My thoughts on evolution

[Sideline]

I am interested in this thread, but not informed enough on either side to join in the debate Can you (Sideline, Barabarian, or other posters) recommend a basic text on evolution and one on creationism for the average non-scientific reader? (I’m looking for something more modern than “The Origin of the Species” and “The Book of Genesis”)
Thank you

Personally, I’d recommend an introductory biology textbook to start off. They are, after all, designed expressly to give people the basic overview and “textbook” approach to the subject. Most of the other books I’ve read have given a more specialized view of evolution.

My first recommendation would be the Prentice Hall book, Biology by Miller and Levine. I haven’t read that particular book yet, but I’ve read other writing by Miller, and he is very clear and easy to understand. It’s often called “the dragonfly book” because of the picture on the cover. I wouldn’t expect that you would want to read it cover to cover, but I would recommend not only reading the section on evolution. You’d at least want to read the section on ecology, genetics, and cells.

I’m actually planning on reading this book myself as a refresher. It’s been a long time since I’ve studied biology in school.

I really don’t think I’m a good choice to be recommending creationist or intelligent design book. It’s kind of hard to recommend something that I don’t think has merit. Perhaps
Of Pandas and People? It is a book that was recommended as a textbook, and theoretically should have a broad overview of the subject.

 

[Sideline]

Well, I don’t know about the Barbarian, but when I was a Captain, I’d get orders from battalion, issue my orders to the platoon leaders and NCOs, then yell, “Saddle up!” and off we’d go.

I’ve probably walked several thousand miles in my time – usually carrying a much bigger load than any sane man would want to carry.

Oh, I completely misunderstood. I thought he was being asked to observe a person walking as an experiment of some type.

I get it now.

 

[The_Barbarian]

“Of Pandas and People” can be a bit of a trap. For example, it says that variations in cytochrome c are a problem for scientists, since mammals, birds, reptiles and amphibians are all equally different from fish.

They hide the fact that this is exactly what we’d see if evolution were true. Many an earnest young creationist has embarrassed himself by relying on that book.

Maybe a quick review of Answers in Genesis’s list of “Arguments We Think Creationists Should Not Use” would be a good idea.
answersingenesis.org/home/area/faq/dont_use.asp

It debunks some of the loonier stuff some creationists rely on.

 

[mapleoak]

Oh, I completely misunderstood. I thought he was being asked to observe a person walking as an experiment of some type.

I get it now.

Well, it was said that Barbarian the ‘scientist’ has observed it. One would conclude it was an experiment. Strange experiment it would be indeed. Wrong conclusion I guess. Sorry Barbarian.

The problem is, they appear in sequence in the fossil record. So that belief is not supportable.

Well no, it is supportable, for one because looking at three sets of fossils lets say, one cannot conclude that the middle one is an intermediary step from the first to the last. All three creatures could very well exist at the same time, each leaving their own fossils behind.
Two, it is very possible that many of the fossilized creatures never existed, but their footprint remains due to the world being created in a state of existence and set in motion.

 

[Sideline]

Well no, it is supportable, for one because looking at three sets of fossils lets say, one cannot conclude that the middle one is an intermediary step from the first to the last. All three creatures could very well exist at the same time, each leaving their own fossils behind.
Two, it is very possible that many of the fossilized creatures never existed, but their footprint remains due to the world being created in a state of existence and set in motion.

Or they could all have been put on earth by the devil to deceive people. Or they could have been created by aliens. Or the fossils might actually just grow in rocks.

Or… what all of the evidence points to could have been what really did happen.

 

[The_Barbarian]

Well no, it is supportable, for one because looking at three sets of fossils lets say, one cannot conclude that the middle one is an intermediary step from the first to the last.

We could, if the evidence so indicated. For example, we can show that Orohippis is an intermediate between Hyracotherium and Epihippus, because of gradual changes in the skull, teeth, and legs.

All three creatures could very well exist at the same time, each leaving their own fossils behind.

Indeed. After all, if you are alive, your father doesn’t necessarily have to be dead.

Two, it is very possible that many of the fossilized creatures never existed, but their footprint remains due to the world being created in a state of existence and set in motion.

That would require that God be deceptive, so I never considered it.

 

[mapleoak]

That would require that God be deceptive, so I never considered it.

Not so. Consider if the world were newly created. If there is an apple tree, it would appear to have all the qualities of being a full grown apple tree which would include appearing to have existed from birth through maturity. This is not deception, rather a fully grown apple tree set into motion in a ‘state’ of existence. The same could be said of an apple seed, if one concludes that everything had to develop from some prior state. The apple seed would have had to appear to be a certain age or stage in development. Would God create a seed that appears to have been the product of an apple tree to deceive? No it would have been created and set into motion in a ‘state’ of existence. We can take it further back and say rather than there being an apple tree or an apple seed, there was just dirt or there were just molecues that had to be arranged. Here also, the dirt would have an ‘apparent’ age and all these molecues would have an ‘apparent’ age. In order to conclude that God is being deceptive, one would have to reason that the creation of time is a deception, since it is apparent that time has no beginning.

 

[The_Barbarian]

Barbarian on the idea that God would form fake fossils:
That would require that God be deceptive, so I never considered it.

Not so. Consider if the world were newly created. If there is an apple tree, it would appear to have all the qualities of being a full grown apple tree which would include appearing to have existed from birth through maturity. This is not deception, rather a fully grown apple tree set into motion in a ‘state’ of existence.

God, forming a fossil that falsely indicated a living thing once existed, would be deceptive. No other way to put it. Likewise. the ancient supernovae we observe, would be clear dishonesties, if they were merely radiation created a few thousands of years ago, to falsely indicate the explosion of a star that never existed, many millions of years ago.

“Apparent age” would be a deception, no matter how it’s excused. And God would not do it.

 

[mapleoak]

mapleoak on the rejection of the idea that apparent age is deception:

God, forming a fossil that falsely indicated a living thing once existed, would be deceptive. No other way to put it. Likewise. the ancient supernovae we observe, would be clear dishonesties, if they were merely radiation created a few thousands of years ago, to falsely indicate the explosion of a star that never existed, many millions of years ago.

“Apparent age” would be a deception, no matter how it’s excused. And God would not do it.

Anything and everything that exists has an apparent age. Everything that exists has to have had a beginning. Time itself had a beginning. When time began would you say everything looked ‘new’ or did would it have had an ‘apparent’ not ‘actual’ age? Can you describe what the properties of matter are that is new versus that of matter that has been around awhile (or would appear to have been around awhile).
To say that apparent age is deception is the same as saying that God setting the clock of time in motion is deception.

 

[vern_humphrey]

mapleoak on the rejection of the idea that apparent age is deception:

Anything and everything that exists has an apparent age. Everything that exists has to have had a beginning. Time itself had a beginning. When time began would you say everything looked ‘new’ or did would it have had an ‘apparent’ not ‘actual’ age? Can you describe what the properties of matter are that is new versus that of matter that has been around awhile (or would appear to have been around awhile).
To say that apparent age is deception is the same as saying that God setting the clock of time in motion is deception.

“New” animals and plants would have no antecedents. Animals and plants that have been around for hundreds of generations would leave remains – fossils.

 

[I_like_Mike]

It is interesting how the human race nitpicks over the slightest details in their lack of understanding and yet glosses over the larger issues of burning the resources of the world way faster than they can be produced.

If a caretaker was put in charge of a whole world and then allowed their offspring to burn, foul, fight and speak ill of the creator of that world… that caretaker and offspring had best have their own means of finding alternate lodgings and not presume any rights or favours as to future lodgings, especially if their last efforts ruined that world for all time.

 

[mapleoak]

“New” animals and plants would have no antecedents. Animals and plants that have been around for hundreds of generations would leave remains – fossils.

But I was considering even the simplest of material forms in existence. If it exists at all, it has to have apparent age. And would seem to have always existed without a starting point in time. If one were alive at the beginning of time, one could not look at ones surroundings and reason that time just started. It would appear to have always been.

 

[mapleoak]

It is interesting how the human race nitpicks over the slightest details in their lack of understanding and yet glosses over the larger issues of burning the resources of the world way faster than they can be produced.

Actually resources are being produced faster than they are being used. Such as is the case with the paper industry.
It really depends ‘which’ resources one is talking about.

 

[vern_humphrey]

But I was considering even the simplest of material forms in existence. If it exists at all, it has to have apparent age. And would seem to have always existed without a starting point in time. If one were alive at the beginning of time, one could not look at ones surroundings and reason that time just started. It would appear to have always been.

That would depend on how good you were at reasoning.

For example, if you understood atomic decay, you would note certain elements are missing – lead, for example. You would find no remains of earlier creatures. You would find no claddistic links between creatures – showing common ancestry. DNA would not show close links between certain species, and wider spreads between others.

 

[mapleoak]

That would depend on how good you were at reasoning.

For example, if you understood atomic decay, you would note certain elements are missing – lead, for example. You would find no remains of earlier creatures. You would find no claddistic links between creatures – showing common ancestry. DNA would not show close links between certain species, and wider spreads between others.

Even ‘time’ itself appears to have no beginning. Yet it had one.

 

[vern_humphrey]

Even ‘time’ itself appears to have no beginning. Yet it had one.

In order to say that, you’d have to define “time” – something no one has yet accomplished.

 

[mapleoak]

In order to say that, you’d have to define “time” – something no one has yet accomplished.

Well, that is beyond my limited thinking.

 

[The_Barbarian]

Anything and everything that exists has an apparent age.

So far, everything that has an “apparent age”, when we check, was as old as the evidence says. But this really doesn’t have anything to do with God faking evidence, with fossils of animals that never existed, or radiation from stars that never existed. That would be blatant dishonesty, which is incompatible with God.

To say that apparent age is deception is the same as saying that God setting the clock of time in motion is deception.

No one actually knows what that means, so it’s not in the least deceptive. But planting fake fossils or radiation from non-existent stars sure would be.

Such things are entirely incompatible with the Christian God.

 

[buffalo]

So far, everything that has an “apparent age”, when we check, was as old as the evidence says. But this really doesn’t have anything to do with God faking evidence, with fossils of animals that never existed, or radiation from stars that never existed. That would be blatant dishonesty, which is incompatible with God.

No one actually knows what that means, so it’s not in the least deceptive. But planting fake fossils or radiation from non-existent stars sure would be.

Such things are entirely incompatible with the Christian God.

Agreed - a deliberate act of God to deceive would not be consistent. However, our lack of fullness of understanding of our observations does not implicate God as a deceiver

 

[kalt]

“That settled it. If Hitler believed in evolution, then the theory had no merit.”

Many people believed (and many still believe) that eugenics makes perfect sense, because they read about evolution.

Many people reject evolution because they’ve read about eugenics.

I guess both groups deserve each other.