A test for claimed knowledge of how macroevolution occurs

It should.According to you and your interpretation of biblical verse and your claim of supporting gospel documentation, all creatures, plants, etc reproduce according to their original created kind.Cats beget cats, dogs beget dogs, etc, and further, what ever is produced from cats reproduction will always be a cat, what ever is produce from dogs reproduction will always be a dog, etc etc and so forth.According to your model (as I understand it), devolution occurs through loss of genetic variations, with different losses in different branches of devolution until you see the varieties of cats (including lions and tigers and domestic cats) we see today, and until you see hte varieties of dogs (including wolves and foxes and domestic dogs).All mutations will not produce an offspring from cats that is not a cat, and all mutations will not produce an offspring of dogs that is not a dog. They will always reproduce according to their kind.The cat kind should form a nested hierarchy from the original created kind to the variations/varieties of cats living in the world today. Including lions and tigers and domestic cats.The dog kind should form a nested hierarchy from the original created kind to the variations/varieties of dogs living in the world today. Including wolves and foxes and domestic dogs.There should be evidence supporting these descents from original created kinds, and they should form nested hierarchies -- because they all reproduce according to their own kind.These nested hierarchies exist.They should be part of your model, and your model should explain them, and it does explain them by saying that they, and all other life forms on earth reproduce according to their kind. It shouldBecause otherwise, how do you explain these observed and documented nested hierarchies for cat kinds and dog kinds that comply with your interpretation of biblical verse and your claim of supporting gospel documentation, that all creatures, plants, etc reproduce according to their original created kind? and what pattern of historical and other data should result from your model if not nested hierarchies?Enjoy

It is interesting that you want to leave God out of creationism (and out of the Flood too, for that matter). But what's the point of your crank ideas if God and miracles are not involved?

Then it can be seen that it's based only on scientific facts and not crank ideas.But I also explained that the original Creation was God's doing. After that we work from what He made.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

Though the varieties of the Kinds may form nested hierarchies, it's all subjective anyway. But what I object to is your idea that nested hierarchies prove evolution.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

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Then it can be seen that it's based only on scientific facts and not crank ideas.

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There are plenty of crank ideas that don’t mention God. If you want your ideas or be seen to be based on scientific facts you’d do better to base it on scientific facts. Leaving God out doesn’t make your ideas look any less cranky.Repeatedly trying to dismiss the fact that you have no explanation for a lot of the genetic evidence doesn’t help either.

Everything after the Creation itself is a working out of observed natural facts.

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Everything after the Creation itself is a working out of observed natural facts

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That still doesn’t make your ideas any more scientific.In fact you can’t escape the religion by just leaving out the Creation. For instance, your weird ideas about the genes of the immune system aren’t based on any real understanding of the relevant natural facts - not at all. Your ideas about how God should have done it are much more relevant.

Others described the immune system as having an enormous number of mutations/"alleles," and IIRC said they did have functions in protecting against diseases, or many of them did or something llke that. All I did was realize that if that is the case different individuals have protections against different diseases, making it llke Russian roulette. I'd have to review the discussion to remind myself what it was all about, but I also remember thinking that its genes must originally have been fixed for certain diseases, which would have meant EVERYONE had the same protections. The mutations would have scattered the protections so that many individuals would have been deprived of the originals. If I'm remembering it at all correctly that still seems to be a fair descriptions of the situation. Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

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Others described the immune system as having an enormous number of mutations/"alleles," and IIRC said they did have functions in protecting against diseases, or many of them did or something llke that. All I did was realize that if that is the case different individuals have protections against different diseases, making it llke Russian roulette.

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For individuals, perhaps. For the species it is good to have a wider range of immunities. It seems entirely possible that the range of immunities is greater than a single individual could carry.

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have to review the discussion to remind myself what it was all about, but I also remember thinking that its genes must originally have been fixed for certain diseases, which would have meant EVERYONE had the same protections.

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No, it wouldn’t have to be true, since you only need one allele for protection and I don’t expect strong, sustained selection for any single allele.

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The mutations would have scattered the protections so that many individuals would have been deprived of the originals

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That doesn’t make sense. Aside from the fact that diseases also mutate so the resistances needed would not be constant, why would mutation “scatter” resistances ?You are also ignoring the fact that heterozygosity is an advantage, giving the resistances of both alleles. The smaller the number of alleles the smaller the proportion of the population to have that advantage.Edited by Admin, : Fix quoted sections.

Then "kinds" is all subjective anyway. Of course that is how it appears when creationists try to use it. It doesn't "prove" it -- it is a prediction fulfilled that validates the theory of evolution. Descent that doesn't fit in a nested hierarchy (say a cross between donkey and a house cat) would invalidate the theory.This is because The traits of the offspring are a combination of {edit}some of{/edit} the traits from each parent plus some mutations. The mutations cause small changes in traits in each generation, which can be passed on to the next generation, and this leaves a trail of accumulated mutations. The traits don't come from other sources, so those traits can be used to see if there is a nested hierarchy, either morphological or genetic traits can be used with similar results.Basic microevolution.EnjoyEdited by RAZD, : .Edited by RAZD, : edit noted

I've found it difficult to take the nested hierarchy notion seriously for some reason. I don't think I really get what is being claimed about it. If it's just the fact that there seems to be a regularity in inheritance patterns from generation to generation, that seems rather trivial or obvious and of no real importance.What you say above about changes in hereditary traits from generation to generation seems to me to be what I just said, obvious, predictable but contributing nothing to the ToE. For one thing the only pattern of inheritance that could be observed is microevolution -- which you acknowledge -- so anything to do with the ToE, inheritance beyond the species, is all assumption, nothing you could demonstrate. And by the way, normal sexual recombination is quite enough to produce the changes you are talking about, you don't need mutations as well, so I'd guess the mutations are also an assumption and not actually observed. Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

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I've found it difficult to take the nested hierarchy notion seriously for some reason. If it's just the fact that there seems to be a regularity in inheritance patterns from generation to generation, that seems rather trivial or obvious and of no real importance.

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If you don’t even understand what the nested hierarchy is - and you obviously don’t - then it is not surprising that you are having trouble.The nested hierarchy is a feature of taxonomy going back to Linnaeus. To give a general overview (there are niggles in the details) it is like this:If you classify species according to their traits you find that there are traits defining groups at various levels. And you find that the smaller groups are entirely contained within the larger groups. E.g. all mammals are vertebrates or all sparrows are birds (and all birds are vertebrates).It doesn’t need to be this way, so the question is why it is. Evolution from a single common ancestor predicts this. Separate creation does not. There is no reason why a Creator would have to make things fit so neatly into a single nested hierarchy - but evolution from a common ancestor has to.

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For one thing the only pattern of inheritance that could be observed is microevolution -- which you acknowledge -- so anything to do with the ToE, inheritance beyond the species, is all assumption, nothing you could demonstrate.

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First, micro evolution is very much a part of the ToE. Second the nested hierarchy is evidence of a pattern of inheritance going beyond the species. The distribution of traits observed in life is entirely consistent with the inheritance of traits from a common ancestor, augmented by extra traits accumulating over time - which are also passed on.

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And by the way, normal sexual recombination is quite enough to produce the changes you are talking about, you don't need mutations as well, so I'd guess the mutations are also an assumption and not actually observed.

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Of course we know that mutations do happen and do add new traits. If you want to argue that it didn’t happen over the hundreds of millions of years life has existed then you need more than the assumption that sexual recombination could account for the differences.

No, of course that's not it.First, there's no "seems". The pattern is an observed fact.Second, it's a particularly unusual type of pattern. The traits used to classify organisms have the rare property that all descendents of a particular ancestor species share the classifying feature, and no organisms not descended from that particular ancestor have exactly that feature.For example, this diagram shows a small portion of the characteristics we use to classify organisms: The lines indicate the scope of a feature. In this diagram the outermost container is Chordates (having a spinal cord and some other features), and the fact that all the organisms in the diagram are inside that container indicates that all those organisms are chordates. Similarly all of them are vertebrates (have a backbone and a skeleton). The next level is two mutually exclusive containers, bony fish and chondrichcthyians (cartilage, not bone). Sharks are in the chondrichcthyians and no shark has a spinal chord or skeleton.Down at the lower levels, amphibians have all the characteristics of tetrapods, lobe finned fished, bony fishes, vertebrates, and chordates. Hominids have all the characteristics of primates, mammals, amniotes, tetrapods, lobe finned fishes, bony fishes, vertebrates, and chordates; but have none of the defining characteristics of birds, reptiles, amphibians, lungfish, or chondrichcthyians.Common descent can only produce this kind of pattern. Other processes don't. Of course God could have created that pattern but that's getting back to Goddidit with no explanation why and no predictive power.Many a creationist has tried to argue that this kind of pattern is common, usually by trying to construct a nested hierarchy of vehicles or other things. All have failed spectacularly; it's impossible to (for example) construct a nested hierarchy of vehicles containing more than a few entries without breaking the nesting feature.Of course you believe that almost all the classes of organisms shown there are not related by descent. But what caused the pattern? Goddidit, let's do lunch?Edited by JonF, : No reason given.

Thank you, that was very clarifying. I've printed it out.I don't use "God did it" so would you please stop attributing that to me?I'll think about it and respond later.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

But you keep admiting that you can't explain the scientific facts. And now you're saying that you don't even have to explain the scientific facts. That's as unscientific as you could possibly get. Why make that distinction? Why have God do the miracle of creation, then stop doing miracles, then at some later date presumably start doing miracles again?Your attempts at "explanations" are laughably, pitifully bad, full of contradictions and ignorance. Why not just let your God do a miracle here or there?