Some Evidence Against Evolution

Excellently well put. There are a myriad of mechanisms available for explaining the change in allelic frequency whether you are looking at the microscale (mutation, recombination, drift, etc) or macroscale (natural selection, character displacement, ecological release, adaptive radiation, sexual selection, founder effect, density compensation, the "island effect", etc) which taken together can create related species as different as Elephas falconeri and E. maximus - the former being the world's smallest (now extinct) elephant at only a meter tall.Don't confuse defnition with mechanism.

This is not an invalid criticism. I think one of the key failings of most scientists who understand evolution is the vast majority simply never try to make it easily understandable to an intelligent but possibly uninformed non-scientist. In that, the general run of professional creationists have a distinct advantage. Although the "nuts and bolts" as you say can get pretty complicated - evolution is a complex subject - there are ways to explain most of it that are accessible. I guess the best thing to do would be to stop the person you're exchanging messages with whenever there's something that sounds jargon-y or hard to understand, and ask them to explain what they're on about...

Naw, t'weren't you, DT. I've never read one of your posts that I haven't a) understood, and b) enjoyed immensely. I was merely responding to Willow's observation that he had some difficulty occasionally understanding what people were talking about. As an observation, that's not an unwarranted accusation (and one I'm personally guilty of quite a bit, I'm afraid). I just wanted Willow to see that all he had to do was ask, in a case like that.

However, wouldn't this criticism apply to just about any field of endeavor? From experience, the more specialized a field the more esoteric the language - at least when practitioners speak amongst themselves. The accusation can apply to the gamut of specialties, from plumbers to computer programmers to cosmologists. In many truly modern cases - relatively "new" sciences like systematics or evolutionary ecology or exobiology - the jargon gets even farther from "common usage" because the practioners are actually making it up as they go along. For a probably familiar example, consider particle physics and quarks with color or humor. How about cosmology? I mean, just wtf does "brane" mean anyhow? Even my own, fairly prosaic field uses specialist terminology, like xeric habitats, cryptoturnover, metapopulation dynamics, etc.Paleontologists aren't any worse than the practitioners of any other discipline, with the exception of the sub-genre of systematists (who are some of the worst...). When they talk about bones, they are mostly using accepted terminology from anatomy, physiology, geology etc. Their naming conventions are latin, based almost entirely on a 300 year old classification system. I actually find them less cryptic, overall, than physicists or even "pure" geologists. If you try and follow one of the detailed geology threads on this board, you'll see what I mean.However, no scientists communicate "truths" in some kind of deliberately obscurantist secret language. They communicate amongst themselves in an idiom - call it a short hand - that describes tiny details or esoteric concepts through the use of specialist jargon. What's more, anyone - scientist or not - can learn what the terminology and jargon mean if they want to bother. That's quite a bit different from some kind of secret handshake or something used by people who are trying to hide what they're doing from the uninitiated.OTOH, I do think that more scientists should try and make the transition from their patois to "common language". Quite a few, including paleontologists like Gould and Leakey, have made the effort. There are an even larger number of science writers (like Zimmer, Quammen, Barlow, Weiner, etc) who have taken great pains to write in clear and accessible prose about what scientists - evolutionary biologists, ecologists, paleontologists, etc - are discovering and speculating. A number of very prominent scientists from other disciplines are also making an effort to communicate their ideas, findings and research to a general audience (like Diamond, Ehrlich, Knoll, Ridley, etc - is my life science bias showing here, or what?). The books are out there - all it takes is a bit of interest and a bit of reading. Creationists may believe (your words) this. That belief doesn't make the assertion true. Given that there are a large fraction of scientists, including paleontologists presumably, who are believers in some divine entity of one form or another, it would seem to render invalid your contention that science in general and paleontology in particular presuppose the non-existence of this entity. It is simply that science doesn't address things that are not natural or that don't conform to natural laws as we understand them. They don't say "it ain't", they simply say "I can't address the question". Science and scientists generally strive very hard to remain in the realms of the verifiable and empirically testable. When they stray, some other scientists will be more than happy (occasionally "gleefully" might be a better word) to point it out. Remember cold fusion? To lend validity to your criticism, you're going to have to document some specific cases where this bias colors the interpretation, or where paleontologists - or any other scientists - have used their field of expertise or the scientific journals in which they publish their findings in order to a) deny the existence of a divine entity OR b) transfer their "expertise from the field of paleontology TO the field of religion/divine."

Willow - I went to some effort in this post to correct your misunderstanding of the use of jargon and/or esoteric language by science. Yet, rather than addressing the points I raised, you merely ignore the post and reiterate your erroneous conclusion. I couldn't care less about whether or not the words you (and Scott, apparently) used were legitimate - they were understandable in context, and hence the purposes of communication were satisfied.Please address the issues I raised in counterpoint to your claim that the language of science is an attempt to "sneak in" bias and deliberately mislead the uninitiated. Alternatively, you can select any specific example where you feel that such is taking place, and although it may cause the cancellation of my membership in the Vast Worldwide Evilutionist Conspiracy (tm), I will reveal the allegedly "hidden meaning" to you - in words that any "ordinary person" can understand.

Okay, since this is supposedly a consolidated reply to me among others, I'll add my two cents in here. Of course it does. The evidence - freely available and accessible to anyone who wishes to take the time to look at it - supports both the overall fact of evolution (i.e., common descent and population change over time), and many but not all proposed mechanisms. A lot of the details can be (and are) argued about. The fact that so many scientists from a myriad of philosophical, national and religious backgrounds agree with the basics, and that despite 150+ years of trying, no one has successfully falsified it, tends to increase the confidence level. Details are a different animal: for example, I'll gleefully argue the MacArthur/Wilson Equilibrium Theory is nothing more than a nice theoretical exercise with no practical utility that is rebutted by observation, even tho' there are a lot of scientists who consider it a solid explanation. And I can cite a dozen - heck, a hundred - "extremely credible non-creationists" who refute Milton's contentions, both religious and atheist. So? Argument from authority is a fool's game - which is why the evidence is what is important. Argue interpretation of the data, not claim an "expert said so, therefore X". This isn't Christian apologetics or witnessing, it's science. You haven't provided any evidence, so what is there to disagree with? You quoted a couple of people. So? I can quote bunches that disagree. Does this advance the discussion, or is it an endless tail-chase? Is there an actual argument buried here somewhere? Actually, what you've done is made a specific claim that has not bee supported. Rather than quoting someone who simply makes the same claim, in this case the burden of proof is on you to show any example of any scientist in any of the main or peripheral disciplines of evolutionary biology that uses their science to conclude this. For example, you could show by specific example how Ernst Mayr - one of the doyens of modern biology - has ever attempted to use evolutionary theory to disprove God. You are continually conflating the metaphysical claims of "scientism" with "science". Not only are the two not identical, but they don't even operate in the same territory. Scientism is a philosophy (and a discredited one on logical grounds). Science is a methodology or process for understanding the world around us (and it works, which is why we keep using it). There are no "brains behind neo-Darwinism". There are quite a few people who are considered tops in the field, but anyone is free to argue with them and/or show how their ideas are false. Many of the early names in the field have been shown to be wrong, at least in the details. A few have been outspoken atheists. OTOH, a large minority are believers of one stripe or another (about 45%). Denying God doesn't seem to be in either their interest or philosophically tenable given their belief system. Neo-Darwinism remains simply the best explanation for the diversity of life. It could be overthrown tomorrow if a better one comes along. Name one religion that can justifiably make that claim. I assume this was one of those parts that wasn't directed at me. To be honest, as far as I can tell, you haven't even advanced an argument. Just a bunch of unsupported assertions backed by a couple of pseudo-authorities. Not much to go on, here. Heh. Philosphy can't explain why the natural world is the way it is. Science can (thus far, anyway). After all, philosophers can argue any number of utterly metaphysical ideas that bear no relationship whatsoever to empiricism. Put two philosophers in a room, and ask them "Why" something. You'll get at least three contradictory answers. As far as reacting like a fundy - I'd be absolutely delighted for you to "take the core of my theory to task". What shall we discuss? Common descent? Population dynamics? Biogeography? Natural Selection? Symbiosis vs competition? Heredity? Feel free to show how any of these are wrong. [qs]I question your motives because I/we do not trust you. How could a person[s] who belong to the other major opposing worldview be honest and fair to their arch-rival ? The atheists of neo-Darwinism are not about to give any help to the relgionists who raged against their machine in the formative years.[/qs]I think you may be looking at a false dichotomy here. There are substantially more than two worldviews out there. Especially when you consider that biblical literalists are an exceedingly small minority of Christians, let alone all the other philosophies that exist from animism to Islam to Shintoism. The funny thing is, there are way more religious people who accept evolution than oppose it. Don't conflate science with atheism - there's no basis whatsoever for this claim.You might find it interesting to examine the early history of Darwinism. Charles Lyell, who never accepted evolution as an explanation for the diversity of life, was the guy who put the final nail in the literalist coffin when he destroyed the notion of the biblical flood and a young earth. He was a geologist, not a naturalist (biologist). And a believer in a Creator God. Then you're condemning an erroneous strawman. Genetics actually provides much better evidence for the relationship among primates, and paleontology/anthropology only postulates that humans and apes derived from a common ancestor - which was neither the one nor the other but shared early characteristics of both. Fossil bones bear out this idea, both in the general sense (because the deeper the bones are buried, the less human they appear), and in specifics (all those latin terms used in comparative anatomy).Again, nowhere in anything I've ever read in any science book OR in any science journal has there been any reference or indication that science denies God. It's simply a question that never arises, because it is irrelevant to the process of science, and irrelevant to the conclusions of science. Atheism as well has absolutely nothing to do with science. It may be a philosophy held by individual scientists, but is not the basis of science itself. I'm sorry, but this is patent nonsense. I absolutely do NOT take everything a scientist, paleontologist or evolutionary biologist, on "faith". I may accept specific claims made by scientists without digging into the details in fields where I have little interest or training. But I don't take it as gospel or as engraved on stone tablets handed down from on high. I'm quite happy to disagree with scientists when their ideas don't appear to match my observations - in which cases I WILL dig more. And it doesn't take 20 years, but you do have to actually read enough or learn enough to understand what they're talking about if you're going to disagree with them. Which, of course, is why I suggested you pick a specific example of some claim or idea proposed by any evolutionary scientist that you think is being deliberately obfuscated through the use of jargon and I'll undertake to provide an understandable explanation for it.Evidence is evidence. The nature of the endeavor is such that examination of the evidence by independent and completely different people with completely different worldviews - if done without preconceptions or presuppositions beyond methodological naturalism - will yield similar conclusions. If they don't, then it's back to the drawing board...

What? You think we didn't know all this? You have an ever-developed sense of your own ability to keep a secret. "Two people can keep a secret, as long as one of them is dead."

True enough. However, this probably isn't the best topic to argue that semantic point. Aren't there a couple of threads where we all went 'round and 'round about the definition of atheism?I'm taking Willow at face value on what he means - I'm assuming that he's using the common-usage anti-theist definition. Which, of course, is far away from the process of science.

Hi Willow,I assume you haven't forgotten my previous posts, and at some point you will take the time to respond? There's no rush - I'm only marginally on-line for the next week or so (although I'll try and check in), and at the connect charge of USD$.50 per minute, my participation and on-line time will be necessarily somewhat limited. However, be aware that I do expect a reply, and I will be checking as I can.------------------
"Cuisve hominis est errare, nullius nisi insipientis in errore perseverare." Cicero