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buffalo
Guest
aka theories. History predicting the future.
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Donald45
Guest
You’ve fallen into a common error here, mistaking the everyday, colloquial use of the term “theory” (which we take to mean a guess, hunch, or speculation) for a “theory” as the term is actually used within science. Within science, a theory—think of gravitational theory, cell theory, relativity theory, or nuclear theory—is not a mere guess. A scientific theory is an empirically-based, evidentially supported explanatory model of the forms and functions of the material world. As theories go, evolution is as close to a certainty as one is likely to find in science. Your claim that “there is no proof of evolution” betrays a vast absence of understanding regarding science in general and evolutionary theory in particular.
I recommend this inexpensive, but excellent little book:
Brian & Deborah Charlesworth, Evolution: A Very Short Introduction (Oxford, 2003); ISBN 0-19-280251-8
God bless,
Don
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Donald45
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Cf. my Post #62.
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Donald45
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Evolution supporters here ignore such comments because they are based on a basic lack of understanding regarding the nature and workings of science. Scientific conclusions are always provisional, never absolute (unlike dogmatic theological conclusions). The frequent use of terms like “maybe” or “might be” simply reflect the provisional nature of scientific conclusions, as well as the scientist’s awareness that—in principle at least—no statement of science is ever final. It is acknowledged that, at some point in the future, new evidence could always lead to different conclusions on a given point. There is therefore a certain humility expressed in such terminology that is often missed by anti-evolutionists.
Of course, some scientific conclusions are more developed, command more scientific confidence, than others. Gravitational theory, for instance, is (like all scientific conclusions) a provisional concept, yet who would seriously be willing to dispute its reality? No scientific statement, in principle, is ever final, but some hold an extremely high degree of scientific confidence, even to the point of virtual certainty (consider heliocentric theory, cell theory, or nuclear theory). Evolution theory, compared with other scientific theories, is as firm and secure a concept as you are likely to find in the sciences.
Concerning using talkorigins as a source for information on evolution, see my Post #30 above.
As for evolution being “nothing but a theory,” see my Post # 62 above.
From this point on, you can consider your comments unignored.
God bless,
Don
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Donald45
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ScottH said:
- If “we don’t know” whether either evolution or creationism is true, why would you insist that either one be taught in a science classromm, let alone both? How are we to teach “with vigor” that at which we can only “guess”?
- The founder of the geological principle of stratigraphy and developer of the geologic column was a Christian named William Smith. Such empirical evidence is in no way contradictory to Christian theology, properly understood, and vice versa.
Don
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2shelbys
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Hi Don,
I have looked in to a lot of sources that have been recommended to me and every single one of them is absolutely full of speculation and guesswork. I am willing to believe the teachings of the Church without requiring proof, that is the basic definition of “faith”. I do not however, have faith in evolution.
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2shelbys
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Don,
Others have tried to say this before but to essentially say that science is nothing more than speculation or “educated” guessing, and that it has never proven anything is simply not true.
Also, I did not mean that my comment was ignored. I meant that the completely speculative nature of evolution as blatantly portrayed in the articles on the talkorigins site is always ignored, but thank you for your consideration.
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Orogeny
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What you want are absolutes. NO science works that way. Name me one single scientific theory that has been proven. One. I’ll wait.
Peace
Tim
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Orogeny
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Which one?
Peace
Tim
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Donald45
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What I suggested was that scientific conclusions are provisional. For you to equate this idea with science being “nothing more than speculation” is a complete non sequitor. Also, I did not say that science never proves anything in any sense whatsoever, only that it doesn’t “prove” things in an absolute, dogmatic sense. To equate my comments with a description such as “the completely speculative nature of evolution” is categorically erroneous. Provisional conclusions are not the same as “speculative guesses.” This is an idea you seem to insist on reading into the situation.
Don
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Donald45
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Nor do I, since affirming evolution requires no faith. It does, however, call for a certain amount of self-education in matters of science, the history of science, and in evolution especially. Acknowledging the reality of evolution in the natural world is not a matter of faith, but of adequate scientific understanding. This is why I often recommend books on this forum. Here are a few “must-haves”:
Brian & Deborah Charlesworth, Evolution: A Very Short Introduction (Oxford, 2003)
Niles Eldredge, The Triumph of Evolution (Freeman, 2000)
Edward J. Larson, Evolution: The Remarkable History of a Scientific Theory (Modern Library, 2004)
David Lindberg & R. Numbers, God & Nature: Historical Essays on the Encounter between Christianity & Science (U. of California, 1986)
Ernst Mayr, What Evolution Is (Basic Books, 2001)
Keith B. Miller, Perspectives On An Evolving Creation (Eerdmans, 2003) [If I were to recommend any single book to Christians, it would be this one]
God bless,
Don
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TheRaiders
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Tim,
Archaeopteryx is not a transitional anything. It is a bird. Did you know feathers, of which this bird has, are much more close to hair than scales? This bird was covered all over with feathers, even though some artists draw a scaley head. By the way, the head used to be drawn reptilian due to its crushed nature, but it is now known by scientists that it is actually a bird head with a large cerebellum and visual cortex.
Also, there are similar design aspects shared amongst birds, mammals, and reptiles so those in themselves don’t prove anything.
These theories layed out and eagerly ate up by evolutionist scientists can not be tested. Also, they don’t make sense.
This new fossil is interesting but I am so wary of their claims about it because of what evolution scientists did with Archaeopteryx. If I were you I’d find another example, because that one is horrible.
Patrick
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TheRaiders
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Don,
I have studied science and understand it. You don’t have a monopoly on that. Also, ever read Dr. Sarfati’s work? Didn’t think so. Those two ways to look at blue eyes are interesting, but the Christian viewpoit is a straw-man argument trying to make Christians with faith look stupid. Let me propose a third way to look at our blue eyes: God created the world, including eyes, and then stepped back from nature and let it run according to His laws. It is this view of God and His creation that made science possible because nature was not fickle, and it was made with patterns by a common creator. I recomend you read about science history, and you’ll find most major founders of modern science fields believed in a primitive form of the modern Inteligent Design movement. So, in conclusion, Christians believe they have blue eyes because their parents gave them blue eyes. They attribute anyone even having eyes to God giving them to us. Evolution-believing Christians don’t know it, but when they say God guided evolution they are believing the very thing that early Christian scientists rejected in Greek and Roman thought: That nature is constantly changed by fickle powers in the universe. It is much more coherant with science history (which follows closely Christian history) to say that God created a diverse biological world, with the ability for blue eyes, green eyes, and what I have: hazel.
I write computer programs, and it is anything but a random process. How much less so is creation, which is packed full of infinately more complex and inter-dependant pragrams we call genetic codes. They were created by God.
Patrick
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Orogeny
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Well, let’s see. It didn’t have a bill. How many birds have no bills? It’s trunk region vertebra are free. How many birds don’t have those vertebra fused? Pubic shafts with a plate-like, and slightly angled transverse cross-section, something not found in birds. Cerebral hemispheres elongate, slender and cerebellum is situated behind the mid-brain and doesn’t overlap it from behind or press down on it. Not at all like birds. Neck attaches to skull from the rear as in dinosaurs not from below as in modern birds. Long bony tail with many free vertebrae up to tip (no pygostyle), not found in modern birds. Pelvic girdle and femur joint is archosaurian rather than avian. Most important, it had teeth. How many toothed birds are there?
Those are from talkorigins.org/faqs/archaeopteryx/info.html#reptile-features
Not even a good try. Archaeopteryx is classified as a bird simply because of the feathers and opposable big thumb. Since that classification, several different species of feathered dinosaurs have been described, so that classification is tentative at best.
Peace
Tim
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TheRaiders
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Just quickly on the teeth. A lot of fossill birds have been found with grasping teeth (the type the Archaeopteryx bird has). Icthyornis and HesperornisIs are two. Also, is it even a reptilian feature to have teeth? No. My lizard doesn’t have teeth. Lots of them don’t. Some mammals have teeth some don’t.
Also, speaking of bills. Ever heard of that mammal called the duckbill plat
You are mistaken Tim, and I don’t blame you. The story that evolutionists put to finds like these makes it all seem very credible.
But did you know that the avian lung design is unique, and also present in Archaeopteryx?
Also, its brain was found to be 3 times the size of a dinosaur of that same size. It also had a wishbone. This highly specialized bone doesn’t pop into someone’s chest overnight, as feathers start growing and brain size triples, and their breathing system is revolutionized.
Evolutionists are often unimaginative people in the sense that they don’t even try to imagine all the things that go in to acheiving flight. Often times they just say “Anything can happen in billions of years”. They can’t even agree on how it was achieved: from jumping up or gliding down out of trees.
But flight requires many things, including good balance. The inner ear and cochlea of this fossil bird were within the range of modern birds. Also, the wishbone must be designed much more flexible than the average bone.
Back to the feathers again: Scales are not in any way similar to feathers. Like hair, feathers come from follicles. Scales do not. But evolutionists (currently) believe we mammals evolved seperately from reptiles.
Here’s something from an evolutionary biology journal:
‘At the morphological level feathers are traditionally considered homologous with reptilian scales. However, in development, morphogenesis, gene structure, protein shape and sequence, and filament formation and structure, feathers are different.’ A.H. Brush, ‘On the origin of feathers’, Journal of Evolutionary Biology 9:131–142, 1996.]
My point is not that this fossil doesn’t share some similarities with reptiles. It is that it was a fully formed bird, not a transitional one. Its feathers were fully formed, as were the things I listed. If you knew about evolution science, transitional species can’t show only fully formed traits of one or the other classification but TRANSITIONAL traits. For instance, we can’t consider a bat transitional between birds and humans, nor a duckbill platypus as a transition between ducks and mammals.
I’ll close with asking if anyone heard about the bird fossil that was found to be 60 million years older than Archaeopteryx? That just doesn’t make sense!
Patrick
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TheRaiders
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Oh, about those feathered dinosaurs you are talking about is one of them Sinosauropteryx prima? Well, turns out after it was touted as proof, later scientists found that the feathers were just a parallel array of fibres probably collagen. The headlines about proof of bird evolution were no matched with headlines about no proof when the Sinosauropteryx prima was found to be just another regular dinosaur. If you think about it, dinosaurs are not ideal for producing birds, they have short forelimbs and large heavy tails. This is the opposite of the ideal candidate.
Also, about beaks. In a sense Archaeopteryx did have a beak. In birds the most unique trait about their jaw is that both the maxilla (upper jaw) and mandible (lower jaw) move. In reptiles and mammals it doesn’t. This supposed transitional bird already had this fully-formed feature, as well as the above-mentioned traits.
It is an interesting fossil, to say the least. I’m scared as hell of big Ostriches. Imagine how much more scary this big bird would be? But I look at it differently than you. I look at how creative God is, and how some of the traits he put into animals are shared between vastly different anials and some are unique and unexplainably belong to just one species. It is as if God made those weird ones just to throw us prideful humans off when we thought we had his design plans figured out.
Patrick
Also, about beaks. In a sense Archaeopteryx did have a beak. In birds the most unique trait about their jaw is that both the maxilla (upper jaw) and mandible (lower jaw) move. In reptiles and mammals it doesn’t. This supposed transitional bird already had this fully-formed feature, as well as the above-mentioned traits.
It is an interesting fossil, to say the least. I’m scared as hell of big Ostriches. Imagine how much more scary this big bird would be? But I look at it differently than you. I look at how creative God is, and how some of the traits he put into animals are shared between vastly different anials and some are unique and unexplainably belong to just one species. It is as if God made those weird ones just to throw us prideful humans off when we thought we had his design plans figured out.
Patrick
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Digger71
Guest
Well, there’s an interesting bit of history to the aerchiopterix, when first discovered Fred Hoyle insisted that it was so much like a theropod that the feathers had to be forgeries. Of course it wasnt. So because feathers were considered exclusive to birds it automatically was placed in the avian family. However, calling it an bird in no way makes the boney tail, snout, unfused spine disappear. The 17 reptilian features are still there.
When creationists get in to a flap saying ‘it’s a bird, a BIRD’ they need to explain those 17 features away. They never manage this, instead they gloss over these features.
Feathers and feather-like structures are now known to have been on many dinosaurs which were clearly not birds.
Some examples:
Dilong paradoxus
Cryptovolans pauli
Protarchaeopteryx robusta (this one is interesting because it has the same fine fibres as found on Sinosauropteryx prima over much of it’s body and quilled feathers on it’s arms and tail, supporting Sinosauropteryx primainclusion in the feathered dinosaurs)
Anyway. I’m digressing.
When creationists get in to a flap saying ‘it’s a bird, a BIRD’ they need to explain those 17 features away. They never manage this, instead they gloss over these features.
Feathers and feather-like structures are now known to have been on many dinosaurs which were clearly not birds.
Some examples:
Dilong paradoxus
Cryptovolans pauli
Protarchaeopteryx robusta (this one is interesting because it has the same fine fibres as found on Sinosauropteryx prima over much of it’s body and quilled feathers on it’s arms and tail, supporting Sinosauropteryx primainclusion in the feathered dinosaurs)
Anyway. I’m digressing.
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Digger71
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‘In a sense’?
Why are giraffes like saddle back tortoises?
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Flopfoot
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Why are discussions about science in the Apologetics forum? Shouldn’t this be in the water cooler?
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Digger71
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The following theropods have been found to have wishbones:
Aves.
Dromaeosaurids, including a new North American species of Velociraptor.
Oviraptorids
Tyrannosaurids.
Troodontids
Coelophysids (Syntarsus and Coelophysis)
Allosauroids including: the new Dinosaur National Monument allosaurid; Allosaurus fragilis, whose furcula was misidentified for years as gastralia; and a new carcharodontosaurid from Argentina.
A recent study of a theropod dinosaur called Majungatholus atopus was found to have what appears to be pneumaticity similar structures to birds. This was in 2005, but the resemblence was noted in the late 19th C. Coelurus fragilis described in 1879 and it’s pheunatic bone structure noted then. Darwins friend, Huxley, also noted the similarity. Other therepods have been studied with similar conclusions. Similar holes in the bone structure have also been found in sauropods. Pneumatic bones enable a bird or dinosaur to expand its overall body size without a commensurate increase in weight…interesting isnt it? The biggest ever living creatures have pheumatic-like structures in their bones.
The way you phrased you statement reveals that you think the features you describe were not wide-spread, but the fossil record certainly supports the opposite conclusion. The were features many types of animal had in common which were clearly not birds.
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