Atheism

[jayfox]

Yes it was patsy, I think it was posted on the Christianity thread but I didn't watch it.

Pretty humourous stuff, is there a long version with similar "insights"?

I can't find the full length version of that one. They have a show called 'Way Of The Master'. Most of the episodes of it are on youtube. It's like listening to a Men At Work album though. The Banana was their 'Down Under'.

The Banana is the only thing that I have seen from Ray Comfort and Kirk Cameron that made me cringe. The rest of everything they have produced, that I have seen, is very good. I do seem to remember discussing the Banana bit on the Christianity thread and someone saying that Comfort later admitted himself it was lame or tongue in cheek?

I can provide you with some links if you want to JB to some of their work if you want. Don't listen to Disco's Men at Work and Down Under references as he and Pantera are overtly negative about any remotely Christian. Have a look and decide for yourself.

 

[Panthera tigris FC]

The Banana is the only thing that I have seen from Ray Comfort and Kirk Cameron that made me cringe. The rest of everything they have produced, that I have seen, is very good. I do seem to remember discussing the Banana bit on the Christianity thread and someone saying that Comfort later admitted himself it was lame or tongue in cheek?

I can provide you with some links if you want to JB to some of their work if you want. Don't listen to Disco's Men at Work and Down Under references as he and Pantera are overtly negative about any remotely Christian. Have a look and decide for yourself.

I am overtly negative over anything irrational....it isn't personal, or specifically anti-Chrisitian.

You can assert that you are 100% positive that your invisible God exists, but outside of your own subjective experience their is not one iota of verifiable evidence to support your claims.

You should check out the videos of Comfort and Cameron, if you can bear to sit through them. Just make sure you switch on your BS detector first.

 

[Disco08]

Agreed Pantera. Jay, haven't I agreed with you more than once that many christians do many good things? Is that something that seems overtly negative to you?

 

[dukeos]

Agreed Pantera. Jay, haven't I agreed with you more than once that many christians do many good things? Is that something that seems overtly negative to you?

I think, as a group, religous people are way more helpful in society compared to Atheists. Maybe because they are trying to "bank" some goodness for the afterlife perhaps, but who cares. Take all of the Religous people on the planet, then weed out the mongrels and evils b@stards, and you would have a clear winner in the "goodness" scale. And, if you were to include me on the religous side, I would not help there situation, before you ask.

 

[Disco08]

I think, as a group, religous people are way more helpful in society compared to Atheists.

Why would you say that?

 

[jb03]

Yes it was patsy, I think it was posted on the Christianity thread but I didn't watch it.

Pretty humourous stuff, is there a long version with similar "insights"?

I can't find the full length version of that one. They have a show called 'Way Of The Master'. Most of the episodes of it are on youtube. It's like listening to a Men At Work album though. The Banana was their 'Down Under'.

The Banana is the only thing that I have seen from Ray Comfort and Kirk Cameron that made me cringe. The rest of everything they have produced, that I have seen, is very good. I do seem to remember discussing the Banana bit on the Christianity thread and someone saying that Comfort later admitted himself it was lame or tongue in cheek?

I can provide you with some links if you want to JB to some of their work if you want. Don't listen to Disco's Men at Work and Down Under references as he and Pantera are overtly negative about any remotely Christian. Have a look and decide for yourself.

I actually said on the Christianity thread that Kirk Cameron has done a lot of good but helping people is not the sole domain of Christians.

I always thought the underrated Overkill was Men At Works "Banana".

 

[Djevv]

How did the Venus' flytrap avoid the argument that IC can't evolve? In two ways. First, rather than gaining a part, it lost a part - the glue that the sundews use. Even more interestingly, the trap was able to evolve because the parts evolved. The trap started out as a Drosera-like leaf, and the parts of the leaf were progressively changed. This makes a striking contrast with the mousetrap which Behe has repeatedly presented to illustrate why IC cannot evolve. As a manufactured item the mousetrap neatly illustrates his definition, but with its static parts it cannot model evolution. With evolving parts, nature can create a snap-trap after all. The mechanical and manufacturing analogies so influential in Behe's thinking miss the flexibility of living things.

Maybe I'm missing something here. This isn't terribly convincing.

Actually not just irreducibly complex ones, any demonstrable genetic 'innovation' would do. Name some.[/url].

Is your argument that because we haven't observed feathers growing on fish or trunks sprouting from cats in the last thousand years that the evidence that we do have from the previous 4 billion years prior to that is somehow irrelevant?

To me the fact that the fossil record shows more basic organisms in the lowest stratum and increasing diversity and complexity appearing chronologically in younger stratum is a pretty good clue to the history of life on Earth.

To the above yes, I would like to see that, either in fossil form or living. Do you know of one?

The fossil record without assuming things like long ages has this testimony:

When a major group of organisms arises and first appears in the record, it seems to come fully equipped with a suite of new characters not seen in related, putatively ancestral groups. These radical changes in morphology and function appear to arise very quickly K. S. Thomson, Morphogenesis and Evolution, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1988, p. 98

also

The history of most fossil species include two features particularly inconsistent with gradualism: 1) Stasis - most species exhibit no directional change during their tenure on earth. They appear in the fossil record looking much the same as when they disappear; morphological change is usually limited and directionless; 2) Sudden appearance - in any local area, a species does not arise gradually by the steady transformation of its ancestors; it appears all at once and 'fully formed'. S.J. Gould, "Evolution's Erratic Pace", Natural History, vol. 86, May 1977

Here is a rebuttal of the vertebrate eye unintelligent design notion.

Another point of ICR's (more quality science there) is that the blind spot caused by the reverse retina doesn't hamper the user because the other eye effectively covers the blind spot. This begs a pretty obvious question though - why didn't God design an eye without a blind spot for people who, for whatever reason, only have one functioning eye? In fact much of their argument revolves around certain components being better placed as they are because of sensitivities, need to regrow, blood flow etc but really, why didn't God just design these components with less restrictions to allow for an eye that doesn't have a blind spot?

ICR and other sites I use are simply people who are likeminded with myself. They are scientists who are reviewing and critisising evolutionary ideas. They quote the work of others and resynthesise or do original research. No different to what 'talkorigins' or the 'Panda's thumb (now that's a title that shows just a hint of bias)' do.

As for the rest of what you said, why didn't God give us wings to fly, a nose like a dog's, the brain of Einstein and eyes like an octopus (actually there is a reason)? Sorry, not sure, but it doesn't help your cause.

 

[Disco08]

As I've said before, one thing that all creationist sites seem to have in common is bad science. Whenever a theory springs from one of these places you can always find a rebuttal by someone expert to the field who points out just how wrong the assertions generally are. As has been asked before, why don't these people submit their work to peer review? It is often based on 'scientific fact' after all.

To the above yes, I would like to see that, either in fossil form or living. Do you know of one?

No. Why would a cat need a trunk? Why would fish need feathers when they live under water?

There plenty of bizarre transitionary fossils on record though. How does creation account for these exactly? Also, how does creation account for the apparently perfect sorting of fossils from less to more complex in the fossil record?

The fossil record without assuming things like long ages has this testimony:

When a major group of organisms arises and first appears in the record, it seems to come fully equipped with a suite of new characters not seen in related, putatively ancestral groups. These radical changes in morphology and function appear to arise very quickly K. S. Thomson, Morphogenesis and Evolution, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1988, p. 98

also

The history of most fossil species include two features particularly inconsistent with gradualism: 1) Stasis - most species exhibit no directional change during their tenure on earth. They appear in the fossil record looking much the same as when they disappear; morphological change is usually limited and directionless; 2) Sudden appearance - in any local area, a species does not arise gradually by the steady transformation of its ancestors; it appears all at once and 'fully formed'. S.J. Gould, "Evolution's Erratic Pace", Natural History, vol. 86, May 1977

Have you read the rest of these documents to see the authors' conclusions as to why these facts don't disprove the theory?

As for the rest of what you said, why didn't God give us wings to fly, a nose like a dog's, the brain of Einstein and eyes like an octopus (actually there is a reason)? Sorry, not sure, but it doesn't help your cause.

That's obviously not the point we were discussing at all. The point is that the eye we do have is poorly designed.

Maybe I'm missing something here. This isn't terribly convincing.

Depends how willing you are to be convinced I guess.

 

[Panthera tigris FC]

How did the Venus' flytrap avoid the argument that IC can't evolve? In two ways. First, rather than gaining a part, it lost a part - the glue that the sundews use. Even more interestingly, the trap was able to evolve because the parts evolved. The trap started out as a Drosera-like leaf, and the parts of the leaf were progressively changed. This makes a striking contrast with the mousetrap which Behe has repeatedly presented to illustrate why IC cannot evolve. As a manufactured item the mousetrap neatly illustrates his definition, but with its static parts it cannot model evolution. With evolving parts, nature can create a snap-trap after all. The mechanical and manufacturing analogies so influential in Behe's thinking miss the flexibility of living things.

Maybe I'm missing something here. This isn't terribly convincing.

You are forgetting that you presented the venus fly trap as an example of IC. Disco presented a mechanism that shows how such an adaptation could evolve with all of its concomitant parts playing useful roles, that would be subject to positive selection in their own right, prior to the evolution of a complete 'venus fly trap'.

You can't dismiss it because on the basis that it debunks your IC argument.

Actually not just irreducibly complex ones, any demonstrable genetic 'innovation' would do. Name some.[/url].

Is your argument that because we haven't observed feathers growing on fish or trunks sprouting from cats in the last thousand years that the evidence that we do have from the previous 4 billion years prior to that is somehow irrelevant?

To me the fact that the fossil record shows more basic organisms in the lowest stratum and increasing diversity and complexity appearing chronologically in younger stratum is a pretty good clue to the history of life on Earth.

To the above yes, I would like to see that, either in fossil form or living. Do you know of one?

Evolutionary theory does not predict such examples, so why would they be captured in the fossil record?

The fossil record without assuming things like long ages has this testimony:

When a major group of organisms arises and first appears in the record, it seems to come fully equipped with a suite of new characters not seen in related, putatively ancestral groups. These radical changes in morphology and function appear to arise very quickly K. S. Thomson, Morphogenesis and Evolution, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1988, p. 98

also

The history of most fossil species include two features particularly inconsistent with gradualism: 1) Stasis - most species exhibit no directional change during their tenure on earth. They appear in the fossil record looking much the same as when they disappear; morphological change is usually limited and directionless; 2) Sudden appearance - in any local area, a species does not arise gradually by the steady transformation of its ancestors; it appears all at once and 'fully formed'. S.J. Gould, "Evolution's Erratic Pace", Natural History, vol. 86, May 1977

You are quoting evolutionary theory here. The observations that led to Gould's punctuated equilibrium. What need to read up on is current evo-devo theories and how minor genetic changes that affect development can be translated in the large morphological changes that we observe in the fossil record. You also need to grasp that individual organisms don't evolve....populations do. Evolution is caused by a change in gene frequencies in populations so this can lead to subtle changes between species or large morphological changes that are selected for some advantage in any give ecological niche.

Your choice of quotes do not support your argument, on the contrary they describe exactly what the modern synthesis of evolutionary theory, that encompasses the processes of natural selection, genetic drift, molecular genetics/biology and their impact via punctuated equilbrium and evo-devo (amongst others), predicts.

What these quotes actually describe is some of the controversial areas within evolutionary biology....ie. the relative importance of the different evolutionary forces that drive change.....there is no debate on the occurrence of evolution by common descent amongst biologists.

ICR and other sites I use are simply people who are likeminded with myself. They are scientists who are reviewing and critisising evolutionary ideas. They quote the work of others and resynthesise or do original research. No different to what 'talkorigins' or the 'Panda's thumb (now that's a title that shows just a hint of bias)' do.

By 'like-minded' do you mean that they are trying to prove foregone conclusions. Just to remind you, that is explicitly contrary to the scientific process. Have a look at what the evidence shows. You add God to the equation before you assess the evidence, thus tainting your conclusions. If the evidence suggested a divine creator I, and the scientific community as a whole, would agree with you. But the fact is, the evidence does no such thing. What is this original 'creation' research?

The difference between these websites is that the talkorigins and the Panda's thumb (an homage to the late Stephen Jay Gould, a great mind in evolutionary biology who used observation and evidence to formulate theories that are important in the field) provide answers that are based on physical evidence, whereas the ICS and other similar websites try to skew the evidence to fit a preconceived notion...the existence of an omnipotent creator. Their findings are easily debunked and have been done countless times before.

As for the rest of what you said, why didn't God give us wings to fly, a nose like a dog's, the brain of Einstein and eyes like an octopus (actually there is a reason)? Sorry, not sure, but it doesn't help your cause.

Um, the reason that god didn't do this is that he doesn't exist. Like you just said 'why didn't God give us.....'. if he existed he could have, but we have to rely on the mechanisms of evolution to explain our morphological, physical and mental traits. It seems to me quite obvious that this theory provides a more accurate prediction of the observations. In this light, I don't understand your final sentence.

I would still like you to explain the common insertion sites of viral sequences in hominid genomes. Just one example of very clear evidence of common ancestry.

 

[jayfox]

Agreed Pantera. Jay, haven't I agreed with you more than once that many christians do many good things? Is that something that seems overtly negative to you?

I haven't heard you say anything like that in a very long time Duckman. In fact when I have tried to raise people's awareness re Christian charities etc., rather than openly acknowledge the incredible number of Christians who volunteer their time, money and energies to help others you moreso have entered into a counter argument that non-christians do plenty of this as well. I would bet my house on the fact that Church going Christians give more of their time to charity work than the average non believer in society. But in saying that there are many, many non Christians who do a fantastic amount of work in the community as well and I am certainly not knocking them. I wish that more people in general gave more of their time to others in today's world, but I think I covered that a while ago in talking about the way that the moral fabric of todays society is seriously slipping.
I enjoy debating with you, but I did raise the point recently that I felt your posting style lately had become more and more sarcastic and overtly negative towards anything we have posted. Pantera has been exactly the same. This is the sort of thing I am talking about from Pantera -"I have posted detailed counters to Djevv's posts about information loss on the Christianity thread. It appears that he has chosen to ignore these posts and continue to repeat old and scientifically debunked ID garbage. Repetition of the same old rubbish does not add weight to the argument." He gets absolutely zero respect from me, regardless of the accuracy of his post, when he presents himself in such an arrogant and self righteous way. But maybe I am reading it wrongly and I would be happy if that was the case.
Dare I say it but, from our side of the fence, Pantera is repeating the same old rubbish. Perhaps, we just would try not to be so blunt as to put it that way.
I would suggest that if you two are getting frustrated by the arguments that Djevv, PPT and I keep coming up with then we should discontinue the debate rather than let these threads spiral into tit-for-tat name calling and sarcastic commentary. There is plenty of time for that on less important threads (in which you can call me whatever you like! ;D)

 

[Disco08]

Dare I say it but, from our side of the fence, Pantera is repeating the same old rubbish.

You mean Pantera is repeating what almost the entire scientific community believe, research and basically dedicate their lives to. Why do you think it's rubbish exactly?

 

[jayfox]

Dare I say it but, from our side of the fence, Pantera is repeating the same old rubbish.

You mean Pantera is repeating what almost the entire scientific community believe, research and basically dedicate their lives to. Why do you think it's rubbish exactly?

I write that whole post and that is the only quote you acknowledge? That is exactly what I am talking about.

 

[Disco08]

I haven't heard you say anything like that in a very long time Duckman.

How many times do I have to say it? I haven't said that christians don't do good things have I?

I would bet my house on the fact that Church going Christians give more of their time to charity work than the average non believer in society.

Why would you bet that though? As I've said, the most secular nations display the highest rates in all human rights indicators and standard of living indicators. This wouldn't be the case if these countries inhabitants weren't amongst the more charitable would it?

I write that whole post and that is the only quote you acknowledge? That is exactly what I am talking about.

Geez, you've got to be quick huh? All I did was quote the point that stuck out to me the most. Would you like to answer the question I asked?

As for discontinuing the debate, that's entirely up to you, and the others individually. I enjoy it, don't feel any need to call anyone any names and am not getting frustrated in the slightest by the logic you, Djevv, PPT and others are displaying.

 

[Djevv]

Their findings are easily debunked and have been done countless times before.

And on the creationist sites the debunkers have been debunked. I find their articles to be mainly well researched and accurate.

I think if you looked at the octopus/eye article, you would find they addressed 'junk DNA'.

On the rest of what you/disco said: I still want to see:
1. Beneficial mutations
2. Laboratory examples of speciation involving the evolution of new 'information' in the genome.

As for the guff about me not understanding evolution. Don't make me laugh :rofl :rofl. I grew up with it, studied it at uni, read books on it, BUT, I only looked at it critically once I became a Christian.

 

[jayfox]

I haven't heard you say anything like that in a very long time Duckman.

How many times do I have to say it? I haven't said that christians don't do good things have I?

I would bet my house on the fact that Church going Christians give more of their time to charity work than the average non believer in society.

Why would you bet that though? As I've said, the most secular nations display the highest rates in all human rights indicators and standard of living indicators. This wouldn't be the case if these countries inhabitants weren't amongst the more charitable would it?

I write that whole post and that is the only quote you acknowledge? That is exactly what I am talking about.

Geez, you've got to be quick huh? All I did was quote the point that stuck out to me the most. Would you like to answer the question I asked?

As for discontinuing the debate, that's entirely up to you, and the others individually. I enjoy it, don't feel any need to call anyone any names and am not getting frustrated in the slightest by the logic you, Djevv, PPT and others are displaying.

Quote 1. Not saying that Christians don;t do good things is not really an acknowledgement of the many good charitable works they do and the fact that many (most?) major charities in our country were founded and still supported by Christian volunteers.

Quote 2. I was talking about our country specifically.

Quote 3. I know that was the quote that stuck out the most and that is my point precisely. Would I like to answer your question? I am happy to acknowledge your posts when you are similarly acknowledging mine. My response to that is that Pantera assumes that any Christian perspective in relation to science is illogical, i.e that God doesn't exist, that science can (in his mind) basically prove this through the, dare I say it, 'theory' of evolution. So what do I think is rubbish? Many of our most famous scientists over the years, who have come up with the many scientific models that we still use today, at least 'believed' in God. Does that make their work illogical too and did their work stem from starting with God and trying to make science work around him? I believe, as I have said before, that there is room for both science and Christianity. They go hand in hand and God is the greatest scientist of all time.

 

[Disco08]

Quote 1. Not saying that Christians don;t do good things is not really an acknowledgement of the many good charitable works they do and the fact that many (most?) major charities in our country were founded and still supported by Christian volunteers.

As I said, I've acknowledged it more than once before, how many times do I have to acknowledge it?

Quote 2. I was talking about our country specifically.

Quite true then. Which country has effected our countries culture the most in the time you're talking about? The USA possibly? Do you know which country has the highest rate of christianity and amongst the worst social indicators in the world?

My response to that is that Pantera assumes that any Christian perspective in relation to science is illogical, i.e that God doesn't exist, that science can (in his mind) basically prove this through the, dare I say it, 'theory' of evolution. So what do I think is rubbish? Many of our most famous scientists over the years, who have come up with the many scientific models that we still use today, at least 'believed' in God. Does that make their work illogical too and did their work stem from starting with God and trying to make science work around him? I believe, as I have said before, that there is room for both science and Christianity. They go hand in hand and God is the greatest scientist of all time.

Most of the people I think you're alluding to lived in times when it was almost unheard of not to believe in God. Contemporary scientists are almost united in the support of evolution, which seems to be what Pantera is defending.

When you say science and God can go hand in hand, do you mean the word of God as spelled out in the Bible?

I know that was the quote that stuck out the most and that is my point precisely.

The remark you made ("Pantera is repeating the same old rubbish") was begging to be singled out. The 'rubbish' Pantera is repeating is acknowledged as accurate and supported by 99.946% of all relevant scientists surveyed in the US since 1999. If you're going to call it rubbish or attempt to discredit it as much as Djevv does then I think it's only reasonable to expect that you would at least have a theory as to why such a large proportion of the people who know the most about the subject in question are all wrong.

And on the creationist sites the debunkers have been debunked. I find their articles to be mainly well researched and accurate.

I think if you looked at the octopus/eye article, you would find they addressed 'junk DNA'.

A couple of 'facts' and an omission that this article throws up that science would more than likely disagree with; 1. It assumes the earth is about 6000 years, 2. All the diversity of life seen on Earth developed since the Great Flood, 3. It says nothing of experiments carried out which demonstrated that entire sections of DNA can be removed in some organisms and replaced with randomized sequences with no effect to the organism which would seem to prove beyond doubt that some DNA is in fact useless. Do the creationists running this website have a rebuttal to this final point?

On the rest of what you/disco said: I still want to see:
1. Beneficial mutations

This page has a great explanation for the less informed (like myself) to understand beneficial mutations. This page lists a few. This would also count, wouldn't it?

 

[Six Pack]

It's a nonsense and it's insulting to claim that Christians do more good in the community than non-christians.

Absolute crap!

 

[Disco08]

Our confidence that evolution occurred centers upon three general arguments. First, we have abundant, direct, observational evidence of evolution in action, from both the field and laboratory. This evidence ranges from countless experiments on change in nearly everything about fruit flies subjected to artificial selection in the laboratory to the famous populations of British moths that became black when industrial soot darkened the trees upon which the moths rest. (Moths gain protection from sharp-sighted bird predators by blending into the background.) Creationists do not deny these observations; how could they? Creationists have tightened their act. They now argue that God only created "basic kinds," and allowed for limited evolutionary meandering within them. Thus toy poodles and Great Danes come from the dog kind and moths can change color, but nature cannot convert a dog to a cat or a monkey to a man.

The second and third arguments for evolution—the case for major changes—do not involve direct observation of evolution in action. They rest upon inference, but are no less secure for that reason. Major evolutionary change requires too much time for direct observation on the scale of recorded human history. All historical sciences rest upon inference, and evolution is no different from geology, cosmology, or human history in this respect. In principle, we cannot observe processes that operated in the past. We must infer them from results that still surround us: living and fossil organisms for evolution, documents and artifacts for human history, strata and topography for geology.

The second argument—that the imperfection of nature reveals evolution—strikes many people as ironic, for they feel that evolution should be most elegantly displayed in the nearly perfect adaptation expressed by some organisms—the camber of a gull's wing, or butterflies that cannot be seen in ground litter because they mimic leaves so precisely. But perfection could be imposed by a wise creator or evolved by natural selection. Perfection covers the tracks of past history. And past history—the evidence of descent—is the mark of evolution.

Evolution lies exposed in the imperfections that record a history of descent. Why should a rat run, a bat fly, a porpoise swim, and I type this essay with structures built of the same bones unless we all inherited them from a common ancestor? An engineer, starting from scratch, could design better limbs in each case. Why should all the large native mammals of Australia be marsupials, unless they descended from a common ancestor isolated on this island continent? Marsupials are not "better," or ideally suited for Australia; many have been wiped out by placental mammals imported by man from other continents. This principle of imperfection extends to all historical sciences. When we recognize the etymology of September, October, November, and December (seventh, eighth, ninth, and tenth), we know that the year once started in March, or that two additional months must have been added to an original calendar of ten months.

The third argument is more direct: transitions are often found in the fossil record. Preserved transitions are not common—and should not be, according to our understanding of evolution (see next section) but they are not entirely wanting, as creationists often claim. The lower jaw of reptiles contains several bones, that of mammals only one. The non-mammalian jawbones are reduced, step by step, in mammalian ancestors until they become tiny nubbins located at the back of the jaw. The "hammer" and "anvil" bones of the mammalian ear are descendants of these nubbins. How could such a transition be accomplished? the creationists ask. Surely a bone is either entirely in the jaw or in the ear. Yet paleontologists have discovered two transitional lineages of therapsids (the so-called mammal-like reptiles) with a double jaw joint—one composed of the old quadrate and articular bones (soon to become the hammer and anvil), the other of the squamosal and dentary bones (as in modern mammals). For that matter, what better transitional form could we expect to find than the oldest human, Australopithecus afarensis, with its apelike palate, its human upright stance, and a cranial capacity larger than any ape’s of the same body size but a full 1,000 cubic centimeters below ours? If God made each of the half-dozen human species discovered in ancient rocks, why did he create in an unbroken temporal sequence of progressively more modern features—increasing cranial capacity, reduced face and teeth, larder body size? Did he create to mimic evolution and test our faith thereby?

Faced with these facts of evolution and the philosophical bankruptcy of their own position, creationists rely upon distortion and innuendo to buttress their rhetorical claim. If I sound sharp or bitter, indeed I am—for I have become a major target of these practices.

Stephen Gould.

 

[evo]

Faced with these facts of evolution and the philosophical bankruptcy of their own position, creationists rely upon distortion and innuendo to buttress their rhetorical claim. If I sound sharp or bitter, indeed I am—for I have become a major target of these practices. 8)

 

[Panthera tigris FC]

And on the creationist sites the debunkers have been debunked. I find their articles to be mainly well researched and accurate.

I think if you looked at the octopus/eye article, you would find they addressed 'junk DNA'.

On the rest of what you/disco said: I still want to see:
1. Beneficial mutations
2. Laboratory examples of speciation involving the evolution of new 'information' in the genome.

As for the guff about me not understanding evolution. Don't make me laugh :rofl :rofl. I grew up with it, studied it at uni, read books on it, BUT, I only looked at it critically once I became a Christian.

I apologise if I mistakenly accused you of not understanding evolution, but the content of your arguments in relation to the subject suggest as much.

I know that article addressed junk DNA. That is why I brought it up again. You still haven't explain this specific example....endogenous retroviruses (ERVs) are found throughout hominid genomes in patterns that match exactly what the theory of evolution by common descent predict. What is your explanation for such a pattern that doesn't invoke evolution? We know what these sequences are (relics of retroviral infections), we know how they invade the genome and we know their distribution in this one family. It is a very convincing argument, and I would like hear a specific counter to it.

As a trained scientist, you would have been trained in critical analysis, yet you claim that you didn't critically evaluate evolutionary theory until you found God (in the absence any evidence outside your subjective experience). So in a sense you were forced to choose: between your God and a literal interpretation of the bible and evolutionary theory with the mountains of evidence to support it.