avocationist
Posts: 173
Joined: Feb. 2006
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Russell,
| Quote | | I thought it was you that wanted to expand the scope from Official Paleontologists to scholars of any description who could read the paleontology literature sensibly. Hey, either way is fine with me! |
Gould was one. And I remember Goldschmidt, no doubt the same one loved by JAD. Also, Colin Patterson.
I've got some quote mines for you. D. Raup and Stanley, Principles of Paleontology, 1978,
"Unfortunately, the origins of most higher categories are shrouded in mystery; commonly new higher categories appear abruptly in the fossil record without evidence of transitional ancestral forms".
White, former president of the Linnean Society,
" Whatever ideas authorities may have on the subject, the lungfishes, like every other major group of fishes that I know, have their origins firmly based on nothing" (credentials not named)
Woodruff, Evolution, The Paleobiological View
"the record fails to contain a single example of a significant transition"
T. Huxley, Three lectures on Evolution
"if it could be shown that this fact [gaps between widely distinct groups] had always existed, the fact would be fatal to the doctrine of evolution"
Gould and Simpson,
"New species almost always appeared suddenly in the fossil record with no intermediate links to ancestors in older rocks of the same region."
Simpson,
"In spite of these examples, it remains true, as every paleontologist knows, tha most new species, genera, and families and that nearly all new categories above the level of families appear in the record suddenly and are not led up to by known gradual, completely continuous transitional sequences."
Raup, Conflicts between Darwinism and Paleontology-
"Paleontology is now looking at what it actually finds,...As is now well known most fossil species appear instantaneiously in the record, persist for some millions of years virtually unchanged, only to disappear abruptly-"
All but one or two were paleontoligists. The rest evolutionary biologists. Evolutionists all, with the possible exceptions of Patterson, who at the least went through a crisis of belief.
| Quote | But I have authors here in my bookcaase that discuss problems with paleontology.
Do you! Who are they? |
W. R. Bird, Jonathan Wells, Richard Milton, Michael Denton (Behe?) Lee Spetner, Philip Johnson.
| Quote | | I believe I pointed out that Behe never made any claims beyond "seems improbable to me" that even could be refuted. |
Well, if that is what you took away from his book I don't know what to say.
| Quote | and what is your reaction to the very specific details that Mike Gene brings out in the assembly and function of the flagellum?+++++++++++++++
I believe you will find the answer to that if you go back over this thread. |
Well, that effort was certainly a waste of time.| Quote | | But just to summarize: my reaction is "Biological systems are, indeed, complex. Really complex. Really, really complex. But no amount of documenting how really, really, really complex they are gets us any closer to 'couldn't have evolved'". |
Really? No amount of complexity? Isn't that like saying no evidence could possibly convince you? That there is no limit to the complexity that random and undirected processes could generate?| Quote | | Now, if there's anything that you feel "Mike Gene" wrote that actually argues "couldn't have evolved" - as opposed to "is really complex" - that I failed to address, please: point it out. I certainly don't want to pass up any opportunity to pursue these things right down to the specifics. |
Well, pretty much what I posted, actually. It's a 5-part essay, and I went through and found what I thought were some of the most interesting parts. You know, on another question, maybe yours, I spent at least 20 hours going through the Flagellum Unspun and Spinning Fine papers, and critiqued it. But no one really got into the nitty gritty of what's there.
| Quote | I assumed that you meant that "a lot of people" had concluded from an informed analysis of paleontological data that the basic idea of "evolution" was fundamentally inadequate - that the idea that species evolved from pre-existing species as a result of random genetic change and selection was incompatible with the bones and fossils.
Well, "a lot of people" turns out to be five. On a list you lost. And the only one of them you've supplied a name for is Stephen Jay Gould, whom you have only read as quote(mine)d by creationists. And his issues have nothing to do with those I assumed you were suggesting. |
If the quotes are out of context, or misleading, then that's a problem. Simply searching the literature for those moments when evolutionsists have spoken about the problems does not constitute quote mining. I believe when I said a lot of people, at that point I was talking about all of them, from the paleontologists on down to ignorant folk like me.
If you are looking for paleontologists who have gone beyond being troubled and have abandoned belief in evolution, and have publicly said so, the list would probably be only 3 or 4 or 5.
I'm not sure what you think Gould's issues were, but I do believe he found that the fossil record does not support gradualism, and therefore he came up with punctuated equilibrium and isolation of small populations to allow him to accommodate the data.
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