The scariest thing I've read in a while.

[Son of Disaster]

I'll be honest, I got to that point in DK's post and I was like "there is no way I'm reading all of these words after someone makes a claim like that"

Evolution is a fact, teaching anything over it is ignorant at best, dishonest and malicious at worst.

Sadly evolution is not fact. There's a reason it's a theory. It's the complete lack of evidence to back up species turning into a completely different species. Claiming it as a fact and the only thing to be taught is as ignorant as not allowing for anything to be taught at all.

Noone can doubt micro evolutioun. It's seen throughout all the species. Even humans exhibit micro evolution. Chileans in the Andes having shorter stockier legs for example. But this is more an adaption response than a species transformation. To be short there is no evidence of species changing from anything but their own base form.
@ metal gear samus The flower link for example is flowers changing into very slightly different flowers. And that paper had it's own section arguing the validity of the biological species concept. It didn't seem to be trying to make the point that plants turn into something other than plants either.
@mr indigo. the catholic church isn't christianity.

Whoever brought up global warming is also delusional.

I like the thought that the federal government should be out out the school system. It should be handled at a much lower level. If government run schools are to exist they should not be based on the tax everyone system. It should be the tax if used. Here's a little food for thought. somewhat interesting

 

[popemobile]

You don't understand the difference between a theory and a scientific theory. Let me help you out:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theory#Scientific_theories

edit: in response to the other part of your post:

The 'distinction' between 'micro' and 'macro' evolution does not exist - they form a continuum. For the most part it is only creationists that claim such a distinction exists.

Also there is plenty of evidence for macro evolution. It's not directly observable because its effects take significantly longer than the amount of time we've been observing it, but your claim that there is a lack of evidence is either ignorant or deceitful

Start here: http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/comdesc/

 

[Obsessed]

Sadly evolution is not fact. There's a reason it's a theory. It's the complete lack of evidence to back up species turning into a completely different species. Claiming it as a fact and the only thing to be taught is as ignorant as not allowing for anything to be taught at all.

To be short there is no evidence of species changing from anything but their own base form.
@ metal gear samus The flower link for example is flowers changing into very slightly different flowers. And that paper had it's own section arguing the validity of the biological species concept. It didn't seem to be trying to make the point that plants turn into something other than plants either.

Your ignorance is showing. I suppose you are going to tell us that the theories of gravity/relativity/spread of disease via germs, are all still theories due to lack of evidence?

A scientific theory by definition is backed up by a lot of evidence, otherwise it would be a hypothesis.

Also you seem to be arguing "kinds." Like, flowers only become other "kinds" of flowers. The concept of kinds is a creationist concept.

http://darwinwasright.homestead.com/11thFFoC.html

(ctrl + f: kinds to skip to this part)

Creationists insist that macroevolution has never been observed, and the excuse they use to deny that it has requires the addition of a bogus condition that simply does not apply. Creationists argue that evolution can only occur within “definite limits”, and then only to subtle variance within their “kind”. They say new diversity is limited to rare and unviable hybrids between those “kinds”, and they usually say that the emergence of new species is impossible.

No “Darwinist” would ever say any of these things. Sorry Stein, but you’ve lost your mind.

In the evolutionary perspective, any single ancestral species can diverge into two or more daughter species, each becoming so distinct that eventually either of the new species would be unable to interbreed with the ancestral and/or sister species anymore. But by ignoring fossil forms, the creationist’s perspective has that completely backwards, insisting instead on an illusory sequence of separately conjured “kinds” which (like “information”) must remain forever undefined, and they imagine that evolutionary diversity can only occur by mixing these “kinds” in hybridization. This is another reason they reject transitional fossils, and instead demand some blend only between current “kinds”. Their perspective has no depth.

Creationists may refuse to acknowledge geologic time scales, and cannot admit that any new organism might be unable to interbreed with the stock from whence it came because their sacred fables say they were “created each after their own kind”. But of course they can’t say what a “kind’ is either, because it’s impossible to identify any point in taxonomy where everything that ever lived isn’t evidently related to everything else. So they largely ignore phylogenetics altogether.

Creationists have to deny macroevolution for the same reason they have to deny transitional species, not because these combined realities can only indicate an animal ancestry, but because either one alone proves that such is at least possible, and creationists are not permitted to admit even that.

If it is possible to walk twenty feet, it’s possible to walk twenty miles. So creationists insist there must be some “definite boundary” blocking the evolution of new “kinds”. But they won’t say where or what that boundary is. Creationists habitually misdefine their terms –if they can be forced to use definitions at all, because they will not be accountable. They can’t be, because they’ve decided in advance never to change their minds even if they’re proven wrong. If they were to find out that macroevolution was ever actually seen and proven to have happened for certain, their cultish faith would still forbid them to admit it. Instead they’d have to redefine their terms, to “move the goalposts” to some higher taxonomic level –but not so high as to have to admit where humans belong in the families of apes.

But now we know there really is no level above species, because every other “grade” in taxonomy is more or less arbitrarily assigned as a construct of human convenience. The Linnaean ranks of family, genus, order, and phyla, are all factually illustrative, but virtually meaningless otherwise because every new taxonomic class that ever evolved began with speciation, the emergence of a distinctly new species, but one that was still just a modified version of whatever its parents were, and who’s eventual descendants will always belong to whatever categories their ancestors did also –no matter how much they may change as time goes on.

The only reason creationists cling to these “micro” and “macro” distinctions is so they can have some excuse to accept “small scale” evolution, which they begrudgingly admit cannot be denied even with the greatest faith; while still denying “large scale” evolution where their exact parameter of “how large” must remain illusive to prevent it ever being disproved. Of course that means “large scale” evolution can mean whatever they want it to at that moment. Frank Sherwin from the Institute of Creation Research recently defined macroevolution as “the origin of every kind of animal”, and later on in the same discussion, he changed his definition to “the origin of all life”. He knows he’s using the terms incorrectly. He simply doesn’t care!

But the fact is he doesn’t get to conveniently redefine what these terms have always meant to the scientists who invented those words in the first place. According to Universities actually teaching this subject, microevolution is variation within species, and macroevolution is variation between species. The different breeds of dogs are an example of microevolution, while the different species of wolves and foxes, panthers and felines, horses and zebras, or llamas and camels –are all examples of macroevolution. Each set is definitely biologically closely-related, but they’re each different species, not different “kinds” of the same one.

Macroevolution is properly defined as the emergence of new taxa at or above the species level. The only time creationists will use the proper definition is when they are as-yet unaware of the fact that speciation has already been directly-observed and documented dozens of times –both in the lab and in naturally-controlled conditions in the field. In fact, we’ve seen it so many times we’ve had to categorize recurrent types of macroevolution we’ve seen so often repeated. Once creationists find out about all this, their first reaction is to use the excuse that some newly evolved species of fruit fly or fish somehow still doesn’t count because it’s “still” a fly or it’s “still” a fish. Well of course it is! Evolution couldn’t permit them to be anything else.

Creationists demand that the new species be so different from their parents that one can’t even tell they’re related. The irony there is that evolutionary theory never suggests that one “kind” of thing ever turned into another, fundamentally-different “kind” of anything, not unless you ignore all the intermediate stages –which of course creationists do.

 

[Firestorm]

Whoever brought up global warming is also delusional.

Nobody but you has brought up global warming.

Also, the link you posted is so very terrible. Did you read the factors? How is a list like that even remotely interesting to anyone with some semblance of intelligence?

I would ask you to read up on what a scientific theory is so you don't make up any more definitions to explain why there is pressure to keep students ignorant of the world around them.

 

[Son of Disaster]

Among other things, they aim to rehabilitate Joseph McCarthy, bring global-warming denial into science class, and downplay the contributions of the civil rights movement.

It was from Obsessed original article. I didn't bother going back to look at who actually said it. Anyway.

@ firestorm what made the factors so terrible might i ask? i wasn't really using it as much of anything. just an interesting idea.

@ pope I'm actually quite well aware of the definition of theory. Yet i made the point because you are calling it fact, which in my mind reads as law. Which it is not. I was commenting about the narrowmindness of only one theory being logical or applicable.

@ obsessed you seem to be assuming what i do and don't believe from a statement that you misinterpreted. I was merely pointing out the danger of falling into one way thinking, in which questioning an idea is not an option.
It doesn't really matter who coined the term micro and macro evolution. They are used as terms to define a broader realm or concepts. It allows for a quick reference to ideas of evolutionary theory. The semantic arguments are not really useful. Most of the argument in the article you cited is that the only people opposing evolutionary theory are religious nut jobs. It could easily be flipped to say that the only people in support of evolutionary theory are atheists. Sweeping generalizations such as these are worthless and do nothing more than try to belittle those of opposite beliefs.

Also the intermediary stages reffered to in all linked sites are terribly huge leaps to make. They are not backed by a fossil record at all. This piece of work gives a leap from a few artistic renditions of reassembled skulls to a body and then the next huge leap to whales. instead of the huge amounts of fossils that should litter the fossil record there are a few horribly over interpretered skeletons and sometimes only skulls. Transitionary forms should be all over the fossil record. And yet they are not. That is why evolutionary theory lacks so much evidence. I also didn't know that darwin believed bears turned into whales. Which seems a bit far of a stretch for me to accept.

The evolutionary concept of kinds is rather the same as the creationist one. That one kind of species through a long period of time adapted into a different species or rather sprung another species from itself. Yet their is simply not the amount of fossils that their should be. if such a concept were true then the fossil record should show far far more transitional forms than all of the species we see today. Natural selection would take care of those species evolution that failed and we would see millions of failed species.

 

[lati0s]

@ pope I'm actually quite well aware of the definition of theory. Yet i made the point because you are calling it fact, which in my mind reads as law. Which it is not. I was commenting about the narrowmindness of only one theory being logical or applicable.

You say that you understand what a theory is but what you say afterward shows that you don't. There are 4 main things in science: observations, laws, theories, and hypotheses, if we consider a fact to be something that is certain then none of these are facts. An observation is any information detected by the senses possibly with tools to aid them, a law is a description of a set of observations, a theory is a proposed and well-supported explanation of why something happens, a hypothesis is an unsupported or poorly supported guess as to why something works.

For example, consider if I pick up my pencil and then drop it and it falls to the floor. The observation is that my pencil fell when I dropped it. Now suppose that I were to drop lots of objects from lots of places and I observed that they all fell until they landed on something, the law of these observations would be that objects fall when dropped. The theory here is that objects fall when dropped because they are attracted to the earth by a force called gravity, that is stronger for heavier objects. One hypothesis here could be that gravity is controlled by a tiny particle called a graviton, which has never been observed but makes sense because other fundamental forces act in this way.

Note that a theory does not need to be disputed, in many cases, like gravity, the evidence for one theory over all others is so compelling that it would be stupid to consider the others. So when one theory is clearly far more supported than any other hypotheses that explain what it explains it is not narrow minded at all to consider only the best theory. Many times people call prevalent scientific theories, like gravity or evolution, facts because they are so likely to be true that there is no more practical need to consider that they may be false than there is practical need to consider that zombies will rise from the dead and attack tomorrow.

 

[popemobile]

thank you lati0s for saving me the time of making nearly that exact same post

 

[Scoopapa]

Dude, this stuff isn't scary at all. Evolution is a hoax, the United States has never done anything wrong (OK it has but don't expect me to ever concede an individual point), and Martin Luther King only deserves passing mention when it comes to civil rights (which itself only deserves passing mention). Only Texas has the courage and moral fiber to stand up and set us all straight!

All joking aside, I'd really like to say a few words about evolution. A theory is the highest form of scientific knowledge, because it actually explains observations that otherwise would have no context. Theories explain several facts. For instance, every fossil we find represents a fact about the morphology of a given animal at a given point in time. Thus, that the form of life has changed slowly over time is a collection of facts. In fact, it is a collection of facts that was appreciated before Darwin. The theory of Evolution is that Natural Selection is the cause of all of this - it explains why we find fossils in the shapes and places that we do, and why classifying species always results in a nested hierarchy, without exception, in addition to why genetic analysis gives us the same hierarchy, why whales and snakes have leg bones, why humans have wisdom teeth, why in some places species A can mate with B and B with C while A can't mate with C, why Bacteria in the exhaust of a chemical plant survive by digesting nylon (and why bacteria isolated and exposed to nylon for generations in a lab have been found to have enzymes to digest Nylon while the founding generations did not), why human embryos begin with tails, why ostriches have hollow bones while bats have solid bones, and why it is impossible to draft a definition of "ape" that covers all of the things currently defined as apes without arbitrarily excluding humans. To quote AronRa:

"For example, primates are collectively defined as any gill-less, organic RNA/DNA protein-based, metabolic, metazoic, nucleic, diploid, bilaterally-symmetrical, endothermic, digestive, tryploblast, opisthokont, deuterostome coelemate with a spinal chord and 12 cranial nerves connecting to a limbic system in an enlarged cerebrial cortex with a reduced olfactory region inside a jawed-skull with specialized teeth including canines and premolars, forward-oriented fully-enclosed optical orbits, and a single temporal fenestra, -attached to a vertebrate hind-leg dominant tetrapoidal skeleton with a sacral pelvis, clavical, and wrist & ankle bones; and having lungs, tear ducts, body-wide hair follicles, lactal mammaries, opposable thumbs, and keratinized dermis with chitinous nails on all five digits on all four extremities, in addition to an embryonic development in amniotic fluid, leading to a placental birth and highly social lifestyle.

Try mapping all of the animals that humans share these various traits with without finding a nested hierarchy.

Luckily, it's unconstitutional to teach Intelligent Design and Creationism in public schools. Still I fear the power that the TBoE holds over textbook companies. I'm sorry, but rephrasing history to sugar coat or ignore all of America's wrongdoings while removing as much mention as possible of those uppity black folks does not represent lashing out at a failed federal education system... it represents the slippery slope of dogmatic nationalism (not to mention blatant racism) that in the past has ultimately lead us to massive worldwide bloodshed. "Those who do not understand history are doomed to repeat it" is supposed to be a warning, but to these people it seems more like a goal. Federal education needs to be improved upon, not overthrown. If we did away with federal education, the destitute would simply not be able to go to school (and when their kids didn't get well paying jobs it'd still be their own damn fault right?). The poor would only be able to afford crappy schools, as any school with low enough tuition for the poor afford would itself not be able to afford good staff / materials. With education and thus competitive edge in the market determined in huge part by current income, the positive feedback would kick in and economic mobility would seriously suffer. Basically, the United States would cease to be the land of opportunity. Thus, good, free education is a must for a fair and equitable society. You're totally allowed to have private schools. If you want to learn about how we've never found a single transitional fossil (hint, sticking your head in the sand isn't a good way to look for fossils), you're more than welcome to do it. I don't throw these comments around lightly, but if the United States actually got rid of public education, I'd move to Europe or Canada before trying to raise a family. I'm not aware of any serious political movement to get rid of public education (only to ruin it), though - so I don't expect it to happen any time soon.

Also the intermediary stages reffered to in all linked sites are terribly huge leaps to make. They are not backed by a fossil record at all. This piece of work gives a leap from a few artistic renditions of reassembled skulls to a body and then the next huge leap to whales. instead of the huge amounts of fossils that should litter the fossil record there are a few horribly over interpretered skeletons and sometimes only skulls. Transitionary forms should be all over the fossil record. And yet they are not. That is why evolutionary theory lacks so much evidence. I also didn't know that darwin believed bears turned into whales. Which seems a bit far of a stretch for me to accept.

Paleontologists work only with fossils. They derive all of their morphological conclusions based on these fossils. Just because you saw an artist's rendering on the Discovery channel or some other non-peer reviewed, popular science media does not mean that the actual scientists endorse it. The pictures on the link you are showing are being used for sake of clarity, not as proof upon which any other conclusions rest - and notice that they only show bones. When the skeleton is incomplete, notice that they only discuss the parts of it that they have. Furthermore, incomplete skeletons can still give us tons of data about a transitional fossil, even if the rest of the animal is absent. Just a skull, for instance, gives information about the teeth, inner ear, and placement of nostrils - crucial traits for understanding the evolution of whales. Paleontologists may name the species based on the skull alone, but there's nothing wrong with that. After all, it can be judged as distinct from the other fossils in the sequence even if not all traits are known, just as you can judge that a Lion is neither a House Cat or a Hyena based only on its head. You could even judge that the head has more in common with the house cat than with the hyena. The crucial thing is that they don't make factual statements about the other body parts that aren't there. Note that they don't say "we only have the skull of creature Y, but we know that the feet were thus because of the feet of creatures X and Z". The only time they say anything about body parts that they don't have access to is where the skeleton shows signs of accommodating those features. For instance, enlarged spines (which is where muscles connect) suggest powerful tail muscles. Note that they use the words "suggests that" and "probably". This inductive reasoning is valuable, but it is never represented as direct observation. So I think I have clearly made the point that no "leaping" has been done from a picture to anything else. You also accuse them of leaping from "skulls to body to a whale". No, there are multiple different fossils - each picture is drawn directly from a fossil, and each represents a different fossil. There is no "leaping" from one to another, there is only representing them in morphological order. Note the eight other independent lines of evidence that support the same order. Note that none of these are based on the pictures, either. Sometimes they only show a skull when in fact there is a fossil of the whole body. Again, the pictures are just for clarity. Read the article, it will tell you all of this. Finally, you say that there ought be so many more fossils other than the ones we have. Have you ever watched an animal decay? In a matter of weeks, a carcass, bones and all, becomes soil. It takes exceptional circumstances for bones to survive long enough to become fossilized. It's amazing that we find as many as we do.

Also, who cares if Darwin believed bears turned into whales? This was before any of the fossils you so helpfully linked to had been found... and he didn't say "Bears did turn into whales and I can prove it!". No, he said, "Bears might have evolved into whales". Besides, Darwin could have been trolling the scientific community with what he thought was made-up nonsense - it wouldn't change the fact that his theory turned out to be one of the most solid theories in science.

 

[Firestorm]

The theory point has already been covered, so just replying to this:

@ firestorm what made the factors so terrible might i ask? i wasn't really using it as much of anything. just an interesting idea.

Personally, I'm not a fan of using teachers' salaries and school revenue as factors that help define how smart the students in a state are.

 

[cantab]

instead of the huge amounts of fossils that should litter the fossil record there are a few horribly over interpretered skeletons and sometimes only skulls.

Fossilation is a rare event. Normally dead things just decompose and break up. When doing geological mapping of about 8 square km of Snowdonia, I found significant numbers of fossils in only one spot a couple of hundred metres long and a few metres thick. Probably about 0.1% of the geological column in that area had visible fossils.

Transitionary forms should be all over the fossil record. And yet they are not.

When scientists find a fossil that fills a gap - a "missing link" - creationists don't accept that as refuting their claims, they simply point to the two smaller gaps left either side.

That is why evolutionary theory lacks so much evidence.

I should drop a box containing printouts of all the scientific papers detailing evidence of evolution on you. That "lack" of evidence would squash you flat. The evolution of species by natural selection, and explanation of the origins of all life from one common ancestor by that mechanism, is one of the best supported and most powerful theories in all biology.

Yet their is simply not the amount of fossils that their should be.

There are the amount of fossils there "should be". Fossilisation is an unlikely event.

if such a concept were true then the fossil record should show far far more transitional forms than all of the species we see today.

The theory of punctuated equilibrium indicates that species experience long periods of slow or no change, then brief intervals of drastic change and speciation. It is thus no surprise that we see few transitional forms.
And that's before considering the fact that most terrestrial rocks are being eroded, most marine ones are destined to be subducted, and most of what there is is thoroughly buried out of easy reach of people.

Natural selection would take care of those species evolution that failed and we would see millions of failed species.

We do see a great many extinct species in the fossil record. Despite the fact that we believe biodiversity to have increased significantly over time, most species are extinct.

 

[Scoopapa]

The theory of punctuated equilibrium indicates that species experience long periods of slow or no change, then brief intervals of drastic change and speciation. It is thus no surprise that we see few transitional forms.
And that's before considering the fact that most terrestrial rocks are being eroded, most marine ones are destined to be subducted, and most of what there is is thoroughly buried out of easy reach of people.

I'd just like to support this further by pointing out that punctuated equilibrium is supported by computer simulations of evolution. (Google search 3DVCE to download an evolution simulator yourself) Change tends to happen in fits in these simulations, with static periods in between. The Youtube user kjlg74 is the creator of 3DVCE, and he has some extremely interesting videos detailing the process of evolution of these virtual creatures (he also has a bunch of videos just showing end-result creatures).

 

[Sir_Lu]

As a student in Texas, I do not enjoy the direction they are taking with our education, however it stems mostly from the fact that they cut Jefferson from the list of revolutionary figures. I just find that insane that they would do that simply because they find him radical.

Otherwise, read what FerrousWheel has stated.

 

[blue_light]

I don't think Kennedy and L.B.J. are the people the board would point to.

This is pretty scary, especially if it spreads to other states. This reminds me of a law passed here a year ago restricting talk about religion in classes, but this is over the top.

It scares me how much average citizens have over the education of millions. If anything, the textbooks should be chosen by the colleges, teachers and professionals. Not elected car-salesmen.

Lebron James isn't white....

(joke)

 

[sonickid01]

Sadly evolution is not fact. There's a reason it's a theory. It's the complete lack of evidence to back up species turning into a completely different species. Claiming it as a fact and the only thing to be taught is as ignorant as not allowing for anything to be taught at all.

instead of the huge amounts of fossils that should litter the fossil record there are a few horribly over interpretered skeletons and sometimes only skulls. Transitionary forms should be all over the fossil record. And yet they are not.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peppered_moth
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_transitional_fossils
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nylon-eating_bacteria
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synthetic_genome#Entire_genomes

if such a concept were true then the fossil record should show far far more transitional forms than all of the species we see today. Natural selection would take care of those species evolution that failed and we would see millions of failed species.

No we would not. Fossilization is extremely difficult, it is unlikely for any individual member of a population of organisms to fossilize independently, and thus the species that propagated well and then evolved further or died out would be more likely to be seen. Additional factors such as body type and bone compositions also affect whether they show up diversely. It's not as though everything that dies will wait for us to find and analyze it intact. Archaeology is difficult.

Just had to put my 2 cents in.

 

[Beab]

It's unbelievable the amount of ignorance that still exists in the world... let alone a first world country like this... So sad.

 

[J-man]

When scientists find a fossil that fills a gap - a "missing link" - creationists don't accept that as refuting their claims, they simply point to the two smaller gaps left either side.

Half the time, i don't even no what a transitional species is!!! i took a look at the wikipedia page, and they looked like and sounded like the same kind of animal...

I should drop a box containing printouts of all the scientific papers detailing evidence of evolution on you. That "lack" of evidence would squash you flat. The evolution of species by natural selection, and explanation of the origins of all life from one common ancestor by that mechanism, is one of the best supported and most powerful theories in all biology.

Yet it is not powerful enough to supress the onslought of atheist and christians alike who are challenging the theory's credibility.

There are the amount of fossils there "should be". Fossilisation is an unlikely event.

No comment, agreed.

The theory of punctuated equilibrium indicates that species experience long periods of slow or no change, then brief intervals of drastic change and speciation. It is thus no surprise that we see few transitional forms.
And that's before considering the fact that most terrestrial rocks are being eroded, most marine ones are destined to be subducted, and most of what there is is thoroughly buried out of easy reach of people.

just an inquiry... i thought punctuated equilibrium was discredited as a bad theory.

{QUOTE]We do see a great many extinct species in the fossil record. Despite the fact that we believe biodiversity to have increased significantly over time, most species are extinct.[/QUOTE]
No comment here.

 

[sonickid01]

Half the time, i don't even no what a transitional species is!!! i took a look at the wikipedia page, and they looked like and sounded like the same kind of animal...

I don't understand what you mean by "the same kind of animal." Bats and birds both have wings, just like insects, so all three are the winged kind of animal. Dolphins, sharks and penguins have elongated faces with snoutlike extensions and have flippers, so they are the swimmy kind of animal. Venus flytraps and crocodiles both have mouths that trap prey and quickly engulf any poor creatures that wander into their jaws, so they are the jawed prey-snatching kind of animal. Fungi like mushrooms and sponges are basically rooted to one spot and grow upward out of that, but they don't grow very tall so they comprise they small rooted kind of animals.

Do you sort of see what's wrong with the argument about different "kinds" of animals and why we need concrete definitions of phyla and groups of different kinds of organisms?

Yet it is not powerful enough to supress the onslought of atheist and christians alike who are challenging the theory's credibility.

Explain. There are not hoards of atheists and christians who are attacking the theory of evolution's credibility. There are very few, miniscule number in science who do, less in the general field of biology, far less in genetics and evolutionary biology, and much, much less with any credibility. The only creationist in genetics with a real name that I've heard of is Francis Collins, the head of the Human Genome Project effort.

No comment, agreed.

And what's your point? We don't see every bit of land covered in fossils because there must be correct conditions for them to form.

just an inquiry... i thought punctuated equilibrium was discredited as a bad theory.

No.

 

[J-man]

I don't understand what you mean by "the same kind of animal." Bats and birds both have wings, just like insects, so all three are the winged kind of animal. Dolphins, sharks and penguins have elongated faces with snoutlike extensions and have flippers, so they are the swimmy kind of animal. Venus flytraps and crocodiles both have mouths that trap prey and quickly engulf any poor creatures that wander into their jaws, so they are the jawed prey-snatching kind of animal. Fungi like mushrooms and sponges are basically rooted to one spot and grow upward out of that, but they don't grow very tall so they comprise they small rooted kind of animals.

When Creationists say "kind", we mean that for example, there was one canine, and through genetics, it reproduced into all the other kinds of canines we have, such as wolves and other breeds of dogs... And by "the same kind of animal" i see a type of extinct frog as a transitional species as well as the oldest type of Bee recorded... that's just one example of several i saw.

Do you sort of see what's wrong with the argument about different "kinds" of animals and why we need concrete definitions of phyla and groups of different kinds of organisms?

http://creationwiki.org/Created_kind

Explain. There are not hoards of atheists and christians who are attacking the theory of evolution's credibility. There are very few, miniscule number in science who do, less in the general field of biology, far less in genetics and evolutionary biology, and much, much less with any credibility. The only creationist in genetics with a real name that I've heard of is Francis Collins, the head of the Human Genome Project effort.

I never said there were hoards. But of the handful, i would vouch that many of them are scientists who have credibility. i would like you to back your arguments of the minuscule numbers.

And what's your point? We don't see every bit of land covered in fossils because there must be correct conditions for them to form.

This just sounds like a strawman argument meant to continue arguing with me. I agree that the amount of fossils are the amount that there should be.

No.

could have sworn in my reading that punctuated equilibrium was just an explanation to cover up something evolution had difficulty explaining.... but then again, from my current knowledge which is not enough, evolution just seems like explanation upon explanation upon explanation with no real observable or testable results.

 

[popemobile]

When Creationists say "kind", we mean that for example, there was one canine, and through genetics, it reproduced into all the other kinds of canines we have, such as wolves and other breeds of dogs... And by "the same kind of animal" i see a type of extinct frog as a transitional species as well as the oldest type of Bee recorded... that's just one example of several i saw.

there is no evidence to support any of these claims

http://creationwiki.org/Created_kind

what is this

I never said there were hoards. But of the handful, i would vouch that many of them are scientists who have credibility.

highly doubtful

i would like you to back your arguments of the minuscule numbers.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Level_of_support_for_evolution#Scientific_support

could have sworn in my reading that punctuated equilibrium was just an explanation to cover up something evolution had difficulty explaining.... but then again, from my current knowledge which is not enough, evolution just seems like explanation upon explanation upon explanation with no real observable or testable results.

You're right in that your current knowledge is nowhere near enough. I suggest doing more research on the topic

 

[sonickid01]

http://creationwiki.org/Created_kind

Created kinds in creation biology, are organisms that share a common ancestry.

The difference between this and the traditional definition of divisions is that you arbitrarily assume the divisions based on qualitative physical appearances of similarity. The argument is simply that when things stop looking alike then that's when they are not related. For example, i believe chihuahuas are vastly different from both golden retrievers and poodles, but chihuahuas are closer to poodles than retrievers. Do I then conclude that those two are the small dog kind and evolved from an original created small dog and the retrievers were created separately, despite that the groups interbreed?

http://www.bringyou.to/apologetics/TREE.gif

This is a phylogenetic tree of acquired characteristics. Fungi and Plants appear very, very similar. Lichens on a tree are extremely similar to simple mosses and liverworts and the like. Do I conclude that oak trees and club fungi are from a same ancestor and that oak trees are not related to cacti, which look vastly different from either? How about snakes and worms which look very alike? Certain worms are poisonous and certain snakes are venomous. Similarity, ergo, same ancestor.

This just sounds like a strawman argument meant to continue arguing with me. I agree that the amount of fossils are the amount that there should be.

I apologize, I was being overly analytical and believed you were implying that the statement supported your argument rather than cantab's.

I realize that this is straying somewhat far from the original topic. In an attempt to save this discussion, with all this evidence for evolution, it is very disheartening that people on the board of education cannot come to terms with science and overcome their preconceived convictions, and try to change the education of entire states because of it.

Does anyone know if the social studies curriculum changes are affecting how the teachers are to talk about Darwin and evolution are mentioned and how they impacted biology?

 

[Ferrouswheel]

@J-Man, are you confident enough that you believe that people shouldn't learn evolution at all? Because I'm pretty sure that the new standards precluded any evolution.

 

[J-man]

@J-Man, are you confident enough that you believe that people shouldn't learn evolution at all? Because I'm pretty sure that the new standards precluded any evolution.

I personally would like to learn more about evolution... So as to understand it more. But to point something out, the period between the Scopes Trial and Sputnik produced more Nobel Prizes for America, especially in the area of Biology. So we don't NEED Evolution, but it's an interesting theory, to say the least, but i don't believe it one bit...

 

[Firestorm]

Have you ever pondered the fact that you don't "believe" it is because you never took the time to learn about it and instead denied it at every opportunity? I learned about evolution in high school and I'm pretty happy I did. It was a worthwhile topic.

You wanted him to back up that there are a miniscule number of scientists who think the theory of evolution is false. You then say that the handful of people who beileve in creationism are credible scientists. You're the one making the ridiculous claim so you are the one who needs to support yourself first.

Creationism is not science. It cannot be tested via the scientific method. A higher power cannot be involved in science. Evolution is a scientific theory just like any of the other theories we currently learn about in school. If we killed theories from the school curriculum, we may as well stop teaching science altogether.

 

[popemobile]

I'll quote this again just so you understand the difference between "theory" and "scientific theory", because judging by your quote that evolution is an "interesting theory", I don't think you quite understand the distinction. And it's a pretty big distinction. The way you're using "theory" can be more accurately described as a "hypothesis".

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theory#Scientific_theories

hth

 

[sonickid01]

I personally would like to learn more about evolution... So as to understand it more. But to point something out, the period between the Scopes Trial and Sputnik produced more Nobel Prizes for America, especially in the area of Biology. So we don't NEED Evolution, but it's an interesting theory, to say the least, but i don't believe it one bit...

I located the apparent source of his argument or at least the same argument:
http://www.reviewevolution.com/viewersGuide/Evolution_07.php

Note that in physiology and medicine [between 1967 and 97], the fields (according to Evolution) most likely to be adversely affected by neglecting Darwin's theory, U.S. scientists won twice as many Nobel Prizes during this period as all other countries put together.

Physiology and medicine are expected to be adversely affected by neglecting evolution in practice as the principles are often used for genetic engineering and other fields of research, even though these sort of developments are relatively recent. Here's the thing: the Scopes trial had little to do with the validity of research several decades later, even though those of that generation were the ones affected by the lack of mention of Darwin and evolution in grade school. The reason is because those who receive Nobel prizes in science are almost assuredly always college graduates or postgraduates. And in these higher sources of education, science can be less impeded to be taught and evolution would still reign, especially if it was simply forgotten and not mentioned in grade school as it would be new information and higher level science, which seems less disputable. Thus the credibility of the theory of evolution in major fields of research and biology would be minimally affected by the Scopes trial. Evolutionary biology would most be affected by a neglect of evolutionary biology. :P

Secondly, it was never even established what the prizes were about. The prizes may or may not have been about evolution or even creationism. Here is a list of prizes of the 20th century in physiology/medicine: http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/medicine/laureates/

In fact, indeed on a quick gloss-through, only one of the prizes between 1927 and 1957 had to do with evolution. Puny number right? However, before that period I found none which did. And after that period, when genetic engineering and similar medical research picked up speed through advances in technology, many prizes were awarded in gene therapy and embryonic development and the like, which is related to evolutionary biology at the least. So the assertion that discrediting evolution causes more Nobel prizes is basically irrelevant to the data.

And thirdly, there was no before/after experiment or data of anything taken to make that assertion. In fact it appears that banning evolution causes more prizes in evolutionary biology if we take base, raw and insignificant data such as this. The graph provided compares Nobel prizes in America with prizes in other parts of the world and attempts to imply that it was because Tennessee banned evolution in grade school when this is simply post hoc, ergo propter hoc.

The assertion that biology doesn't need evolution is false in entirety as the theory of evolution and the diversification of species is one of the central tenets of the whole field of Biology and one of the most unifying theories in science. It is comprehensive, well explained, and well documented and its principles are applied in much of science for genetic research and other fields.