(May 21, 2012 at 4:16 pm)Hovik Wrote: ....you'll see exactly how stupid you look right now.

No, she won't. There is bible stuffed into every pore and oriface. She is impermeable to any form of enlightenment.

The kind of stupidity which this asshole is presenting can only survive in a closed system, Hovik. Creatards cannot allow air, light or facts to contaminate their little fucked up belief structure or the whole mess will come crashing down like a house of cards.

(May 21, 2012 at 4:28 pm)libalchris Wrote: Let me simplify this discussion: What evidence would it take to convince you that macroevolution can occur?

Her mother, while hanging lovingly onto a bible, changing from a tree shrew into something vaguely simian right before her very eyes.

Alter2Ego Wrote:They eliminate an intelligent designer and end up with a theory that is full of holes.

If you have a puzzle that's 95% completed except for a few holes here and there, you get a pretty damn good idea of what the picture is. If you're building a puzzle that displays a picture of a duck, you're not going to get 95% of the way there and go "Wow, I really don't see a duck. It must be a fucking house!"

(May 21, 2012 at 4:41 pm)Hovik Wrote:

Alter2Ego Wrote:They eliminate an intelligent designer and end up with a theory that is full of holes.

If you have a puzzle that's 95% completed except for a few holes here and there, you get a pretty damn good idea of what the picture is. If you're building a puzzle that displays a picture of a duck, you're not going to get 95% of the way there and go "Wow, I really don't see a duck. It must be a fucking house!"

Hell you can tell what a picture is going to be for the most part with 50% of the puzzle complete. Fortunately though, evolution is much more complete than that. The theory of evolution is full of holes, but they happen to be small ones in less than important places.

Theory of evolution is really 2 separate things:
change over time by natural selection (Organisms can change over time, often quite drastically, and the change is due to natural selection acting on random variations)
And then common descent. Common descent is the idea that all life evolved from a common ancestor (it also encompasses in it the idea that change occurs over time)

It is a fact that change occurs, and that all life is descended from a common ancestor, it is one of the most supported ideas in science today. Even many intelligent design advocates accept this. Michael Behe accepts the second one, he agrees that all life descended from a common ancestor, he just believes that instead of natural selection acting on variation causing the change, that it is guided by a creator. Natural selection definitely occurs and is a strong driving force of evolution, but it may not be the only one. There may be other forces at work yet to be discovered, although natural selection is widely accepted as the primary driving force of evolution.

Holes is an indication that a theory is constructed and interpreted with intellectual honesty. Perfection is evidence of lack of intellectual honest at least on the part of the interpreter.

I'm just going to pose 2 questions to the op

1.What evidence would be required to convince you that macroevolution occurs?
2.What limits evolution?

In regards to question 2, you have said before that microevolution occurs (that is, change within a species) but that this change is limited, and as a result small changes can't build up to cause huge amounts of change over time. What prevents that from happening? What factor is it that causes change to occur, and then just stop at a certain point?

(May 21, 2012 at 6:16 pm)libalchris Wrote: 1.What evidence would be required to convince you that macroevolution occurs?
2.What limits evolution?

1. Cats giving birth to dogs or crocoducks.
2. God.

"I read up on Ambulocetus and Acanthostega and was not impressed. The language used in describing Ambulocetus is so speculative that it amounts to science fiction writing."

You should be plenty comfortable with speculative language, given your favorite book of fantasy-which, mind you, lacks the entirety of the science portion of fiction.