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Ichthyic



Posts: 3325
Joined: May 2006

(Permalink) Posted: Jan. 27 2007,03:47   

Quote
Regarding the quote above, the problem is this quickly gets fairly complicated, and too lengthy for posting.


yeah... right.

you must be awfully simple minded to think the quoted section is anything other than crystal clear.

You were asked a very simple question, and you punted.

now we know why you work for the DI.

do they teach classes in obfuscation and deflection before you're allowed to claim you're an actual "fellow"?

...and about the rest of your lies:

we also note that we can clearly see the picture Wes kindly reposted right in the thread, you know the one right above your last bullshit session that says tasmanian wolf on one side and wolf on the other, even though they are both the same picture?

holly crap, you people amaze me.  How do you do these things and keep a straight face?

 
Quote
But we also need to keep in mind that there are potentially many non scientific reasons why one might opt for one paradigm over another.


emphasis mine, and unless you can name ONE good reason why a "paradigm" should be accepted in science for non scientific reasons, your argument is entirely full of holes.

...but you already knew that.

the real question is are you stupid, or are you just trying out some new angles?

 
Quote
I think we need to stick to the evidence and what it says.


L-I-A-R

you should have more honestly stated that thusly:

"I think I need to work more on making my manufactured evidence a bit more credible"

face it, your ilk views actual evidence like a vampire views the sun.

Your writings don't even rise to the level of mundane; that person was simply being kind to you to see what funny shit you would say next.

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"And the sea will grant each man new hope..."

-CC

  
Aardvark



Posts: 134
Joined: Feb. 2006

(Permalink) Posted: Jan. 27 2007,04:09   

CH responds:

Quote
A niche does not cause an adaptation. Adaptations occur via unguided biological variation, such as by mutations. They can then be selected for and become one step in a series of evolutionary changes. Because the biological variation is unguided, there is no target. And since the design space is large and a large number of designs and species are possible, the variation is not likely to repeat. This is why evolutionists are surprised by impressive similarities. Then they explain them as due to similar niches.


Are you trying to say that there is some kind of law preventing evolution from creating superficially similar animals?

If so, then how is that law going to be incorporated into ID?

  
jeannot



Posts: 1201
Joined: Jan. 2006

(Permalink) Posted: Jan. 27 2007,05:06   

It appears that Dr Hunter is confused in his argumentation. I’ll try to help him with my best English.

He seems to argue that convergence is a problem for the theory of evolution while, actually, he shows us that convergence is merely a problem for the inference of reliable phylogenies, which is a completely different issue.

Dr Hunter, if you want to use convergence as an argument against the ToE, you'll have to prove that convergent evolution is impossible. You haven't done anything of the sort, yet. We await.

Regarding the phylogenetic inference: yes, homoplasy (be it by convergence, reversion or parallelism) can be problematic. In fact, the whole field of cladistics aims at resolving issues due to homoplasy.  If hompoplasy didn’t exist, there wouldn’t be any researcher in phylogenetics, we would just use the good old principle of parsimony to infer phylogenies that would always be 100% accurate.
But how do we solves the problems?
First, we use our own experience and logic. We know, from experience, that some poorly defined traits like gross morphology can be extremely labile and cannot be used to support common ancestry (otherwise, dolphins would belongs to the fishes, wouldn't they?).
However, there are been confusions, especially in taxonomy, for example when defining the superclass of "pisces", separate from tetrapods, while in fact, we are more closely related to the trout than the trout is related to a shark. But the anatomy of the skeleton indicated us the correct topology. Sharks (chondrichthyes) don't have any bones, while humans and trouts (osteichtythes) do. The fish-like shape can be easily explained by the fact that fish have to swim, but why would humans and trouts have bones, if not by common ancestry?
Another way to get around homoplasy is using data from paleontology. We know, by the fossil record, that tetrapods evolved from particular osteichthyes, sometime in the Devonian,  while chondrichthyes (sharks) already existed. It confirms us that tetrapods and other osteichthyes share a more recent ancestor than osteichtyes and chondrichthyes.
Lastly, we now mainly resort to DNA sequences to infer phylogenies. In this case, all characters (nucleotides) are considered equal. Homoplasy is still common, but researchers have defined models of evolution which are used to detect the most probable tree. And those trees, with a very few exceptions, confirm the phylogenetic relationships that were established thanks to anatomy and paleontology (chondrichthyes and osteichthyes for instance).

I hope that helps.

  
don_quixote



Posts: 110
Joined: Aug. 2006

(Permalink) Posted: Jan. 27 2007,05:11   

Cornelius, please learn how to use blockquotes. Thanks.

PS: learn some science too.

  
jeannot



Posts: 1201
Joined: Jan. 2006

(Permalink) Posted: Jan. 27 2007,05:17   

Quote (Aardvark @ Jan. 27 2007,04:09)
CH responds:

Quote
A niche does not cause an adaptation. <snip>


Are you trying to say that there is some kind of law preventing evolution from creating superficially similar animals?

Dr Hunter's view is not accurate. The environment "causes" the adaptation to a particular niche, by selecting mutations.

Now, as I said, he just has to prove that morphological convergences are impossible, even if they result from different mutations.

I also would like to know his hypothesis. First, do placentals and marsupials share a common ancestor?

  
Cornelius Hunter



Posts: 11
Joined: Jan. 2007

(Permalink) Posted: Jan. 27 2007,05:31   

Wesley:

You wrote: "What is "erroneous" about objecting to the use of the very same picture to represent two different species of mammals?"

No problem in pointing out my mistake. I presented over 120 slides that day which I had quickly put together, and yes there were a few mistakes here and there. Your contrived version of events, however, is absurd. There were no "ID headliners" at my talk. I did not present the "the wolf and thylacine as identical twins separated at birth argument." I did not claim that such "instances of convergence ... cannot be explained" by evolution. I did not copy one image, reverse it, and desaturate it (why wouldn't I have done that with the others?).

I normally would not take the time to respond to such a mixture of ad hominems and falsehoods, but you *are* pointing out a mistake in my graphics. Both wolf images were straight off the web, and in my hasty collection of marsupial and placental examples I accidentally got a marsupial wolf graphic confused as a placental. Yes it was a dumb mistake, but it was not at all important to my uncontroversial point, which was that in biology there are many convergences.

  
oldmanintheskydidntdoit



Posts: 4999
Joined: July 2006

(Permalink) Posted: Jan. 27 2007,05:44   

Quote (Cornelius Hunter @ Jan. 27 2007,05:31)
Wesley:

You wrote: "What is "erroneous" about objecting to the use of the very same picture to represent two different species of mammals?"

No problem in pointing out my mistake. I presented over 120 slides that day which I had quickly put together, and yes there were a few mistakes here and there. Your contrived version of events, however, is absurd. There were no "ID headliners" at my talk. I did not present the "the wolf and thylacine as identical twins separated at birth argument." I did not claim that such "instances of convergence ... cannot be explained" by evolution. I did not copy one image, reverse it, and desaturate it (why wouldn't I have done that with the others?).

I normally would not take the time to respond to such a mixture of ad hominems and falsehoods, but you *are* pointing out a mistake in my graphics. Both wolf images were straight off the web, and in my hasty collection of marsupial and placental examples I accidentally got a marsupial wolf graphic confused as a placental. Yes it was a dumb mistake, but it was not at all important to my uncontroversial point, which was that in biology there are many convergences.

decent of you to come clean. Now if you do not mind, we'll go on and on about this "error" for over 100 years.


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I also mentioned that He'd have to give me a thorough explanation as to *why* I must "eat human babies".
FTK

if there are even critical flaws in Gauger’s work, the evo mat narrative cannot stand
Gordon Mullings

  
Wesley R. Elsberry



Posts: 4991
Joined: May 2002

(Permalink) Posted: Jan. 27 2007,06:20   

Quote

Your contrived version of events, however, is absurd. There were no "ID headliners" at my talk. I did not present the "the wolf and thylacine as identical twins separated at birth argument." I did not claim that such "instances of convergence ... cannot be explained" by evolution. I did not copy one image, reverse it, and desaturate it (why wouldn't I have done that with the others?).


OK, so none of the other speakers on the schedule came to your talk. I stand corrected.

However, the presence of the argument claiming that thylacine/wolf similarities represent a problem for homology, and thus evolutionary explanation, is confirmed both by the documentation of the proceedings and by notes from an attendee that I've now consulted.

As for *who* copied the image, flipped it, and desaturated it, I made no claim that that person was you. What I did say was that the image falsely labeled "Wolf" is the same image as the one correctly labeled "Tasmanian Wolf".

As a "mistake", though, that is a whopper.

Why did we not hear anything from your fellow ID advocates about this, and yet we *still* have all sorts of complaints about perfectly correct illustrations of crypsis in peppered moths?

Edited by Wesley R. Elsberry on Jan. 27 2007,06:38

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"You can't teach an old dogma new tricks." - Dorothy Parker

    
Wesley R. Elsberry



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(Permalink) Posted: Jan. 27 2007,06:34   

Quote

CH responds: A niche does not cause an adaptation. Adaptations occur via unguided biological variation, such as by mutations. They can then be selected for and become one step in a series of evolutionary changes. Because the biological variation is unguided, there is no target. And since the design space is large and a large number of designs and species are possible, the variation is not likely to repeat. This is why evolutionists are surprised by impressive similarities. Then they explain them as due to similar niches.


Yes, the niche is not the *cause* of adaptation. However, nobody in this argument claimed it was. What you've left off, though, is the fact that the physical constraints that *define* the niche also will be perfectly straightforward explanations for why some changes will be favored (they improved differential reproduction) and others will be disfavored (they decreased differential reproduction). The example of burrowers is one illustrating this, and the example I've used, that of fast swimmers in water adopting a fusiform shape, is another. Changes that produce shape closer to fusiform are *preferred* in organisms that have to move through water quickly, and those that chunkify body shape are *disfavored* in organisms that have to move through water quickly. The fact that the organisms live in the water and try to move quickly doesn't *cause* any particular change to happen, but it *does* give us an independent reason for deriving an expectation for the eventual fate of any such change that does happen.

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"You can't teach an old dogma new tricks." - Dorothy Parker

    
deadman_932



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Joined: May 2006

(Permalink) Posted: Jan. 27 2007,07:23   

Quote
Most of the technical literature does not explore why comparative anatomy, for instance, is evidence for (or against) evolution, for the simple reason that it is not written from a theory-neutral perspective, but rather is written from an evolutionary perspective...From a theory-neutral perspective, what is it about the bat and horse similarities that are "deeper" and a "result fo common descent" ? Similarly, look here at the the flying squirrel and flying phalanger...Why are their similarities "superficial" and "appear not to have resulted from shared inheritance" ?


I took the liberty of combining two of your "responses" there, CH.

You know, Mr. Hunter, I gave you a perfectly good reference for questions of your sort:
Vogel, Steven. (2003). Comparative Biomechanics: Life's Physical World. Princeton: Princeton University Press. You might also look at Vogel's earlier work "Life's Devices," again, by Princeton U. Press.

Organisms on this planet share common ancestry so far as we can tell, by every means we have available.
I'll assume you would call this view "theory-laden" as if it were a perjorative. Well, great, you're welcome to do that. Since you're a member of the DI, I'd say your views are quite likely to be "theory-laden" as well, as I'm sure you'll eventually demonstrate.

At any rate, Mr. Hunter...on this planet, organisms encounter a non-biological reality in the form of oh, ---- physics, chemistry, hydrodynamics, aerodynamics etc., --- which constrain and at the same time, create "optima" that CAN affect the trajectory of organisms and the shared inherited characteristics of said organisms ( like oh, pentadactyly and the fact that...oh, ...mammals  .have SKIN), that have arisen , sometimes in similar ways .

Look at your instance of phalangers and flying squirrels, for example. Do they have gliding in common? Why, yes. Skin? Yes. Pentadactyly? Yes. Are they tetrapods? Yep. Biomechanically, there's not that many ways for mammals to glide, I'd say. Here's a sugar glider in action  
and a flying squirrel:


(the flying squirrel is headed "west," sugar glider "east")

Other than the fact that they are using loose folds of skin called patagium to "glide" what similarities do you find so significant?

For instance, are the patagium of oh, say sugar gliders  ATTACHED the same as in  flying squirrels?  No..the flying squirrel has little cartilaginous "spurs" that form a frame for the loose skin along the side of the body. This spur can be adjusted in angle which then results in greater or lesser tautness for the skin, aiding in "steering". In sugar gliders, the patagium attach from the "pinky finger" of the  forelimb back to the first toe of the hind foot.

Skin would appear to me to be far more susceptible to evolutionary change than bones and the bones of the two animals in question are distinct in regard to this gliding adaptation, no?  

Optima in relation to physical constraints in light of a common "bauplan" , eh? That common "bauplan" includes pentadactyly that is found throughout mammals and hence would carry a bit more "weight" , dont'cha think?
By the way, if this post seems a bit muddled, it's because I just woke up and it's 5:30 AM

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AtBC Award for Thoroughness in the Face of Creationism

  
Shirley Knott



Posts: 148
Joined: Feb. 2006

(Permalink) Posted: Jan. 27 2007,08:25   

deadman_932,
Lovely!  Thank you, delightful bit of writing there, with some lovely, direct, useful examples of the problem with stopping at the surface details.

hugs,
Shirley Knott

  
The Ghost of Paley



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Joined: Oct. 2005

(Permalink) Posted: Jan. 27 2007,09:02   

Wouldn't this paper indicate that the similarities are indeed skin-deep, at least with respect to thylacines? Why else would the molecules group them with (other) carnivorous marsupials?

I wish these fascinating creatures were still with us.

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Dey can't 'andle my riddim.

  
slpage



Posts: 349
Joined: June 2004

(Permalink) Posted: Jan. 27 2007,09:06   

Quote (guthrie @ Jan. 26 2007,17:26)
Sorry Tracy, make that Ladies and Gentlemen.  

As for the question- I thought that they were all related in the first place, so the last common ancestor probablty had 5 fingers as well.  Not to mention that they inhabit similar habitats, so that physical laws ensure some convergence upon similar body shapes etc.  
That seems quite straightforwards.

That Hunter is questioning the issue of a shared pentadactyly in marsupials and placental mammals is  a clear indication that is really does not understand evolution very well.

I knew this after encountering him at Infidels a few years ago - clueless, but as seems to be a requirement for the IDcreationist crowd, very, very sure of himself and the authenticity of his naive positions. (I know, I know - all those ad hominems - keep in mind, I am not using this to rebut his claims - that is easily and has been done by others - no, I am just pointing out the obvious)

That none of his fellow IDers have taken him aside and explained the basics of the position HE is arguing says as much about them as it does him.  This sort of covered-up incompetence is endemic in IDcreationist circles, from Dr.Cook to Dr.Wells to Dr. Hunter - titles clearly have little value when you pontificate on things you clearly do not get.

The truly sad part is this - the bible -believin' audiences will take what he says at face value because he is, after all, DOCTOR Hunter, pro-IDcreationist.



And yes - the establishment of pentadactyly in extant vertebrates goes back well before the split between marsupials and placentals.

  
slpage



Posts: 349
Joined: June 2004

(Permalink) Posted: Jan. 27 2007,09:13   

Quote (Cornelius Hunter @ Jan. 27 2007,05:31)
Wesley:

You wrote: "What is "erroneous" about objecting to the use of the very same picture to represent two different species of mammals?"

No problem in pointing out my mistake.

Mistake.

"MISTAKE"????


A mistake is using "their" instead of "there", or writing "ilium" when you meant "ileum".

Using the same picture to represent two different species is not a mistake, especially when the picture was clearly manipulated (mirrored) in order to do so.

I mean, is it really that hard to Google Images for 'wolf'?

I smell purposeful dishonesty, myself.

But then, I have become conditioned to expect dishonesty and incompetence by the many egregious examples of this sort of thing from the DI crowd.

  
Mike PSS



Posts: 428
Joined: Sep. 2006

(Permalink) Posted: Jan. 27 2007,09:34   

Quote (Cornelius Hunter @ Jan. 27 2007,04:29)
CH responds: A niche does not cause an adaptation. Adaptations occur via unguided biological variation, such as by mutations. They can then be selected for and become one step in a series of evolutionary changes. Because the biological variation is unguided, there is no target. And since the design space is large and a large number of designs and species are possible, the variation is not likely to repeat. This is why evolutionists are surprised by impressive similarities. Then they explain them as due to similar niches.

The bolded part shows how many IDC arguments that use "information theory" arguments make mistakes with RM+NS+Time (+other factors.  Don't want to go Portuguese on this one).

The first assumption that RM is "random and unguided" does not mean that NS is "random and unguided".  As deadman_932 states...
Quote
At any rate, Mr. Hunter...on this planet, organisms encounter a non-biological reality in the form of oh, ---- physics, chemistry, hydrodynamics, aerodynamics etc., --- which constrain and at the same time, create "optima" that CAN affect the trajectory of organisms and the shared inherited characteristics of said organisms ( like oh, pentadactyly and the fact that...oh, ...mammals  .have SKIN), that have arisen , sometimes in similar ways.


The "design space" may be large BUT the space itself is overlaid with an environment "field" that may influence the "direction" of selected mutations.  Let me rephrase that...
The "design space" is not neutral to the selected mutations.

Mr. Hunter:  Since your argument REQUIRES a neutral "design space", how does your argument hold up if the "design space" is not truly neutral to selection?

  
GCT



Posts: 1001
Joined: Aug. 2005

(Permalink) Posted: Jan. 27 2007,09:53   

Quote (Cornelius Hunter @ Jan. 27 2007,04:29)
===============================================
Responding to GCT

Quote  
To replace materialistic explanations with the theistic understanding that nature and hurnan beings are created by God.


Mr. Hunter, you are a fellow of the DI, surely you know what their position is.  Do you reject that position?  Do you hold that ID is purely scientific?  If so, why does the DI push so hard for theistic understandings?



Of course I wouldn't be a DI fellow if I did not share some fundamenatal views with DI. But I certainly do not agree iwth everything that DI people have written. Regarding the quote above, the problem is this quickly gets fairly complicated, and too lengthy for posting. I'd like to defer to my upcoming book entitled *Science's Blindspot* which should be out in spring, where I go into issues such as this in detail. I hope the book will help build bridges between disparate folks who nonetheless share the goal of pursuing the truth rather than dogma.
===============================================

It seems that you don't really wish to answer my question.  I thought it was pretty straight-forward.  If ID is indeed scientific, and the DI is only concerned with pushing a scientific theorem, then there should be no need to sermonize to the crowd and continually speak about religious matters.  That the members of the DI can not help but speak, endlessly, on religious matters speaks volumes.  I have, to date, never heard a scientific argument for ID, yet I've heard many religious/philosophical arguments for ID.  I wonder why this is, but it seems I won't get an answer in this thread.

  
N.Wells



Posts: 1836
Joined: Oct. 2005

(Permalink) Posted: Jan. 27 2007,10:23   

I said      
Quote
if the requirements of their niche cause adaptation toward the same morphological/functional solution.


Cornelius Hunter responded      
Quote
A niche does not cause an adaptation. Adaptations occur via unguided biological variation, such as by mutations. They can then be selected for and become one step in a series of evolutionary changes. Because the biological variation is unguided, there is no target. And since the design space is large and a large number of designs and species are possible, the variation is not likely to repeat.


Let's unpack the mistakes again.  (Edited to add: I see that Mike addressed some of the same points while I was off-line.   Thanks, Mike.)

A) Adaptations do not solely occur via unguided variations.  They appear to occur mostly through mutations and recombination alternating with selection (among other pathways).  Recombination can be guided, in the sense of sexual selection, and ecological selection can also easily be directional.

B) "Because the biological variation is unguided, there is no target."   There is no target per se, but directional change is easily accomplished.  With possible rare exceptions, mutations appear to be unguided, but selection is entirely capable of imposing directionality on the process.  If there is differential reproductive success that is attributable in significant part to inheritable variation, and that preferential success continues over multiple generations, there will be a directional change in the population.  

C)  To the extent that the requirements of the niche are providing the challenge to reproductive success, it is fine to say that the requirements of the niche contributed to causing any resulting adaptations.  Those requirements contributed to the existence of the problem, they helped provide the motivation and the directionality of the change, and thus they helped produced the end result.

D)  "And since the design space is large and a large number of designs and species are possible, the variation is not likely to repeat."  The key here is that the design space is indeed large, so exactly identical variations are indeed unlikely to repeat, but there are many broad categories of problems faced by organisms that come up again and again, so the broad categories of responses are again fairly similar.  If you live in the water and need to either get food or avoid becoming food, you may well need to swim fast.  As Wesley said, the laws of hydraulics are quite constraining, so streamlining provides a common solution, thus a lot of fast aquatic creatures end up looking similar.  However, there is an infinity of ways to arrange minor details of form while being streamlined overall.  Thus superficially similar streamlining should not be a surprise, while similar arrangements of minor details would be. Deadman provided an excellent example of this when he talked about overall similarities in skin folds in gliding mammals versus dissimilar details of construction in different groups.  

There's no design reason that both a bat's wing and a bird's wing need to contain one scapula, one humerus, one radius and one ulna.  There's no design reason that all bat wings need to be supported by five fingers, whereas all bird wings need to contain two fused fingers plus one more in the form of the alula.  Why do all the bird versions contain so many similarities to each other that are never seen in bats, and vice versa?   How come all birds have feathers but none have fur, while the reverse is true for bats?   How come all birds share an alula and not a pteroid bone, whereas all pterosaurs share an pteroid but not an alula?  Common ancestry within each of those groups provides an easy explanation.  In a design world, any car can have windshield wipers, radios, and/or air conditioners.  In an evolution world, only Buicks might have air conditioners, only Fords might have windshield wipers, and only Jeeps might have radios.

     
Quote
This is why evolutionists are surprised by impressive similarities.

But mostly we aren't.  We are impressed by them, but our theory requires them.

   
Quote
Cornelius Hunter: It is strange that evolutionists never get around to addressing the scientific issue [of convergence].

   
Quote
Me: The charge that evolutionists “don’t get around to this” is completely false, and can only be indicative of profound ignorance of the field, or mendacity.

   
Quote
Hunter:  Most of the technical literature does not explore why comparative anatomy, for instance, is evidence for (or against) evolution, for the simple reason that it is not written from a theory-neutral perspective, but rather is written from an evolutionary perspective. Yes, the implications for evolutionary theory are explored, but typically only insofar as modifying the question of *how* evolution occurs, not *if* evolution occurs.

Hunter's second response does not save the woeful wrongness of his initial claim that evolutionists don't get around to discussing convergence.  

Furthermore, much of the discussion of convergence involves discussing the legitimacy of phylogenetic inferences ("does this particular similarity reflect a shared evolutionary history or not?", where "not" includes convergence).  However, "not" also includes ID.  If the answer was always that particular similarities could never confidently be attributed to a shared evolutionary history, then that would raise the issue of "if" evolution occurs, contrary to Hunter's claims.  


     
Quote
(Hunter) From a theory-neutral perspective, what is it about the bat and horse similarities that are "deeper" and a "result [of] common descent" ?

Already answered.  Deadman's answer is excellent, and I already said that if we see the same embryological tissues contribute to two features, the same genes activated during their construction, utilization of the same developmental pathways, and the same bones ending up in much the same places in the same basic relationships to adjacent bones, nerves, blood vessels, and so forth, then we can make a reasonably secure claim of homology.  If we additionally have a fossil record that shows similar structures or a gradation of change in probable intermediates then the claim is that much stronger.

  
stevestory



Posts: 13407
Joined: Oct. 2005

(Permalink) Posted: Jan. 27 2007,13:43   

Real science makes significant findings all the time. H. pylori causes ulcers. Coffee protects against cirrhosis. Dark energy exists. Neutrinos have mass. New tests for cancer, new info about protein dynamics, materials with negative refraction indices, RNAi, WMAP and on, and on, and on, and on, and on, and on, and on, and on, and on, and on, and on, and on, and on, and on, and on. And most findings you won't even hear about. The average postdoc toiling away in obscurity will produce 1-3 papers per year. (Those of you who watch the Discovery Institute may ask, "...and how many press releases?" The answer, strangely enough, is usually 'none'.)

If science had this big blind spot, and the discovery institute people have spent 15 years and millions of dollars looking into it, free of any competition, and not discovered a single significant thing, either the blind spot isn't really there, or the DI researchers are the stupidest collection of scientists ever assembled.

   
stevestory



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(Permalink) Posted: Jan. 27 2007,14:03   

Quote (Wesley R. Elsberry @ Jan. 26 2007,22:11)


   
GCT



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Joined: Aug. 2005

(Permalink) Posted: Jan. 27 2007,15:29   

Quote (stevestory @ Jan. 27 2007,15:03)

Wow Steve, it's like you two were separated at birth.

  
stevestory



Posts: 13407
Joined: Oct. 2005

(Permalink) Posted: Jan. 27 2007,16:01   

Anyone who would suggest anything other than an honest mistake in the above diagram is really avoiding the real issue about similarities.

It's strange that evolutionists never get around to addressing the scientific issue. The fact remains, and I'll rephrase the question Wesley and the rest of you are ignoring, why are some similarities--my brother is about 6'3 and I am 6', and we both have blonde hair--considered evidence for a close evolutionary relationship, whereas equal and greater levels of similarity--brad pitt is about 6' like me, and has blonde hair--are rejected?

Dumb old evolutionists.

   
k.e.



Posts: 40
Joined: Jan. 2006

(Permalink) Posted: Jan. 27 2007,18:06   

Quote (GCT @ Jan. 27 2007,15:29)
Quote (stevestory @ Jan. 27 2007,15:03)

Wow Steve, it's like you two were separated at birth.

I see C.H. needs some assistance....

Typical Darwinist ad homo attack.

When are you going to concentrate on my new book?


I only came here to get some tips on how to handle a skeptical press.

So give me some more questions, I need more practice ignoring them.

Lenny: whilst I didn't deny 'stone the adulterers to death'   Howie Ahmanson   was a major financier behind the DI, notice how I cleverly deflected the focus of the reply to a specific and propably unanswerable question on an actual cash contribution made by the miscreant Machiavelian mangler of the Episcopal Church.

There is no point trying to tie Howie Ahmanson to me and the DI.

If you had any brains, you would notice I can deny mendacity with the best of them.

Just try accusing me of deliberate deception by using the same drawing for a Tasmanian Tiger and a Wolf.

It was a mistake...it rhymes with mendacious....get it.

  
Tracy P. Hamilton



Posts: 1239
Joined: May 2006

(Permalink) Posted: Jan. 27 2007,18:39   

Quote (stevestory @ Jan. 27 2007,16:01)
Anyone who would suggest anything other than an honest mistake in the above diagram is really avoiding the real issue about similarities.

It's strange that evolutionists never get around to addressing the scientific issue. The fact remains, and I'll rephrase the question Wesley and the rest of you are ignoring, why are some similarities--my brother is about 6'3 and I am 6', and we both have blonde hair--considered evidence for a close evolutionary relationship, whereas equal and greater levels of similarity--brad pitt is about 6' like me, and has blonde hair--are rejected?

Dumb old evolutionists.


Steve,  I see no blond in the picture.  Am I supposed to color it in?  It may take a while - the DI has my crayons.

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"Following what I just wrote about fitness, you’re taking refuge in what we see in the world."  PaV

"The simple equation F = MA leads to the concept of four-dimensional space." GilDodgen

"We have no brain, I don't, for thinking." Robert Byers

  
"Rev Dr" Lenny Flank



Posts: 2560
Joined: Feb. 2005

(Permalink) Posted: Jan. 27 2007,18:59   

Dr Hunter:

Thanks for not answering any of my questions.  Naturally, I didn't expect you to -- creationists do seem to all have lethal allergies to answering direct questions.

But then, my questions make their point to all the lurkers whether you answer them or not (though NOT answering them does seem to emphasize the point a wee bit).

So I don't really need your cooperation anyway.  (shrug)

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k.e.



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Joined: Jan. 2006

(Permalink) Posted: Jan. 28 2007,01:10   

OK lets be fair with Doc.CH

..... he got rolled on a tiny insignificant detail, we're making a moutain lion out of mole.

Here's a bone Doc.CH .....in fact a caveful of 200,000 to around 800,000 years ago of bones.

Your not a YEC are you?


“To find complete, undamaged skeletons of Australia’s largest predatory marsupial, Thylacoleo, was a dream come true.


You may have better luck making this marsupial 'liger' into a hat or a rabbit up your sleeve ...I dunno .....see how it plays with the pre-schoolers they love rabbits and they're easier to train.

  
"Rev Dr" Lenny Flank



Posts: 2560
Joined: Feb. 2005

(Permalink) Posted: Jan. 28 2007,07:44   

Hey Doc, what are some of those things that you disagree with DI about?

Can you list a few, and explain why you disagree with them?

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"Rev Dr" Lenny Flank



Posts: 2560
Joined: Feb. 2005

(Permalink) Posted: Jan. 28 2007,07:52   

Quote ("Rev Dr" Lenny Flank @ Jan. 26 2007,19:16)
Dr Hunter:

DI continually tells us that ID is not creationism.

In the DI's Wedge Document, it states:

"FIVE YEAR OBJECTIVES

* Major Christian denomination(s) defend(s) traditional doctrine of creation"


If ID is not creationism, then (1) what is this "traditional doctrine of creation" that DI wants Christian churches to defend, and (2) why does DI want churches to defend it?

Or is DI just lying to us (under oath) when it claims ID isn't creationism.

Well, Doc . . . . ?

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"Rev Dr" Lenny Flank



Posts: 2560
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(Permalink) Posted: Jan. 28 2007,07:55   

Quote ("Rev Dr" Lenny Flank @ Jan. 26 2007,19:27)
Hey Dr Hunter:

IDers complain a lot about evolution's "materialism".  What, precisely, about “evolution” is any more “materialistic” than, say, weather forecasting or accident investigation or medicine?  Please be as specific as possible.

I have never, in all my life, ever heard any weather forecaster mention “god” or "divine will” or any “supernatural” anything, at all.  Ever.  Does this mean, in your view, that weather forecasting is atheistic?

I have yet, in all my 46 years of living, to ever hear any accident investigator declare solemnly at the scene of an airplane crash, “We can’t explain how it happened, so an Unknown Intelligent Being must have dunnit.”  I have never yet heard an accident investigator say that “this crash has no materialistic causes — it must have been the Will of Allah”.  Does this mean, in your view, that accident investigation is atheistic?

How about medicine.  When you get sick, do you ask your doctor to abandon his “materialistic biases” and to investigate possible “supernatural” or “non-materialistic” causes for your disease?  Or do you ask your doctor to cure your naturalistic materialistic diseases by using naturalistic materialistic antibiotics to kill your naturalistic materialistic germs?

Since it seems to me as if weather forecasting, accident investigation,  and medicine are every bit, in every sense,just as utterly completely totally absolutely one-thousand-percent “materialistic” as evolutionary biology is, why, specifically, is it just evolutionary biology that gets your panties all in a bunch?  Why aren’t you and your fellow Wedge-ites out there fighting the good fight against godless materialistic naturalistic weather forecasting, or medicine, or accident investigation?

Or does that all come LATER, as part of, uh, “renewing our culture” … . . ?

Well, Doc . . . .?

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www.RedandBlackPublishers.com

  
"Rev Dr" Lenny Flank



Posts: 2560
Joined: Feb. 2005

(Permalink) Posted: Jan. 28 2007,07:58   

Quote ("Rev Dr" Lenny Flank @ Jan. 26 2007,19:33)
Hey Dr Hunter:

Do you repudiate the extremist Reconstructionist views of the primary funder of the Center for (the Renewal of) Science and Culture, Howard Ahmanson?  If so, why do you keep taking his money anyway?

Well, Doc . . . .?

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Cornelius Hunter



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(Permalink) Posted: Jan. 28 2007,12:11   

Wesley Elsberry writes: "However, the presence of the argument claiming that thylacine/wolf similarities represent a problem for homology, and thus evolutionary explanation, is confirmed both by the documentation of the proceedings and by notes from an attendee that I've now consulted."

Actually, I did not question the evolutionary explanation, but I guess that would spoil your story. Folks, I am really not your enemy here. I have no problem with evolution, in principle. My skepticism is with several of the evidential arguments. I came here asking for a justification/ defense of one of the most fundamental claims of evolution. My question was, how is it that similarities such as the pentadactyl pattern are such powerful evidence for evolution, in light of equal and greater levels of similarity in distant species, such as displayed in the marsupial and placental cousin species?

This was my question. There are many, many more examples of similarities that do not fit the common descent pattern. Why are those that can be fitted to the common descent pattern cited as such powerful evidence? Without some justification, this fundamental claim of evolution appears to be selective. Unfortunately, good justification is hard to come by. The vast majority of the responses simply avoided the question and made up their own.

For instance, Stephen Wells responded,  "For starters, how about some discussion of dentition and skull morphology, with regard to the claim that the thylacine and the wolf have 'almost identical' dentition?" Where did that claim come from?

Jeannot responded, "So Mr Hunter, you think that convergence is somehow problematic for the theory of evolution? ... if you want to use convergence as an argument against the ToE, you'll have to prove that convergent evolution is impossible." This is a combination strawman plus shifting the burden of the proof. Deadman responded with another version of this strawman: "Should I throw up my hands now and shout "We've met our Waterloo, they  [similar looking species] LOOK alike!?" He then pointed to some references (good background material but they don't answer the question).

Brightmoon responded: "is cornelius trying to say that thylacine anatomy is similar because of separate creation ?" Huh? Aardvark responded: "Are you trying to say that there is some kind of law preventing evolution from creating superficially similar animals?" No, I'm not saying that. I'm trying to find good justification for one of your claims. Wesley continued to avoid the question with this: "What you've left off, though, is the fact that the physical constraints that *define* the niche also will be perfectly straightforward explanations for why some changes will be favored (they improved differential reproduction) and others will be disfavored (they decreased differential reproduction)." Of course. Now, how about answering my question?

There were, however, a few answers to the question. N. Wells gave this answer:

"The important thing about the forelimbs of birds, bats, dogs, pterosaurs, pigs, moles, anteaters, dolphins, and so forth is that their differences overwhelm their similarities, but their similarities are deeper and are the result of common inheritance.  In contrast, their similarities are in many ways far less than the similarities between golden moles and marsupial moles or between ‘flying’ squirrels and ‘flying’ phalangers, but the latter similarities are superficial and are appear not to have resulted from shared inheritance.   Both sets of comparisons and contrasts provide powerful evidence for evolution."

Unfortunately the explanation that one type of similarity is "deep" and the other "superficial" isn't going to satisfy very many people. This explanation really just raises more questions. When I asked for details, he deferred to Deadman who did give an answer:

"Skin would appear to me to be far more susceptible to evolutionary change than bones and the bones of the two animals in question are distinct in regard to this gliding adaptation, no?  Optima in relation to physical constraints in light of a common "bauplan" , eh? That common "bauplan" includes pentadactyly that is found throughout mammals and hence would carry a bit more "weight" , dont'cha think? By the way, if this post seems a bit muddled, it's because I just woke up and it's 5:30 AM"

This seems like a perfectly reasonable answer, as far as it goes. The problem is it is farily subjective. Do we really want to make one of the fundamental evidential claims for evolution contingent on an opinion about what might, and might not, be more difficult for evolution to accomplish?

The one other answer was given by Douglas Theobald: "The difference is simple.  In one case we have structural similarity that has a functional explanation (wolves).  In the other case, we have the much more puzzling phenomenon of structural similarity in spite of functional diversity (pentadactyl limbs).  This latter problem is what common ancestry explains, quite elegantly.  Hence it is this latter type of similarity that is evidence for evolutionary homology."

Yes, of course, the personal incredulity of evolutionists is well documented. This is the standard response, but appeals to personal incredulity hardly make for strong scientific evidence. Nor does it help when evolutionists mysteriously drop this incredulity when such instances arise in distant species where common descent cannot be summoned as the explanation. In these cases we are told there was a structural convergence where the functions differ.

What we have here are a vast number of similarities across the spectrum in biology, often arising via different genes and development pathways, and often showing up in distant species. Whereever possible, they are ascribed to common descent. Otherwise they are said to have evolved independently. So far so good. But the former do not qualify as particularly powerful, objective, evidence for evolution.

  
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