evolution

[hecd2]

What is your point? Our friend Alex here was proposing that the first life forms were delivered by meteors.

I proposed no such thing. I simply described a hypothesis put forward by Fred Hoyle. It is a rather sad reflection on your reading skills that you think I was proposing Hoyle’s panspermia.

As for the “peer review published evidence” that all depends on who controls the printing presses and text books.

Those who control the printing presses, thank heavens, are those who lie in the great tradition of scientific investigation and truth - a tradition that stretches back to Galileo and before. Scientists have excluded superstition, magical thinking, religious prejudice, religious authority, fanatacism, sola scriptura from their methods. Yet scientists include devout followers of every religion and no religion.

The idea of “random mutation” leading up to all we see is simply improbable. I.

Ah, but your personal incredulity does not constitute evidence against the Theory of Evolution. Scientists are rather cleverer and more sophisticated than to accept something that is “simply improbable”. You have forgotten more than half of the neo-Darwinian theory and most of Darwin’s idea: Natural Selection which is anything but a random process.

Alec
evolutionpages.com

 

[hecd2]

Catholic Dude:

• After all we didnt get this information until 7 years later and only when the media wanted to release it.*

Incorrect - the timing is nothing to do with the media. The fact is that the paper has just been submitted to and published in Nature. It is not unusual for scientists to take many years to analyse and publish analyses of fossil discoveries.

The fact is “scientist” can mean anything, including those investing time in scientific practices which the Church considers immoral (eg cloning, embryonic stem cell experimentation, etc). Further scientists can classify unborn infants to be “blobs” thus abortion is not murder.

This is all quite irrelevant to the point in question which is whether scientists have systematically destroyed fossil evidence, which I repeat is a bizarre idea.

                          "not in any way"? Im not a scientist but that comment is an oversimplification at the least.

Any oversimplification is yours. Evolutionary theory does not require a linear progression of species as I explain very clearly in the sentences after the ones you put in bold and I repeat here: Both allopatric-with-migration and sympatric speciation can result in coexisting species that share a common ancestor. (A more modern example is H neanderthalensis and H sapiens in Europe - both evolved from an earlier common ancestor and both shared the same geographic range for many thousand years).

Further, the smallness of the skull is another issue which led the lead scientist to say this is one factor that goes against the theory man came from that species.

Perhaps you would be kind enough to give us a reference for that claim because I can’t see where the authors said any such thing.
Let’s not forget this from the actual scientific paper, which you have chosen not to comment on:
“As the earliest secure evidence of Homo is found outside the known region of overlap4, it is nonetheless possible that H. erectus evolved from H. habilis elsewhere, and that the Turkana basin was a region of secondary contact between the two hominin taxa”

Alec
evolutionpages.com

Bumping this, because we await a response to it from Catholic Dude. Why is he so silent about it?

Alec

 

[Catholic_Dude]

I proposed no such thing. I simply described a hypothesis put forward by Fred Hoyle. It is a rather sad reflection on your reading skills that you think I was proposing Hoyle’s panspermia.%between%

You said:
The only credible hypothesis of extraterrestrial life origins that I am aware of is Fred Hoyle’s panspermia. In that case the idea that earth was seeded with the origins of life - simple uni-celled organisms which arrived on meteorites and which subsequently developed on earth into eukaryotes and multi-celled organisms through the vast panoply of evolution that we know and understand. In fact, it seems very likely that some building blocks of life (some amino acids, some alkanes) arrived here on meteories such as the Murchison meteorite. It is likely that those building blocks were naturally formed in space.Ok, rereading this you didnt give a blanket acceptance of this theory, but you none the less called it “credible” and “very likely that some arrived on meteorites”. To say you proposed “no such thing” is no less misleading that what I said.

Those who control the printing presses, thank heavens, are those who lie in the great tradition of scientific investigation and truth - a tradition that stretches back to Galileo and before. Scientists have excluded superstition, magical thinking, religious prejudice, religious authority, fanatacism, sola scriptura from their methods. Yet scientists include devout followers of every religion and no religion.

Dream on. If you think the printing presses (media and academics) are controlled by purely objective individuals you are sadly mistaking. Turn on the TV and see what kind of “medically approved” medication is being marketed to adults under the guise of childish cartoons with a laundry list of “side effects” carefully woven in at the end. As for issues like abortion, one “scientist” can call it a blob while others call it a human. Dont even pretend there arent agendas at the highest levels. That is gullibility of the highest and most dangerous order.

Ah, but your personal incredulity does not constitute evidence against the Theory of Evolution. Scientists are rather cleverer and more sophisticated than to accept something that is “simply improbable”. You have forgotten more than half of the neo-Darwinian theory and most of Darwin’s idea: Natural Selection which is anything but a random process.

No, “natural selection” does not explain how such complex life forms emerged. It might answer why one survives over the other, but the mutations themselves, the very mutations that make one cell or animal ‘superior’ to the others is not at all explained. Your theory in no way explains how wings were first formed and led to flight or even why after all this mutation there isnt some super animal that holds the best characteristics of all lifeforms. The only thing close are humans, who radically dominate all other life forms, yet we are very weak (physically).

 

[Catholic_Dude]

Bumping this, because we await a response to it from Catholic Dude. Why is he so silent about it?
Alec

I didnt think it was worth responding to, we were on two sides of the fence and werent going anywhere. But if you want:

Incorrect - the timing is nothing to do with the media. The fact is that the paper has just been submitted to and published in Nature. It is not unusual for scientists to take many years to analyse and publish analyses of fossil discoveries.

Timing is everything. While you do have a point regarding the time it takes to analyze there is hardly a time when anything is published without the time itself taken into consideration (eg slow or declining circulation).

This is all quite irrelevant to the point in question which is whether scientists have systematically destroyed fossil evidence, which I repeat is a bizarre idea.

It is not a bizarre idea when you realize the stakes. Im not saying it for sure did happen, but to dismiss such an idea as bizarre shows a lack of understanding of how the world operates, especially politics.

Any oversimplification is yours. Evolutionary theory does not require a linear progression of species as I explain very clearly in the sentences after the ones you put in bold and I repeat here: Both allopatric-with-migration and sympatric speciation can result in coexisting species that share a common ancestor. (A more modern example is H neanderthalensis and H sapiens in Europe - both evolved from an earlier common ancestor and both shared the same geographic range for many thousand years).

According to the article "The old theory is that the first and oldest species in our family tree, Homo habilis, evolved into Homo erectus " that doesnt sound insignificant to me.
If I remember correctly the article even said there was a gap in the fossil record after 2M years.

Perhaps you would be kind enough to give us a reference for that claim because I can’t see where the authors said any such thing.

I guess that specific article didnt say it, but other articles that same day did, here is one I tracked down from the BBC:However, to some researchers, the small size of the erectus skull suggests that species may not have been as similar to us as we once thought.

Let’s not forget this from the actual scientific paper, which you have chosen not to comment on:
“As the earliest secure evidence of Homo is found outside the known region of overlap4, it is nonetheless possible that H. erectus evolved from H. habilis elsewhere, and that the Turkana basin was a region of secondary contact between the two hominin taxa”

I understand what you are saying, the idea that one evolved into the other cant be ruled out, though at this point it isnt as certain as it once was thought.

 

[hecd2]

I didnt think it was worth responding to, we were on two sides of the fence and werent going anywhere.

Actually you weren’t even in the ballpark

Timing is everything. While you do have a point regarding the time it takes to analyze there is hardly a time when anything is published without the time itself taken into consideration (eg slow or declining circulation).

I have no idea what your point is here. You claimed that the time between discovery and publication was sinister and I pointed out that it wasn’t - simple as that. You are simply wrong.

It is not a bizarre idea when you realize the stakes. Im not saying it for sure did happen, but to dismiss such an idea as bizarre shows a lack of understanding of how the world operates, especially politics.

Your claim that scientists have systematically destroyed evidence is insulting, unsupported by any evidence whatsoever, and frankly a fantastical invention of your own

If I remember correctly the article even said there was a gap in the fossil record after 2M years.

No it didn’t - another invention of yours.

I guess that specific article didnt say it, but other articles that same day did,

The only ‘article’ that counts is the scientific paper - and you still haven’t read it have you?

Alec
evolutionpages.com.

 

[wildleafblower]

Has this[Big Bang] theory ever been positively verified by any means at all? .

Nobel Prize winner (2006) George Smoot (center) is pictured with Dr. Tayeb A. Kamali (R) Vice-Chancellor of the Higher Colleges of Technology, and Dr. Bob Richards (L) CEO of CERT during meetings in Abu Dhabi on July 28. Professor Smoot is the American astrophysicist and cosmologist who was awarded the 2006 Nobel Prize in Physics with John C. Mather for their discovery of the black body form and anisotropy of the cosmic microwave background radiation. This work helped cement the big-bang theory of the universe using the COBE (Cosmic Background Explorer) satellite. According to the Nobel Prize committee, “the COBE-project can be regarded as the starting point for cosmology as a precision science”. Dr. Smoot is a professor of physics at the University of California, Berkeley. In 2003 he was awarded the Einstein Medal.
certonline.com/NewsAndEvents/News/2007/7/Nobel-Laureate-visits-CERT.aspx
http://www.certonline.com/NewsAndEvents/News/2007/7/Nobel-Laureate-visits-CERT.aspx

Humm, I need to return to page 3 for an important update!

 

[zian]

ok, I’ll bite …

Isn’t the premise of this thread just the bogus “if humans evolved from apes, then why are there still apes?” argument?