Summations Only

To take on just some of the falsehoods...

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But of course it must be added that there is no rational explanation for the sorting of the sedimentary strata in which they appear either, as if eras of time could be characterized by only one kind of sediment.

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They aren't. The geological record does not show any such order.

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The rising of the ocean water in the first months of the FLood would certainly have deposited sediments according to Walther's Law.

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No, it would not. You could expect an upward-fining order but that is not seen either - not as a feature of the entire geological record.

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The overwhelming evidence is that the layers in which the fossils are found were simply mechanically produced by water

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And that is an outright lie.The Flood explains neither geology nor the fossil record. The very idea is a joke.

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Note: Not one single post here has offered evidence or reasoned argumentation for anything. Mine has actually done more in that direction than any other.

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Really? Can you support your claim that there is a "sorting" of geological layers and that this alleged "sorting" is used to date rocks.I think that every informed person knows that the primary method of dating is the geometrical relationships between strata, and the really rather basic point of the Principle of Superposition. Radiometric dating is a very welcome addition, and it must be printed out that it provides strong support for mainstream geology and very strong evidence against the idea that large amounts of the geological record were deposited in a single year.

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I'd like to see someone actually PROVE that the order of the fossils supports evolution. Can you prove increasing complexity perhaps? Anything at all.

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More correctly the maximum complexity increases - although that trend is mainly due to life starting simply rather than any force encouraging the development of complexity. Parasites, for instance, tend to become simpler.It's sort of amazing that someone who' spent so many years arguing about this should be so unaware of the evidence. The earliest known fossils are stromatolites - structures created by single-called organisms. Multi-called life appears later, we have the strange Ediacarian fauna. Early chordates appear in the Cambrian, followed by early vertebrates, primitive fish. Have a look at Myllokunmingia and tell me that's as complex as a modern mammal. At the other end of the scale, with human evolution we have a progression from Australopithecines through early Homo species, up to Habilis to Erectus to modern Homo Sapiens.

Lame excuses won't cut it Faith. Apart from contradicting yourself in the first two sentences (how can it be both a result of microevolution and no evolution at all ?) you aren't addressing the point of the order of the fossils.Are you really going to argue that mechanical sorting is going to produce the observed order, or are you just trying to sweep it under the carpet?

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I've answered the only offering of evidence from the other side on this thread with reasoned argument. There has been only that evidence

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No. I have, for instance seen no substantive argument against the fossil evidence for the "reptile"-mammal transition, for instance.

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When I say a particular idea is just mental juggling or the like, I believe I have just shown how it is so it isn't just an empty statement. That's a substantive argument, I SHOW how it's purely imaginative.

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No. In fact outright lying would be a more accurate description

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But as I said back upthread, if you rule against my objection to the term "new species" perhaps all I can do is leave the thread whether I want to or not. Not a threat and not something I could change my mind about if it's really the only option.

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If you can't make your case without making ridiculous false accusations then something is badly wrong with your position.

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And here's where I point out that the sequence of changes in the fossil bones that would have to evolve between the reptile and the mammal is purely imagined. This is a substantive argument against the ToE, that it really is mostly mental, with very little actual evidence.

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The sequence, of course, has to be based on the actual bone structures, so to call it "purely imagined" is either irrelevant or false. Even worse the *evidence* is the fossils which correspond to stages in the transition. Ignoring dramatic evidence and implying that it does not exist is hardly honest.

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So to my mind the next task on this thread is for someone to give evidence that the necessary rearrangement of bones to show an evolutionary connection between those fossils is really genetically possible and not just assumed and imagined.

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RAZD has already done so, although it is not actually necessary. That is the pint of referring to the variation in dogs, although you clearly missed the point. And, I will add, this is an objection based on ignorance. You offer no reason to think that the changes are nor possible at all.

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Millions of years is fictional. Nothing would be left alive after even a million years.

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According to your assumptions. But since the evidence shows that "millions of years" is reality that's just a reason to consider your assumptions false.So, no your "reasoning" is obviously faulty.

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So you didn't want debate when you set up this thread, even though "we win" certainly is going to provoke debate. Then when you get debate you attack the person and treat the argument like trash.

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it s supposed to be debate about the fossils. And your argument is still speculation with strong evidence against it. Using it as a reason to dismiss evidence is simply neither rational nor sensible.

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I like my argument, I think it's viable, I think it kills evolution.

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Obviously you like it or you would have abandoned it after your repeated failures to make an adequate case. But to say that it kills evolution is a ridiculous - and obvious - falsehood. You can't kill well-evidenced scientific theories with speculations. You need to have better evidence - and you aren't anywhere close.

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That's pretty funny if the fossil record is a lot of separate unrelated species. You'd just be imposing the theory on them, not getting evidence from them.

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No. If the evidence is misleading, following it is still following it - even to a false conclusion. These fossils are amazingly good evidence for evolution, and until you produce a better explanation (which does not mean an explanation that you like better) they remain so.

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I don't dispute any of the facts. What I'm disputing is the evolutionist interpretation that this sequence of living things proves evolution, the genetic descent of the higher from the lower

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we have a good explanation for the fossil record. You don't. That's a pretty big advantage to us.

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but nevertheless there never has been any actual evidence of genetic descent, and now I've been arguing that in fact the changes required to get from the reptile bones to the mammal bones are genetically impossible.

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Of course the sequence of fossils, with their similarities and differences IS evidence of genetic relationship, typically from recent common ancestors. We don't assume direct descent, only that the fossils representing branches on a family tree.But asserting that that couldn't happen is something that requires rather more evidence than you've offered. Given that we are speaking of similar creatures with relatively small differences, is it not likely that their genomes are also similar with small differences ? And if that is true, why should they not be related ? Why can't it happen ?Objections that are very likely false are not good objections. Especially in the absence of any reasonable alternative explanation.

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I think I've made a good observation here: genetics doesn't work the way it would have to work to produce the gradual changes between fossils that is always assumed to be how evolution works. It doesn't produce gradual changes over generations, it produces variations.

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That's not a good observation, that is a bad assumption. The gradual changes are wrought by the cumulative effects of variation and selection working together. It is the accumulation of new variations guided by selection that produces gradual change. That's one of the reasons it is slow - it takes time for suitable variations to appear.And you really need to learn that your liking for an argument does nothing to make it stronger. Assumptions with - at best - feeble support are always weak, no matter how much you like them.

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The problem I'm trying to highlight here is that discussions of fossil evolution completely ignore what genetics actually does

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It's not a subject that is covered in great detail because it's still not that well understood.
(Although I'm sure you could find work on the subject if you cared to. Have you even tried?)However since it is clear that you do not understand what genetics does, and have not even made a good-faith effort to try to understand what genetics does, your opinions on the matter may rightly be rejected.

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Evo theory just goes on and on about how such and such changes occurred over those millions of years without knowing if it is even possible, and in reality it's just not.

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Your uninformed opinions and reality are two very different things. If you are foolish enough to get the two confused - as you so frequently do - be assured that we will not,

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Yes and I'm sure this is generally true in most sciences. But two things come to mind to explain why this might not happen with evolutionary theory.

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Unfortunately there are substantial falsehoods in your reasons.Firstly denying that the evidence exists does not make it go away. The fossil sequences in themselves are strong evidence for evolution. The mere fact that you cannot offer any reasonable alternative explanation - and that your counter-argument amounts to no more than assuming that evolution must be false - should at least give you pause for thought. And that is before we get into the evidence from taxonomy, biogeography and genetics.Second it is quite possible to question evolutionary theory without bein labelled a creationist. Of course, because evolution fits so well with the evidence it is hard to come up with an alternative that works any better. But it must be noted that we do not see strong arguments against evolution.

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personally think that as genome studies continue it may well have to be faced that there is a hard-wired part of it that makes a species a species. I read somewhere that there is a part of the genome that doesn't vary. I don't know if I extrapolated to the fixed species structure myself or if it was part of that article.

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That doesn't seem to be true, and there is no reason to think that it is. And if this is a test, how could we determine if it failed?

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I also believe that if studies were done on population genetics along the lines I've suggested, creating new populations from a few pairs in reproductive isolation and continuing to do that with each new population that forms - could take a decade or three or ten or more depending on the rate of reproduction -- that it would be seen that the development of new phenotypes always goes with reduced genetic diversity, which is the opposite of what is needed for evolution to progress to macroevolution.

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That is not a fair test because we already know that artificial selection can reduce genetic variation quicker than mutation can replace it. A test that will give the result that you want even if you are wrong is a rigged test.So both tests seem to be invalid.

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Well, it's a castle in the air, hard to shoot down.

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If you really think that you can shoot down a genuine sscientific theory by lying about it, please demonstrate this ability. I'll even let you choose the theory.

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I've said I can see why it's seductive. But if there is no way to get from one creature to another genetically it's a bust.

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So, to be more accurate it IS strong evidence, but you speculate that the fossils might be unrelated despite the evidence to the contrary. I hope you can see that an unlikely speculation is not much of an objection.

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The point was that you can't impose an interpretation on the facts and continue to call it facts.

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The sequence is a fact. Even if you reject the dates the ordering is an observable fact, not an interpretation.

Still trying to deceive people, Faith ?We know that the Flood couldn’t create the fossil record as we see it. Even you know that. It can’t even explain the abundance.

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It explains it all quite nicely.

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No, and you know it doesn’t

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In a way a few billion years of selective burial can't possibly

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The fact that there are too many fossils to be reasonably created by the Flood (remember the discussion of crinoids, for example ?) shows that billions of years of accidents and lesser disasters is a better explanation.And there is far more, such as the order of the fossil record and the fact that the geological record can’t be reasonably accounted for by the Flood either. All things you know from last discussion.

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Not your personal attacks on me, though of course nobody is bothering about those things lately.

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If you want to keep your sins secret then don’t go around flaunting them. And if you insist on displaying them for all to see don’t complain when somebody notices,