Register | Sign In


Understanding through Discussion


EvC Forum active members: 65 (9162 total)
4 online now:
Newest Member: popoi
Post Volume: Total: 915,817 Year: 3,074/9,624 Month: 919/1,588 Week: 102/223 Day: 0/13 Hour: 0/0


Thread  Details

Email This Thread
Newer Topic | Older Topic
  
Author Topic:   Rebuttal To Creationists - "Since We Can't Directly Observe Evolution..."
dwise1
Member
Posts: 5930
Joined: 05-02-2006
Member Rating: 5.8


Message 10 of 2926 (894422)
05-15-2022 8:43 PM
Reply to: Message 9 by AZPaul3
05-15-2022 5:57 PM


Re: Patience
It's only been a day since this was promoted.
I'm sure that I've seen him show up a couple times in the "online now" line. Maybe he's waiting for the kind of response he was hoping for.
While we're at it, has anyone ever heard it pronounced "evayution" before this video? Has me wondering about its point of origin.
And then I started wondering whether he has a more direct connection with the video, as in whether he had created it. Its "bug" (a TV network "watermark" in the corner of the screen) is of a salamander, which also figures into his email address.
None of what means anything. Just being curious.
This thread could be more correcting misimpressions than fighting monsters.
Probably not how you meant that, but, yeah.
Anybody who actually knows anything about evolution, including FossilDiscovery, knows that "macroevolution" is just "microevolution" over many more generations -- ie, that they're the same thing on different time scales. Almost all the replies so far have been to that effect, but it's not FossilDiscovery we need to be explaining that to but rather to creationists, which I take to be the purpose of the video.
The problem is that creationists won't get the message. They have been taught and hence are convinced that "macroevolution" is something completely different from "microevolution", even to the point that it "must operate completely differently". Hence, whenever we try to explain the truth to them, they will reject our explanations outright because "our explanation does not address macroevolution, but only microevolution which are two different things!" Their own indoctrination and misinformation and disinformation about evolution keep them blinded from the facts and the truth.
We have recently witnessed that with candle2's dis-definition of evolution as being "a cat evolving into a dog" blinding him to our many far more accurate explanations, which he basically refuses to even look at because "if they don't address how a cat would evolve into a dog then they aren't talking about evolution".
I saw this in action outside of this forum with Erika "Gutsick Gibbon's" video, Chatting with YEC Rebekah about Radiometric Dating, in which she dialogues with a YEC, Rebekah -- while Erika does most of the talking, explaining radiometric dating to Rebekah who politely listens, the overall tone is very congenial and not confrontational.
The scene that brings this up is where the subject of how fossils are dated came up (I seem to recall Rebekah asking that) and Erika provides a very good explanation: fossils are not radio-dated directly (since that would require them to have been melted completely whereupon they would no longer be fossils), but rather from the stratigraphic layer they are found in (which itself is dated through other means). Here is my explanation to candle2 in Message 36 when he tried to invoke the standard "fossils dated through circular reasoning" lie:
DWise1 writes:
candle2 writes:
Also, fossils are dated by the strata that they
are found in, and the strata is dated by the
fossils they contain.
Yes, and? But the way you say that means that you are insinuating circular reasoning. Same dishonest creationist lie, hasn't changed a bit.
Radiometric dating on rock is how long ago it solidified from being molten.
Radiometric dating cannot be performed on sedimentary rock since it is ground down and recycled older rock, so radiometric dating would just get the age of bit of old rock tested. However, we can tell which layers are older than others by the order in which they are stacked. We can also establish dates for layers from igneous intrusions which bracket them in. Therefore we can determine the age of a particular layer.
Fossils cannot dated directly (excluding organic specimens). For one thing, if you melt the fossil in order to "start its clock", then you have destroyed that fossil -- if it's a fossil, it hasn't been melted, so no radiometrically dating a fossil. Fossils result from burial and so are most commonly found in sedimentary rock, but we can arrive at a date for the layer it's found in as described above (extremely important that you don't just pull a fossil out of the ground and carry it to a museum).
So how do we identify a layer here to be part of that other layer way over there?
In geology it's done by with identifying characteristics which have been determined empirically, which includes index fossils. However, many of those index fossils are microscopic, eg diatom shells which evolve over time. Fossils such as the ones that we are interested in (eg, dinos) are not used a index fossils. Thus the fossils identifying the stratum (from which we know its age) are not the same as the fossils that get their age from which stratum they're in. There is no circular reasoning here.
In Erika's video, after she explained fossil dating to Rebekah, whose countenance revealed some confusion, Rebekah repeated the same question, to which Erika gave a summary of her explanation which Rebekah seemed to accept regardless of whether she was not convinced.
The thing was that Rebekah's YEC indoctrination had taught her to expect to be able to perform radiometric dating directly on the fossil itself, so when the truth was explained to her, she couldn't understand it for what it was. And the same holds true for a plethora of cases where the YEC's indoctrination prevents them from learning the truth.
So, how can we correct creationists' lies? I started out in the 1980's thinking that all I had to do was to show them that their claims are wrong and why. So I know from bitter personal experience that that does not work. Also helps to explain why I've run out of patience with them and their evil ways.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 9 by AZPaul3, posted 05-15-2022 5:57 PM AZPaul3 has not replied

  
dwise1
Member
Posts: 5930
Joined: 05-02-2006
Member Rating: 5.8


Message 18 of 2926 (897997)
09-17-2022 1:29 PM
Reply to: Message 17 by Kleinman
09-17-2022 12:46 PM


Re: Video not available
Let's start with the physics of Darwinian evolution. What are the two physical processes that Darwin described? Then tell us what laws of thermodynamics applies to these processes.
The physics of neo-Darwinian evolution (we have learned a lot in the past 163 years) are the same as the physics of life itself. An operational definition of evolution would be "the net results of populations of organisms doing what life normally does."
Therefore, trying to "disprove evolution" by abusing thermodynamics et alia would also be an attempt to prove life to be impossible. That one is not going to fly -- never has, never will.
But go ahead and knock yourself out. Just don't expect me to make the trip to the pantry for the microwave popcorn. I've seen this show before.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 17 by Kleinman, posted 09-17-2022 12:46 PM Kleinman has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 20 by Kleinman, posted 09-17-2022 1:47 PM dwise1 has replied

  
dwise1
Member
Posts: 5930
Joined: 05-02-2006
Member Rating: 5.8


(1)
Message 36 of 2926 (898024)
09-17-2022 4:22 PM
Reply to: Message 20 by Kleinman
09-17-2022 1:47 PM


Re: Video not available
You left something out of that quotation. IOW, you lifted it out of context, typical creationist act.
That is from Darwin's section, "Divergence of Character", in which he explains his ideas of how new species arise. Part of his explanation through analogies (he was not a mathematician -- the mathematical analysis of evolution came with population genetics in neo-Darwinism having had to wait for genetics), included the little matter of extinction, which follows sixteen long paragraphs of exposition (the part you left out embolded):
quote:
But during the process of modification, represented in the diagram, another of our principles, namely that of extinction, will have played an important part. As in each fully stocked country natural selection necessarily acts by the selected form having some advantage in the struggle for life over other forms, there will be a constant tendency in the improved descendants of any one species to supplant and exterminate in each stage of descent their predecessors and their original parent. For it should be remembered that the competition will generally be most severe between those forms which are most nearly related to each other in habits, constitution, and structure. Hence all the intermediate forms between the earlier and later states, that is between the less and more improved state of a species, as well as the original parent-species itself, will generally tend to become extinct. So it probably will be with many whole collateral lines of descent, which will be conquered by later and improved lines of descent. If, however, the modified offspring of a species get into some distinct country, or become quickly adapted to some quite new station, in which child and parent do not come into competition, both may continue to exist.
Just one small part of Darwin's entire exposition, yet you presented only that ... once you had carefully scrubbed what Darwin was talking about.
But if you had an actual point that you were trying to make with that lifted-out-of-context quote, then you could have stated it. But you didn't, did you, Littleman? You never do. Gee, if you actually had something to say, one would think that you would say it. If you actually had a point to make, then one would think that you would make it. Yet you never do, do you, Littleman?
Almost as if you're just trying to bullshit us. Which is so tiringly typical of creationists.
 
PS:
OBTW, you keep talking about "the physics of Darwinian evolution". Yet you never reveal just what the hell you're talking about?
Obviously you are just trying to jerk us around. Which is tiringly typical of creationists.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 20 by Kleinman, posted 09-17-2022 1:47 PM Kleinman has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 39 by Kleinman, posted 09-17-2022 4:40 PM dwise1 has replied

  
dwise1
Member
Posts: 5930
Joined: 05-02-2006
Member Rating: 5.8


Message 45 of 2926 (898033)
09-17-2022 5:07 PM
Reply to: Message 31 by Kleinman
09-17-2022 3:50 PM


Re: Video not available
Biological competition "disrupt" (slows) adaptation.
Ah, the classic creationist mistake/deception of misrepresenting evolution as being only one part of the entire process: either it's only natural selection or it's only mutation. Wrong! All you have proven is that you do not know what you are talking about, which again is tiringly typical of creationists.
Adaptation is an iterative process (I'm a retired software engineer, so I know something from iterative processes), which simplified goes something like:
  1. (jumping into an ongoing loop) Start where you have a population which is adapted sufficiently to its environment. Observe that there is some genetic and phenotypic diversity within the population centered about a hypothetical optimum though with an acceptable degree of deviation from that optimum.
  2. That starting generation then reproduces resulting in a new generation of offspring who are very similar to, though still different from, their parents. This increases diversity through a number of different factors, including recombination and mutations.
    This step also includes the non-viable genotypes which never are born/hatched/sprouted but rather spontaneously abort (I keep hearing the figure of about 50% -- that is also why you plant a few seeds in each hole in your garden). Those spontaneous abortions play no further role in this iterative loop and hence their non-adaptive traits are eliminated from the gene pool.
  3. The new generation survives and matures ... some of them. This is part of where their fitness comes into play, though it is almost literally a crap shoot (a freak accident could take out the most hyper-fit individual, so the surviving population does so statistically with greater fitness being a contributing factor).
  4. The surviving mature individuals enter the mating game and reproduce. This is where sexual selection comes into play.
    This is also where various reproductive strategies; eg, produce mass quantities of eggs in the hope that a few survive, produce a few eggs and be around to nurture them, etc.
  5. Loop back to Step 1.
Please note that the closer an individual is to the optimal mean for its population in their environment (it may help to visualize this as a bell curve with the optimal mean in the center) then the more fit it is.
Now consider a change in the environment where that optimal mean is no longer in the center, but rather off to one side (or even beyond the curve in the most extreme cases). In those cases, the fringe individuals closest to that new optimal mean will be the ones most fit for the new environment and will have their genes represented more in the next generations. That is adaptation.
So here's a question for you, Littleman. All that expresses change to changing environments. For that matter, many common definitions of "evolution" involve change, but not stasis.
But what about statis? How does evolution explain stasis, the absence of change? I know the answer, but do you? I've even already given you the answer.
This is a consequence of the first law of thermodynamics.
Really? How?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 31 by Kleinman, posted 09-17-2022 3:50 PM Kleinman has not replied

  
dwise1
Member
Posts: 5930
Joined: 05-02-2006
Member Rating: 5.8


(1)
Message 50 of 2926 (898040)
09-17-2022 7:23 PM
Reply to: Message 39 by Kleinman
09-17-2022 4:40 PM


Re: Video not available
I'm not trying to bullshit you.
No, that is all that you are doing. That is all that you have to work with.
All that creationists have is bullshit. That is all that you have to offer, to present. That is all that you have ever presented in about 544 messages!
Is that your god? The God of Bullshit?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 39 by Kleinman, posted 09-17-2022 4:40 PM Kleinman has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 51 by Kleinman, posted 09-17-2022 7:56 PM dwise1 has replied

  
dwise1
Member
Posts: 5930
Joined: 05-02-2006
Member Rating: 5.8


Message 52 of 2926 (898042)
09-17-2022 8:04 PM
Reply to: Message 39 by Kleinman
09-17-2022 4:40 PM


Re: Video not available
I'm not trying to bullshit you. I'm trying to explain to you the physics of Darwinian evolution. Since you are so impatient, just read this:
The Physics of Darwinian Evolution
Whaaaaat??? Two-slightly-plus pages of bullshit????
You need to join forces with MrIntelligentDesign. That guy is a truly a legend in his own mind, just like you. And he publishes his nonsense on vanity sites, just like you. Except his nonsense show a lot more work going into them than ... yours. I mean, he's nuttier than a fruitcake, but at least he shows up ... sometimes. You ... eeh!!

This message is a reply to:
 Message 39 by Kleinman, posted 09-17-2022 4:40 PM Kleinman has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 56 by Kleinman, posted 09-17-2022 8:17 PM dwise1 has not replied

  
dwise1
Member
Posts: 5930
Joined: 05-02-2006
Member Rating: 5.8


Message 55 of 2926 (898045)
09-17-2022 8:15 PM
Reply to: Message 51 by Kleinman
09-17-2022 7:56 PM


Re: Video not available
It is strange that you would think that physics, math, and experimental evidence are bullshit.
No! I do not!
Rather, it is your own perversive abuse of those disciplines that I think is bullshit.
 
Look and learn, you idiot!
You are using quote tags. NO!
Use qs tags to quote another member.
If you have no clue what to do, USE THE PEEK MODE!!!!!! You stupid idiot! Duh???
Look for somebody else's message where they do something you'd like to do.
Go into Peek mode to see exactly what he had typed in.
Use it!
That is exactly how simple it is.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 51 by Kleinman, posted 09-17-2022 7:56 PM Kleinman has not replied

  
dwise1
Member
Posts: 5930
Joined: 05-02-2006
Member Rating: 5.8


(2)
Message 77 of 2926 (898099)
09-18-2022 9:32 PM
Reply to: Message 75 by Kleinman
09-18-2022 5:07 PM


Re: Video not available
What principles of aeronautical engineering did the Wright Brothers get wrong?
The same number that they got right: none!
They were bicycle mechanics, not engineers. Like almost all those aeronautical pioneers, they tinkered together their aircraft primarily by guess and by golly and as such, many died when their aircraft would break up in mid-flight because of stresses that none of them knew how to deal with or design for. The ones who went on to create the aerospace industry were just lucky to have not crashed. In 1912, Glenn L. Martin flew the seaplane that he had built himself from Newport Beach to Catalina Island and back, breaking the over-water record. He also had no training in engineering but rather was a tinkerer, so he's lucky that he survived that flight to go on to form the Glenn L. Martin Company which has gone on to be merged with many other companies (eg, Lockheed-Martin).
Jack Northrop was one of the first ones to analyze those stresses using the geometry and physics that he had learned in high school. His aeronautical career started in 1916 when he was hired by the Loughead brothers (they changed their name later to Lockheed). That was more than a decade after the Wright brothers' 1903 flight at Kitty Hawk.
Donald Douglas was the first one to arrive with an actual engineering degree (the first BS Aeronautical Engineering degree earned at MIT, 1914), going to work for Glenn L. Martin in 1915. Commentary in Blue Sky Metropolis (PBS) about Douglas' main contribution was that now you could build an airplane that was a little less likely to break your neck.
So the Wright Brothers knew nothing about aeronautical engineering, but rather tinkered their way along. Which supports ringo's remark:
ringo writes:
That's like bringing up the Wright Brothers in a discussion about twenty-first-century aviation.
Twenty-first-century aviation involves a helluva lot of engineering. The Wright Brothers involved none!

This message is a reply to:
 Message 75 by Kleinman, posted 09-18-2022 5:07 PM Kleinman has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 78 by Kleinman, posted 09-18-2022 11:10 PM dwise1 has replied

  
dwise1
Member
Posts: 5930
Joined: 05-02-2006
Member Rating: 5.8


(1)
Message 79 of 2926 (898102)
09-18-2022 11:32 PM
Reply to: Message 78 by Kleinman
09-18-2022 11:10 PM


Re: Video not available
What a fucking idiot you are! Did creationism make you that way? Or were you already damaged and was attracted to creationism?
Learn the history some time. Aeronautical engineering had to be developed (with MIT's first degree presented a full decade after Kitty Hawk), so in the meantime they had to tinker and stumble their way through it (and do a lot of crashing).
The mathematics of studying evolution came long after Darwin with neo-Darwinism. Why don't you ask about Darwin's mathematical explanation of genetics? He didn't provide one because we didn't know about genetics yet! And the development of the mathematics of population genetics also didn't come until after Darwin. So why do you keep harping on about Darwinian evolution? You may as well ask about all the creationist research I did on the Internet in 1980.
The bullshit is strong in you. Please take a bath.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 78 by Kleinman, posted 09-18-2022 11:10 PM Kleinman has not replied

  
dwise1
Member
Posts: 5930
Joined: 05-02-2006
Member Rating: 5.8


Message 81 of 2926 (898105)
09-19-2022 12:46 AM
Reply to: Message 80 by PaulK
09-19-2022 12:24 AM


Re: Video not available
And you still haven’t explained how microevolutionary events can’t add up to macroevolution, just as I predicted.
Of course he hasn't. He's a creationist. Creationists only know to follow their scripts. Outside of their scripts, they don't know what to say, so they just keep repeating their scripts. They cannot even think, but rather all they can do is to follow their scripts.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 80 by PaulK, posted 09-19-2022 12:24 AM PaulK has not replied

  
dwise1
Member
Posts: 5930
Joined: 05-02-2006
Member Rating: 5.8


(3)
Message 99 of 2926 (898172)
09-20-2022 2:39 AM
Reply to: Message 95 by ringo
09-19-2022 9:50 PM


Re: Video not available
Living things are open systems (plenty of energy coming in), so conservation isn't really relevant.
I also could see him maneuvering towards that old creationist canard, "evolution violates thermodynamics".
A basic problem with that one is that evolution is primarily just the net result of life doing what life naturally does. So if evolution is supposed to violate thermodynamics, then so does life so, according to creationists, life should be impossible. And yet ... there it is!

This message is a reply to:
 Message 95 by ringo, posted 09-19-2022 9:50 PM ringo has seen this message but not replied

  
dwise1
Member
Posts: 5930
Joined: 05-02-2006
Member Rating: 5.8


Message 100 of 2926 (898173)
09-20-2022 2:45 AM
Reply to: Message 93 by Theodoric
09-19-2022 9:25 PM


Re: First
Did I say anything like that? Why would you ask that unless you were trolling?
He's a creationist.
Creationists don't understand what they're talking about, but rather they mainly are just following a script. When I was hanging out with the Jesus Freaks circa 1970 I saw a lot of those scripts ... and my own experience with creationists ever since then confirms that they are still using those same old stupid scripts. The only difference is that the IDiot scripts are a lot fancier and filled with more fancy terminology and references to obscure math, the better to deceive us with. ID is still nothing but bullshit, but it's a higher grade of bullshit than the old standard creationist stuff. Makes it harder to wash away with the hose.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 93 by Theodoric, posted 09-19-2022 9:25 PM Theodoric has not replied

  
dwise1
Member
Posts: 5930
Joined: 05-02-2006
Member Rating: 5.8


Message 153 of 2926 (898244)
09-21-2022 12:45 PM
Reply to: Message 149 by Percy
09-21-2022 10:53 AM


Re: Video not available
... and I was the physicist who thought that 9 not being a prime number could be experimental error.
My mathematician professor in a highly theoretical postgraduate computer science class (ie, very heavy on the math) told that joke to illustrate inductive reasoning in that an engineer had proven through inductive reasoning that all odd numbers are prime. He found that pattern with the numbers 1 through 13 at which point he took the inductive step. Yeah, 9 is not prime, but using his professional experience in statistical sampling he just ruled that one out as an outlier (there's always at least one in any sampling).
Many universities accept foreign students, in part so that they can charge them full tuition. We had several foreign students in our class, mainly Chinese. During the telling of that joke they were frantically taking notes on it, not realizing that it was a joke (his joke-telling was typical of math teachers; just consider Tom Lehrer). Similarly a senior engineer at work told of when he had been sent to China (or maybe Taiwan) to train them on the system that the company had sold them and he started a break by writing something on the board about being back in 5 minutes; he returned to find them hotly debating what that inscription was supposed to mean.
I am so embarrassed about my wrong guess that you meant lebensraum. Are they maybe competing for poker chips?
His inability to understand Lebensraum is indicative of far greater problems.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 149 by Percy, posted 09-21-2022 10:53 AM Percy has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 173 by Percy, posted 09-22-2022 9:06 AM dwise1 has not replied

  
dwise1
Member
Posts: 5930
Joined: 05-02-2006
Member Rating: 5.8


(1)
Message 154 of 2926 (898245)
09-21-2022 12:51 PM
Reply to: Message 151 by Tanypteryx
09-21-2022 12:24 PM


Re: Video not available
Kleinman writes:
Anyway, I like teaching biologists the physics and mathematics of biological evolution.
Really? You don't act like you like it, and you're not very good at it.
His is a typical creationist empty boast.
It looks so much like a creationist who boasted that he loves to teach evolutionists about their own theory, at which point he "taught us" that evolution is a snake laying an egg and a bird hatched out. Thirty years later that same creationist still knows nothing about what evolution is or how it works despite thirty years of his opponents repeatedly trying to explain it to him.
You can always tell a creationist, but you just cannot tell him anything.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 151 by Tanypteryx, posted 09-21-2022 12:24 PM Tanypteryx has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 155 by Tanypteryx, posted 09-21-2022 1:13 PM dwise1 has not replied

  
dwise1
Member
Posts: 5930
Joined: 05-02-2006
Member Rating: 5.8


Message 171 of 2926 (898300)
09-21-2022 11:59 PM
Reply to: Message 170 by ringo
09-21-2022 10:45 PM


Re: Video not available
I'm sure the chimpanzees don't brag about being related to you either. But you don't get to pick your relatives.
There's a good Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy quote for that, but I simply could not find it.
The HHGTHG observation was the ape-descendant humans rarely invite their cousins to dinner (depicted in the BBC TV series with the caption "This Never Happens").
So it is indeed not the chimpanzees who would brag about our relatedness, but rather it's the humans who wish to deny it.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 170 by ringo, posted 09-21-2022 10:45 PM ringo has seen this message but not replied

  
Newer Topic | Older Topic
Jump to:


Copyright 2001-2023 by EvC Forum, All Rights Reserved

™ Version 4.2
Innovative software from Qwixotic © 2024