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Author Topic:   What would falsify evolution?
PaulK
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Posts: 17828
Joined: 01-10-2003
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Message 4 of 18 (78607)
01-15-2004 7:02 AM
Reply to: Message 3 by Brian
01-15-2004 6:52 AM


Assuming that you want
a) A refutation of the historical course of evolution (rather than some other part of the theory)
b) something that can't easily be accomodated
then you're on the right lines.
However I'd choose something that is on the line of human ancestry - the earliest non-human primate for instance. There's no theoretical difficulty in humans predating whales.

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 Message 3 by Brian, posted 01-15-2004 6:52 AM Brian has replied

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 Message 7 by Brian, posted 01-15-2004 7:32 AM PaulK has replied

  
PaulK
Member
Posts: 17828
Joined: 01-10-2003
Member Rating: 2.5


Message 9 of 18 (78614)
01-15-2004 7:59 AM
Reply to: Message 7 by Brian
01-15-2004 7:32 AM


If you want a clear-cut example you must first be clear-cut on exactly which part of evolution you want to disprove.
When I get home I'll see if I can find something more useful but here's something that might be relevant.
At one point it was generally believed that life on Earth had been much the same throught time. The Earth was commonly thought to be only thousands of years old, and the mummified animals found in Egyptian tombs were easily identifiable as modern life - although they themselves were thousands of years old. Then we began to understand geology and paleontology and this view collapsed. The Earth was far older than most had believed and the forms of life on it had changed considerably over time. Without these realisations evolution would never even have been proposed.
Alternatively you can go for specific evolutionary hypotheses such as the suggestion I made in my previous post.
If you want evolution in the most important sense then I would go for boiling down the phylogenetics section of the "29 Evidences FAQ" at T.O. 29+ Evidences for Macroevolution: Part 1
This stuff literally should not work if it were not the case that species diversify over time by producing lineages of modified copies.

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