold faced lie.
Do we need to rehearse the precise data again?
It would appear that the question about what stops micro from becoming macro has been answered by your own team.
It need not happen
It might happen
It could happen
It probably won't happen again
Gee isn't evolander science terrific?
The mantle ate my homework!
I always wondered where all those kids who dropped out in the first round of the spelling bees ended up and now I get to post to them after all these years.
raven · 1 February 2008
soteos · 1 February 2008
Hey Keith,
What, to your mind, is the scientific theory of ID?
Do you agree with Behe that the evidence for common descent is overwhelming?
Do you agree with Behe that the Earth is over 4 billion years old?
Do you agree with Behe that much of the diversity we observe in nature is due to evolution? (He just claims that it cannot all be due to natural processes).
If there is a qualitative difference [between micro- and macro- evolution], by what mechanism is microevolution prevented from becoming macroevolution in time? Place your answer in the context of the source that you quoted which describes macroevolution as “consisting of extended microevolution”?
raven · 1 February 2008
Bill Gascoyne · 1 February 2008
Perhaps someone should point out to Keith (not that it would do any good, but for the benefit of the lurkers) that the only reason the divisions that happened during the Cambrian are called "phyla" is that they happened so long ago, and the distinctions between all of their subsequent ancestors has grown over the last 600M years. (Now to repeat the analogy I learned here on another thread): If you take the "bush" or "tree" of life, the major branches started out as small divisions in a twig that is now the trunk. You can take a cutting from a tree, with just a few twigs dividing, and grow it into an entire tree such that the twigs of today are the major branches of tomorrow. Similarly, if you were to wipe out all life on Earth except for the microbes and a few closely-related genera of worms, any biologist that descended from those worms a few billion years hence might classify those few genera as the major phyla at the base of the tree of life that he observes.
Keith Eaton · 1 February 2008
Stacey S
I will and how about your read the two essays on methodological naturalism I referenced.
Torbjörn Larsson, OM · 1 February 2008
Jackelope King · 1 February 2008
Bill Gascoyne · 1 February 2008
David Stanton · 1 February 2008
Keith,
I will assume for the sake of civility that you really don't realize how incredibly stupid your statements are. (Yea, that was me trying to be polite). Let me try to make it simple for you.
Evolution is what happened, the theory of evolution is the explanation for how it happened. It would certainly not be a very good theory if it could not explain what happened. In this case, the theory explains what happened and it could also explain a great many alternative histories that did not happen, but not every conceivable one. There are plenty of possible histories that the theory of evolution could not explain, but since they didn't occur, the theory need not explain them. The theory does not account for any observable outcome, just the one that have been observed. It also predicts what will be observed in the future, so it is continually tested.
Of course all of this is such elementary logic that it is really unlikely that you don't already understand this. In that case you are just blowing smoke. By the way, you never did answer any of my questions. Of well, you still haven't answered Nigel's questions either. I wonder why that is. So, do you now admit that your nonsense about lack of macroevolution is completely wrong, or do you want to explain why you still think it is meaningful even though you have not addressed any of my points?
Stanton · 1 February 2008
Keith Eaton · 1 February 2008
It is amazing that people can become so brainwashed by a metaphysical dogma that they actually believe they can talk about the behavioral aspects of an organism with a handful or fewer specimens and know when it's being interpreted upside down when the entire scenario of the instant case occurred 600 million years ago.
Evolution does not predict anything it looks backward and interprets scattered observations over deep time according to a preconceived dogma. It is a multivariate curve fitting smorgasbord of alternative explanatory axioms that frequently are internally inconsistent and that maintain a constant state of turmoil among the various adherents.
The raw material of evolution is primarily one thing, random mutation of DNA sequences that result in deformed proteins which may or may not be expressed and if expressed may be beneficial in very small percentages and most likely detrimental or lethal. Whether it is helpful or harmful is determined by the environment the altered organism inherits. This to is unrelated to the "alteration" in any casual sense, but rather by happenstance alone, two independent physical processes, one purely random, the other with significant random influences intersecting in time and space.
By definition such yields precisely zero opportunity to demonstrate prophecy, to predict the future trajectory of any particular line of decent either short term or long term.
This is admitted when evolanders confess that if one to rewind the time tape and replay the last billion years there is zero chance that the results would be in any way similar, certainly the odds that we would be here is not different from zero.
I predict that one billion years from now all life will be limited to giant flowering avocados, several species of bumble-bees, and a limited number of microorganisms.
In a billion years we'll know if I was correct or not.
pvm · 1 February 2008
Stanton · 1 February 2008
David Stanton · 1 February 2008
Keith,
Way to go creolander. You have now completely ignored the substantive arguments of at least three different posters. All you can do is keep blubbering the same old nonsense that each and every one of us has already demolished. You have not answered a single question put to you and you seem incapable of learning anything.
I told you that if you did not answer my questions that I would berate your ancestry and your intelligence. Well, now I guess there really is no need. You have done an excellect job of demonstrating just how morally and intellectually bankrupt you are all by yourself. Next time, try not to complain about the quality of responses you get here until you have answered at least one question put to you.
At least your prediction about one billion years from now seems plausible. I'm sure the bees will be very happy. Sure seems like a lot of trouble for an intelligent designer to go to though just to end up with bees, unless of course she was a bee in the first place.
fnxtr · 2 February 2008
Ladies and gentlemen, I believe we are approaching timecube territory.
Jackelope King · 2 February 2008
Torbjörn Larsson, OM · 2 February 2008
David Stanton · 2 February 2008
Here is an example of the type of logic we have been treated to by Keith on this thread:
So, you say you have worked out the law of gravity huh. Well I don't believe it. You can't be serious. After all, according to your so-called "law" there could be many more planets in the solar system and there aint. So go try to explain that you earthbound twits. You and your pathetic "law". You say you can explain the motions of the planets that do exist, but then again your so-called "law" could actually explain the motions of any planet couldn't it, so what good is it? Now what kind of a "law" is that I asks you, it can't even explain why there are no more planets than there really are. After all, you freely admit that there could be more planets, there just aint. Anywho, if I don't wants to believe it it cants be true. And besides, it doesn't even come close to explaining why raspberry jam has seeds, so what good is it?
And we wonder why he won't answer any questions!
raven · 2 February 2008
Nigel D · 2 February 2008
How do you define the term "science"?
Do you agree with Behe that to use the Bible as a scientific text is "silly"? (I'm guessing "no", but you have yet to express any opinion about the writings of Michael Behe, professor of biochemistry at Lehigh University and the only ID advocate with a single relevant credential). Well, except that mathematics and spirituality do not pertain to any evidence. Mathematics is the exercise of pure logic from clearly stated axioms, while spirituality has no basis in evidence. Spirituality is a personal, emotional thing, and is different for everyone. It does not generate anything resembling evidence. So? So? Wrong. The evidence indicates increasing disorder in any closed system. Order can only increase in an open system if disorder is increased outside it. Have you never heard of the second law of thermodynamics? Do you understand it? So, what do you think about young-Earth creationists who claim that the laws of physics have changed over time to make it appear that the Earth is older than they claim it to be? Contrary to the claims of Behe, Dembski and their pals, there is no evidence of design in life. Quite the opposite, there is much evidence of sub-optimal and jury-rigged design. If you want to claim there is evidence for design, be aware that the evidence only supports Incompetent Design. Are you sure you want to call your god incompetent? Linky: http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/jury-rigged.html Looks like you missed the memo about ID not being about religion, too. Do you actually understand what "methodologcal naturalism" means? It is the basis for all scientific progress. Methodological naturalism is simply the assumption that natural phenomena occur through natural processes. Processes that can be observed and measured and recorded and repeated (where applicable - obviously, we can't re-run the collision of India into Asia to form the Himalaya). No it doesn't. What it does do, however, is acknowledge that God is entirely capable of operating through natural processses, and that He does not need to tinker with the world. There is no evidence of divine tinkering, but the evidence is entirely compatable with the idea that God knew exactly what he was doing when he started it all. He had no need to tinker. However, what modern science does is state that if an observation is not reproducible, then we cannot examine it or discern anything with certainty. Look at cold fusion. It is extremely doubtful that room-temperature fusion is possible, because the phenomenon could not be repeated independently. What do you understand by the word "explained"? If an observation is different for different observers (under otherwise identical conditions), then it ain't scientific. Yeah, I bet the scientists working on abiogenesis wish they actually did have "many" millions of dollars to spend. However, the tricky bit is that there are several possibilities, and there is too little evidence remaining from the time that abiogenesis occurred. All we can do is measure what is possible, and put together a reasonable set of inferences. However, this does not mean that we will not eventually have a very, very educated guess about how it occurred. But, again, abiogenesis is a side issue. However life began, evolution has occurred subsequently. Liar. The god-of-the-gaps argument is alive and well and living with Billy Dembski. Rubbish! ID as expounded by Behe, Wells, Johnson, Dembski et al. comprises three things:
(1) Argument from ignorance (god of the gaps)
(2) Argument from personal incredulity
(3) Strawman attacks on evolutionary theory coupled to a non-sequitur. That's it. No, they don't. There is no evidence for "intelligent" design in nature. Complexity is, if anything, evidence of bad design. Apart from carrying an untouchable preconception. Go on, then Keith: What scientific research has been illuminated by the design inference? A classic argument from personal incredulity. Nice logical fallacy, Keith. BTW, NS is itself a design process, according to Bill Dembski's definition of design. Except that this kind of incoherence makes one doubt whether you even read those linked pages, never mind understood them.
Nigel D · 3 February 2008
Nigel D · 3 February 2008
Nigel D · 3 February 2008
Nigel D · 3 February 2008
Stuart Weinstein · 3 February 2008
Nigel writes:
"think you are right to say it is an interesting question. We don’t know yet, and we may never know. It may be impossible for the necesary molecular evidence to survive nearly 4 billion years of “fossilisation”. Certainly a large proportion of the rocks that were formed at that time will have been subducted into the mantle by now, thus destroying any molecular fossil evidence they contained"
Those that weren't subducted have been heavily metamorphosed (baking the crap out of any molecular evidence) or eroded with the resulting sediments recycled through the mantle via subduction.
David B. Benson · 3 February 2008
Rather rigid, is he not?
Nigel D · 4 February 2008
Nigel D · 4 February 2008
Nigel D · 4 February 2008
Nigel D · 4 February 2008
Richard Simons · 4 February 2008
Stanton · 4 February 2008
Keith Eaton · 4 February 2008
The infantile behavior of evolanders is both amusing and concering.
Amusing in that in their bluster and blather one sees different members across time taking diametrically opposing positions, inconsistent stances on everything from abiogenesis to the pace of evolutionary change, the mechanisms, the role of RM and NS, etc. I find it rather comedic and enjoy the laughs it provides.
Of course feeding our young people such tripe and inculcating a totally materistic approach to life is quite concerning in that it attempts to destroy the ethical and moral underpinnings of western culture for 2,000 years.
You see for all their protestations, real scholarship does indeed confirm that terrible ideas spawn horrible consequences such socail darwinism, eugenics, facism, totalitarianism, communism and the atrocities so associated.
That does not mean darwin himself promoted such directly but rather his ideas were co-opted by others and used to develop such ideas and justify their actions. See "The Truth About History" as one respected example of such scholarship.
The evolanders constantly drag out their little mantras and assign them to every opponent and every argument against their theory.
Personal incredulity........except where it's the informed view of several thousand highly visual and vocal scientists that the total collective knowledge is absolutely unable to offer explanatory information, experiemntal results and can only muster let's pretend fairytales as explanations for major observations.
God of the Gaps...........Non-existent in the present debate in reality outside abiogenesis, the creation of the universe, and the frontend -loaded capacity for change built into the design of life and its mechanisms.
Demonizing the opponent is the totality of the evolander approach as evidenced in every publication, debate, article and discussion. It's all you've got and it comes up way short.
==========================================================
A little personal amusement
http://www.news24.com/News24/Technology/News/0,9294,2-13-1443_1815872,00.html
Three weeks ago during excavations by Smith and his team, they came across a fossil of an ancient giraffe (Sivathere) entangled with a whale.
Other giraffe fossils were also found. The giraffe fossils and whale fossil were "buried" in the same place at the same time. Rhasieda Bester who lives in the area, found the whale fossil when she helped with the excavations at the fossil park.
Whales could not have swum so far upriver, but a strong wind might have driven the carcass from the sea up to the river mouth.
Smith believes a flood might have swept away the large herd of giraffe, nearly a hundred in all, when the herd went to drink water.
They were washed downstream and into a pool where they got stuck in the sand.
For giraffes, bending down is an anatomical challenge. To reach ground level—for example, when drinking—a giraffe has to splay its front legs at an angle of almost 45 degrees. A giraffe’s circulatory system is also specially modified, because the high pressure needed to pump blood up to its head could cause brain damage when the head is lowered. To deal with this problem, giraffes have elastic blood vessels that relieve some of the excess pressure. They also have a series of valves in their neck veins that ensure that blood always flows from the head back toward the heart, even when this means going against gravity.
Those poorly designed giraffes have managed to struggle on for a supposed 1.5 million years and been just peachy.
PvM · 4 February 2008
Science Avenger · 4 February 2008
Ban the lying git for Christ's sake.
ben · 4 February 2008
Bill Gascoyne · 4 February 2008
Bill Gascoyne · 4 February 2008
So, did Keith also post this on TO? Keep in mind, Keith, this is PT, not TO...
Jackelope King · 4 February 2008
Richard Simons · 4 February 2008
PvM · 4 February 2008
Nigel D · 4 February 2008
David B. Benson · 4 February 2008
Not only is Keith Eaton rigid, he also uses MSU, Making Stuff Up.
Bill Gascoyne · 4 February 2008
David B. Benson · 4 February 2008
Bill Gascoyne --- Yes, MSU includes that too...
Bill Gascoyne · 4 February 2008
I stand corrected. Reference, please...
Keith Eaton · 4 February 2008
If they started with (say) 100 g of glycine, a 0.001% yield of hexaglycine would be more than 10^18 molecules. This is definitely non-trivial
Even if 90% of hexaglycine were destroyed in this way, you’d still have more than 10^17 molecules of it spreading out into the ocean around the vent.
A though spewing out single isolated molecules unrelated to the 20 critical amino acids of life had crap to do with abiogenesis of a true replicating entity.
If you had actually read the paper you would have seen it showed the Chinese research had nada to do with anything resembling pre-biotic creation of a replicator capable of promoting evolution by RM and NS.
And of course you're not demonizing me you ignorant butthead you're demonizing the author of the paper.
David B. Benson · 4 February 2008
Bill Gascoyne --- Oh, I just MSUed it...
:-)
Jackelope King · 4 February 2008
Keith Eaton · 4 February 2008
http://www.discovery.org/scripts/viewDB/index.php?command=view&id=2552
The Third Way by Dr. Shapiro is a good introduction for the casual reader to the direction that real biological science is going and its 180 degrees away from classical darwinism and its variants.
What Shapiro and his peers on the leading edge of the revolution in informational genomics, natural genetic engineering, and the intelligent aspects of cellular operations reveal is the anachronous nature of the BS the evolanders here vomit out daily.
These people are clinging to the biological equivalent of weather vanes, lightning rods, water-witching sticks, eight track cassette tapes and lava lamps in these posts.
People wanting to see the current state of the subject should read Shapiro in particular and discover that TO is possibly the least informed group spitting out history.
I chuckle when I recall that a decade ago at TO and other evolander sites I argued that the best description of the cell writ large would be a closed loop manufacturing complex with both digital and analog aspects, particularly informed and intelligent sensory based adaptive capacities, and layered quality control mechanisms to insure integrous operations and results. (It swamps 6 sigma in error free operations, man's best efforts to date)
Evolanders yelled, screamed, cursed, ranted and insulted me with diatribes about information theory not applying to biology, Shannon's conflict with biological information, the lack of any real informational storage and retrieval capabilities in the cell and "its all just chemistry and physics".
You butt-heads are as ignorant of the parade of real scientific understanding and progress now as you were a decade ago.
Shapiro is an "evolutionist" but his actual ideas are quite ID friendly.
Pvm · 4 February 2008
Keith Eaton · 4 February 2008
Yeah I sure am anxious to respond to the bait and switch tactics of evolanders...dream on.
Honest intellectual dicussion is as foreign to the evolanders here as lakes in the Sahara.
How can people whose ethics are relative, whose philosophy is means justify the ends, whose goals are to edify themselves in front of their peers and show their great intellect as clearly superior to all members of the human race, and to promote and proclaim blasphemy against the Christian God as frequently as context permits be engaged in honest intellectual debate...it's demonstrated as impossible every day, here and elsewhere.
Now new posters go read Shapiro, DI contributors, and true origin artivles and leave this band of wantabee mental midgets behind.
Pvm · 4 February 2008
Pvm · 4 February 2008
Stanton · 4 February 2008
Jackelope · 4 February 2008
David Stanton · 4 February 2008
I agree. This guy is the biggest hypocrite we have ever had here and that's saying a lot. He accuses us of dishonesty while telling lie after lie. He accuses us of bait-and-switch tactics while ignoring all of our arguments and bringing up completely unrelated topics time after time. He accuses us of demonizing our opponents while hurling insult after insult aimed at peole he doesn't even know. And worst of all, he refuses to answer any questions put to him even after being asked over and over for days.
Well I for one will not respond to his insults or his arguments again. Anyone who thinks that this guy is doing anything but making Christians look bad must be delusional. Indeed, the only rational response at this point would seem to be: I know you are but what am I?
Keith Eaton · 4 February 2008
The only problem is that in every discussion I have shown evidence that your protestations and presentations are hollow, fabrications, outright lies, pure assertion and dogma, and demonstrate a complete lack of intellectual honesty.
I demonstrated an entire suite of references on micro and macro evolution as being different, that one was routinely observed , the other rarely if at all and then only under special definition.
I gave historical references to the origin of the terms illustrating the false attribution to creationists.
You people are so sick that you can't even recognize your own ignorance and error let alone admit when you've been caught in your lies.
Pitiful!!
PvM · 5 February 2008
As usual Keith accuses others of lying and yet all we have seen is his avoidance of addressing his flawed understandings of science.
His behavior not only shows how hollow Intelligent Design really is but also how far it wants to go in making Christianity look foolish.
Job well done Keith.
Notice how Keith has yet to respond to his homochirality question and my answers or his ignorance about recent prebiotic research in the area of hot vents. Such is life when one relies on creationist sources only.
Most people on this site are well enough educated to see the foolishness in Keith's comments.
Thank God.