Evolution! Did we come from monkeys?

[Steve_Andersen]

surf(name removed by moderator)ure:

This is what we call the “bait and switch.” Variation, a change within the species, is not to be confused with macro-evolution, change from one species to another.

What you call “variation” is what is known as MICRO-evolution, the only definition of evolution that is demonstrated in the natural world.

sigh

That micro/macro stuff is semantic slight of hand IMHO
While they are different they involve mostly the same processes
Both micro and macro evolution have been observed

talkorigins.org/indexcc/CB/CB902.html

talkorigins.org/indexcc/CB/CB910.html

talkorigins.org/faqs/faq-speciation.html

Macro changes are merely a whole lot of micro changes put together
surf(name removed by moderator)ure:

Variation is evidence of a Creator, since He designed us to learn to resist certain diseases and operate under changing conditions. It always takes place, just as in your examples, within the species. It never changes one species (fish) to another species (bird).

(1) You can’t have evidence for the supernatural…. to claim so seems kinda blasphemous to me. Like trying to take a tape measure to God

(2) We actually have a pretty good fossil record, as well as the genetics, biochemistry, comparative physiology, etc of fish turning into birds (reptiles and amphibians were intermediary steps along the way of course)

Could a modern fish evolve into a bird? No, those two lines split a long time ago but it is conceivable that under the right circumstances that a fish might evolve into something more or less bird-like (or vice versa) after all we already have lungfish and walking fish and (ahem) flying fish as well as highly adapted marine birds such as penguins. God only knows what another 100,000,000 years might do to these species.

 

[Steve_Andersen]

surf(name removed by moderator)ure:

1. What did the lower form of primate evolve from,

from an even lower form
surf(name removed by moderator)ure:

and how?

evolution of speices through natural selection
surf(name removed by moderator)ure:

1. Why is there no fossil evidence for this ancestral species?

there is and more importantly there is the genetic evidence as well
surf(name removed by moderator)ure:

If it took millions (or billions) of years to gradually evolve, shouldn’t there be examples galore of all of these “in-between” stages?

Every fossil is an example of a transitional species
We have museums full of them

They just announced this week the discovery of a major new dinosaur find with a “transitional” species between dinosaurs and birds

cnn.com/2005/TECH/science/05/04/dinosaur.diet.ap/index.html

They’re actually wising up and using the term “transitional” it their press releases now to try and put this silly old “criticism” to rest
surf(name removed by moderator)ure:

1. Why is there no evolution (change from species to species) going on at present?

What makes you think there isn’t?

We have observed speciation in the past century
talkorigins.org/faqs/faq-speciation.html
surf(name removed by moderator)ure:

1. Why are there no new species?

What makes you think there are not? See “Observed Instances of Speciation” above
These have occurred both naturally and in the lab through both hybridization and selection

PS extinction (the dark side of natural selection) has also been observed

 

[PhilVaz]

surf(name removed by moderator)ure << (2) The 1/2 inch layer of cosmic dust on the moon indicates the moon has not been accumulating dust for billions of years. >>

You are kidding right? OK, let’s stick with this one. You are saying the moon should have a dust layer that is (what) 500,000 feet high or something, since the earth is 4.5 billion years old? Is that the argument? OK. Now please defend that, who determined the dust layer should be higher than what it is, and based on what? But first, I warn you, read this

Arguments that creationists should not use by AnswersInGenesis

And more on the moon dust argument by same

see also this information by Chris Stassen

There is a recent creationist technical paper on this topic which admits that the depth of dust on the Moon is concordant with the mainstream age and history of the solar system ( Snelling and Rush 1993 ). Their abstract concludes with:

“It thus appears that the amount of meteoritic dust and meteorite debris in the lunar regolith and surface dust layer, even taking into account the postulated early intense bombardment, does not contradict the evolutionists’ multi-billion year timescale (while not proving it). Unfortunately, attempted counter-responses by creationists have so far failed because of spurious arguments or faulty calculations. Thus, until new evidence is forthcoming, creationists should not continue to use the dust on the moon as evidence against an old age for the moon and the solar system.” (source: Snelling, Andrew A., and David E. Rush, 1993. “Moon Dust and the Age of the Solar System” in Creation Ex Nihilo Technical Journal 7, No. 1, pp. 2-42)

So the “moon dust” argument has been abandoned by “professional” young-earth creationists for over a decade.

Also Moon Dust, short answer

And longer answer Cosmic dust and the age of the earth

surf(name removed by moderator)ure << (6) The moon contains considerable quantities of U-236 and Th-230, both short-lived isotopes that would have been long gone if the moon were billions of years old. >>

Short answer here

Both nucleotides are formed by ongoing processes. 230Th is an intermediate decay product of 238U, which has a half-life of 4.468 billion years. 236U is produced in trace amounts by the capture of slow neutrons.

Number (6) actually proves the earth is much older than 80,000,000 (80 million) years, and at least ten (800 million) to twenty (1.6 billion) times that. Why? Because all the (persistent) radioactive elements with half-lives less than 80 million years are gone (they are not found in nature). All the ones greater than 80 million years exist in nature, and since it takes 10 to 20 half-lives for an isotope to fully decay away, you can do the math: the earth must be at least 800 million or 1.6 billion years old for the short-lived radioactive elements to have completely decayed away.

For details, see my (unfinished) reply to Bob Sungenis here

Deal with my awesome counter-responses to your bogus young-earth claims (2) and (6).

surf(name removed by moderator)ure << Shall I go on? >>

Your other arguments for a “young earth” are – what G. Brent Dalrymple called them 25 years ago – “absurd.” Can you go on? Sure, but first take a look at the detailed answers provided by TalkOrigins.

How Good are those Young-Earth Arguments? – all your really bad scientific claims are demolished here

Phil P

 

[AlanFromWichita]

abcdefg:

If creation and evolution were both right, those who believed in evolution came from monkeys and those who didn’t were created by God

Works for me! Ooh ooh aah aah tookytooky!

I guess my better half was created by God and I’m not sure where I came from!

Alan

 

[Ahimsa]

AlanFromWichita:

Works for me! Ooh ooh aah aah tookytooky!

I guess my better half was created by God and I’m not sure where I came from!

Alan

Well I’ll be a monkey’s uncle!

 

[Exporter]

There is so much misinformation on this thread that it deserves to thrown in the Trash Bin.

The very question that was asked was brimmingh over with a lack of modern science and an ignoring of the Creation as per the Holy Bible.

Get that invalid idea than monleys donated to the gene pool of man. Dont you know the difference between Apes and Monkeys?

 

[Ahimsa]

Exporter:

There is so much misinformation on this thread that it deserves to thrown in the Trash Bin.

The very question that was asked was brimmingh over with a lack of modern science and an ignoring of the Creation as per the Holy Bible.

Get that invalid idea than monleys donated to the gene pool of man. Dont you know the difference between Apes and Monkeys?

Exporter,

How about we re-phrase the question: “Evolution!! Did we come from apes?”

 

[AlanFromWichita]

Exporter:

There is so much misinformation on this thread that it deserves to thrown in the Trash Bin.

How about the water cooler? Isn’t that where the bricks and mortal world gets its misinformation?

Get that invalid idea than monleys donated to the gene pool of man. Dont you know the difference between Apes and Monkeys?

I don’t. Are monkey one of the “great apes?” I am pretty fuzzy on my high school taxonomy lessons.

Alan

 

[Zosimus]

I think it all comes down to faith.

However Why dinosaurs? could it have been a “run through” on how an eco system would work?

In theory how I understand it through natural select which aurguably goes hand in hand with evolution the strong survive while the week die out. Why then are there still monkeys around?

Seems when ever an exstinct species is uncoverd for example
the australpithecus to me nothing more than a monkey that start assuming it was a missing link although the spine is curved for tree dwelling and a brain no bigger than an orange they start piecing thing together on assumtions and making up stories as if it was unfutable truth

lahokamal:

i ask for a brief answer; can you build a building without ground floor?you cannot. how can you build a theory without explaining the origin of first living organism? Add the lack of transitional forms, invalid evolution mechanisms to this.evolutiondeceit.com

 

[AlanFromWichita]

AlanFromWichita:

How about the water cooler? Isn’t that where the bricks and mortal world gets its misinformation?

Oops. I just caught my typo “mortal.” That would be the mortal world as opposed to cyberspace, I suppose.

Gosh I hate that term “cyberspace” about as much as any full-fledged cliche.

Alan

 

[Gastro]

Scientists recently observed a star that was 50,000 light-years away from us explode. If the earth is only 6,000 years old, how did the light travel from the explosion to our planet?

Andrew

 

[Steve_Andersen]

……In theory how I understand it through natural select which aurguably goes hand in hand with evolution

Evolution is the observed phenomenon
Natural selection is the theory to explain it

Zosimus:

the strong survive while the week die out.

Not the strong
The most likely to pass on more offspring

Zosimus:

Why then are there still monkeys around?

why wouldn’t there be?
Modern monkeys have also evolved and are adapted to their current environment

Zosimus:

Seems when ever an exstinct species is uncoverd for example
the australpithecus to me nothing more than a monkey that start assuming it was a missing link although the spine is curved for tree dwelling and a brain no bigger than an orange

No, Australopithecus was bipedal

IIRC recent finds indicate that bipedalism is much older than originally thought

……they start piecing thing together on assumtions and making up stories as if it was unfutable truth

Of course they gather evidence and try to construct explanations

That’s what science** is.**

 

[brotherhrolf]

Has anyone heard of theistic evolution in this thread?

 

[wanerious]

surf(name removed by moderator)ure:

Evidence from Space:

1. The shrinking sun limits the earth-sun relationship to less than “billions of years.” The sun is losing both mass and diameter.

I know these are not your arguments — you have picked them up from some disreputable source. They are old and tired, and frankly disavowed by many who argue as you do. Even so, they should be addressed. The above, for example, betrays a common misunderstanding of natural behavior and is unfortunately behind many of the following ridiculous assertions. In fact, the Sun pulsates, so extrapolating current behavior over a time scale greater than the natural period is just the wrong thing to do. It’s as if you took readings over a few seconds of a pendulum that slowly swings from side to side, and concluded that the Earth must only be a few seconds old, since then the pendulum would burst through the ceiling were it to continue its present trajectory. There are always nuggets of truth involved — the Sun is losing mass, yes. Enough to perturb the Earth’s orbit on a scale of anything less than billions of years? No.

2)The 1/2 inch layer of cosmic dust on the moon indicates the moon has not been accumulating dust for billions of years.

You should read up on this claim. It was posited based upon erroneous data, and it has been soundly refuted. No one, not even the ICR, claims this any more. In fact, a series of the latest data confirms that the 0.5-2.5 inch layer of dust is exactly what we would expect for a 4 billion year old moon.

1. The existence of short-period comets indicates the uinverse is less than billions of years old.

Why? Short-period comets only indicate that there are bodies with highly elliptical orbits that originate somewhat beyond the orbit of Neptune. Occasionally, some of them are jostled out of their normal orbits and race in towards the Sun. There are also long-period comets originating from a very distant spherical region that point directly towards a 5 billion year old solar system.

1. Fossil meteorites are very rare in layers other than the top layers of the earth.

What are “fossil meteorites”? Are we really to expect that, were this true, it somehow escaped the attention of the thousands of very smart scientists who make geology their life’s work?

1. The moon is receding a few inches each year. Billions of years ago the moon would have been so close that the tides would have been much higher, eroding the continents quickly.

I really don’t understand this one. Ok, so the moon is receding. Even taking this data at face value, and at a constant rate (!) for billions of years, this puts the moon very close to the Earth 4.5 billion years ago. Which is exactly what the current theory regarding the origin of the moon states. What’s wrong with eroding continents billions of years ago? Whatever continents existed then are likely subsumed under the crust now anyway.

1. The moon contains considerable quantities of U-236 and Th-230, both short-lived isotopes that would have been long gone if the moon were billions of years old.

I’d like to see a source for this one. If true, it would indeed put the age of the moon in doubt. I have never heard of anomalous isotope abundances, so I first suspect hogwash.

1. The existence of great quantities of space dust indicates the solar system is young.

This is related to the moon-dust assertion above. There are no “great quantities” of dust. A great many recent measurements place the abundance of dust at levels we would naturally expect.

1. At the rate many star clusters are expanding, they could not have been traveling for billions of years.

I don’t understand. Star clusters are expanding? This is news to me. There is a mechanism for dating the star clusters based upon their “expansion”? Since they are gravitationally bound, why would they expand? Where are they traveling? Is this somehow more convincing than the age determination via H-R diagrams? This seems very confused.

 

[wanerious]

1. Saturn’s rings are still unstable, indicating they are not billions of years old.

No one claims that they are billions of years old. They probably formed in the last 10-100 million years, and will probably dissipate in the same rough time frame. A basic scientific principle: The universe was different in the past than it is today.

1. Jupiter and Saturn are cooling off rather rapidly. They are losing heat twice as fast as they gain it from the sun. They cannot be billions of years old.

Why not? They are losing stored heat from the Helmholtz mechanism. It is not accurate to say that they are “cooling off”, but that they are radiating heat at a greater rate than they are receiving it. That’s ok, as long as they have a source of heat, which they do. To know about the disequilibrium of Saturn and Jupiter but not to know of their internal source smacks of intellectual dishonesty.

1. Jupiter’s moon, Io, is losing matter to Jupiter. It cannot be billions of years old.

Again, it is likely that the system of moons around Jupiter was different billions of years ago. Billions of years from now, Io will probably not exist. What’s the problem? Why do things have to be the same in the past? Natural systems evolve and change.

Shall I go on?

I suppose you can, but be aware that you look more and more silly posting someone else’s arguments that either don’t make any sense or are highly disreputable. I’m begging you to learn some real science.

 

[iamrefreshed]

AlanFromWichita:

This is an excellent point.

For that matter, it goes for all material existence, too. The Vatican may have come up with the Big Bang theory which works as a model for many scientists, but that theory requires just as much faith as any Biblical story, for you just can’t get from something to nothing.

Sure, Einstein and others show us how matter and energy can be interchanged, but energy had to have a source, too, or so-called “scientific” theories of origin are no less fantastic than Mother Goose.

One of my favorite quotes attributed to Einstein is, “religion without science is blind. Science without religion is lame.”

My favorite Einstein quote: “God does not play dice”.

Alan

 

[iamrefreshed]

Steve Andersen:

No, you’re misrepresenting the mechanism.

“mutations” aren’t necessarily the things of grade B Sci-Fi movies

The more correct term is “variation”
With the exception of identical twins we are all different on a genetic level.

So while we may be subject to a mere 3,500 mutational disorders we are subject to well over 6,000,000,000 successful genetic variations
That’s over 1,700,000 to 1 and evolution is all about the odds

It is this variation that is the start of evolution; genetic drift of isolated populations has been clearly demonstrated

The most noticeable is the variation in skin color

A crueler example is sickle cell anemia. It is caused by a mutation that developed naturally in an area of West Africa where malaria is endemic. Being a carrier of the mutation confers resistance to malaria and is thus a survival advantage. The tragic downside is that if 2 carriers have children there is a 25% chance that each child will develop sickle cell anemia. There is also a 50% chance that each child will inherit the beneficial mutation therefore the mutation persists in areas with malaria because it is a net benefit.

On the other hand, the incidence of the mutation is decreasing in people of West African decent living in the US or other places where malaria is not a problem since it confers no benefit.

Something I don’t understand about your last paragraph. Forgive me as I am far from a scientist. How does the incidence of the mutation decrease? Is it because of natural selection?

 

[iamrefreshed]

Just an observation from a non-scientist. Why is it that with its 1 billion plus years, evolution has not eliminated disease? Wouldn’t that be a natural path for it to take?

 

[wanerious]

iamrefreshed:

Just an observation from a non-scientist. Why is it that with its 1 billion plus years, evolution has not eliminated disease? Wouldn’t that be a natural path for it to take?

If the organisms that cause disease didn’t also change over time, you might be right.

 

[iamrefreshed]

wanerious:

If the organisms that cause disease didn’t also change over time, you might be right.

That’s a valid point for diseases that attack from OUTSIDE the body.

I was referring diseases humans get through their gene pool. Shouldn’t they have been eliminated through natural selection? Why are their still children born with Down’s Syndrome for instance?