How do you know God isn't dead?

[Statler Waldorf]

"It is an act of virtue to deceive and lie, when by such means the interest of the church might be promoted."

Bishop Eusebius. (260-339 A.D.)

If you are going to live a lie, may as well be a liar.

The irony is almost too much to bear! Here we have an atheist complaining about Christians being dishonest all the time while he is quoting John Lawrence von Mosheim’s Ecclesiastical History out of context. Not only is he quoting out of context but he is then falsely attributing the quote to Eusebius. Sometimes life is far more fantastic than any piece of fiction.

damn... these replies are getting too large. Why is it always like this with you?!

It has still been rather enjoyable wouldn’t you agree?

TLDR: other methods for dating the Earth are presented besides radiometric... will you dismiss those too?

That depends; you’re going to have to be more specific about which method you are referring to. As far as I am aware, radiometric dating is the granddaddy of them all though.

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You have to be really committed to continue with this, but I'll play along. Why would a tissue match contradict anything that I've said? Have I not repeatedly stressed that no matter where the human is, it is one of us? Have I not taken the time to explain to you how long this has been the case? Race is a social construct with relation to human beings as a species - but it doesn't take a very bright person to see that a diverging evolutionary paths have been taken. MC1R, KITLG, ASIP, SLC245A5, SLC45A2, TYR, and OCA2. Evolution is not a matter of what you deem to be trivial, it is only a matter of change. The markers behind the color of a persons skin are very clearly mutations - that much is well demonstrated and well evidenced. Why a mutation for pigmentation would somehow make tissue more or less suitable for transplant- or why it would be a significant enough difference to incur speciation - is a mystery...and frankly, it's a mystery why you would wonder such things.

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I will try to keep this very simple for you. An organ transplant tissue match requires very similar genetics, so much so that often siblings are not matches for one another. So even though you claim that Aboriginals and Europeans have been separated for thousands upon thousands of years, not enough significant evolutionary change has occurred between the two groups in order to make tissue matches impossible. Differing skin colors between groups of people is not Evolution, the genetic information needed to produce those skin colors were present in the parent populations. You’re committing the fallacy of equivocation by changing the definition of the term Evolution in the midst of the discussion.

You should probably find a way to word that first sentence in a way that makes it coherent.

Sounds like a comprehension problem to me.

We have a point where we find no evidence of behavioral modernity - then we have a point where we do. Certainly, there's room for another explanation - nevermind the observation that this all coincides with our evolutionary development regardless - care to suggest one?

Why does the explanation have to be Darwinian? Where does this faith commitment to the theory come from? If you do not know the explanation then just admit it and do not try to sell everyone on the idea that it must still be a Darwinian explanation.

What cretinist claims? I keep hearing that they exist, but like the spirits they invoke they never seem to make an appearance.

There are over 20,000 creation articles available for free online and several peer-reviewed creation journals available for subscription; if you cared about the truth you’d educate yourself on the theory.

No faith is required. Nothing elusive about mutation - as I said, it happens all the time. Mutations do not need to be beneficial, nuetral, or deleterious for evolution to have occurred - it will have occurred in every case. The results will be different, but evolution is constant in this regard.

Did you not read what I wrote? In order for Common Descent to be valid, you need trillions upon trillions of cases of beneficial mutations that increase the amount of genetic information in the organism to have taken place in our past. Yet, you’d have a difficult time presenting even two observed cases of this actually happening in Nature, it’s all blind faith. The overwhelming majority of expressed mutations are harmful to the organism’s chances of survival.

Unifying theory of biology. Let that sink in.

Baseless assertion, let that sink in.

You're going to have to do better than "a user generated site" or "who determined the classification".

Two completely relevant questions you dodged.

The number of chromosomes went largely unnoticed in classification for a fairly simple reason. The folks who devised the system had no idea what a chromosome was. Of course we do now, and genetics -has- given us reason to shuffle it around a bit. In fact, genetics finally gave us the power to complete the picture - to more accurately determine what was related to what, and how closely. Without genetics, evolutionary theory was incomplete. That's why our current theory is called "modern synthesis". Speaking of chromosomes, and since you'll be asking for predictions in a moment (albeit predictions for a different conjecture) I find it useful to mention that the distinction between ourselves and our nearest primate relatives along the lines of chromosomes was itself the subject of a prediction made in support of both modern synthesis and common descent. Guess what happened? It panned out, we found the distinction precisely where we expected to find it. Perhaps you should choose your metrics more wisely.

You’re awfully good at making unsupported claims. Who made the prediction? When did they make it? They predicted Humans would have fewer Chromosomes than Chimps? Why?

You're the one that asked the question Statler, human beings are primates because we meet the definition of a primate. Why did we decide to pigeonhole our family tree into this particular group? Why not include racoons? I wouldn't know, but specificity is useful - so that's probably part of the "why".

So they are primates because someone arbitrarily classifies them as such? That doesn’t prove they are related to other primates at all.

You've been given ample evidence. I'm not sure why being a primate has you so ruffled up - it isn't as though you had choice in the matter. Your parents were primates.

You have not given me any evidence; you simply made a handful of appeals to homologous traits, which does not necessitate a common ancestor at all; for a theory that you claim is so well supported you sure seem to have a difficult time supporting it.

Because wear patterns on bone and their likely arrangement in any given organism is something that physics helps us to establish. Keep up.

Grasping at straws, you were caught being disingenuous. Physics operates completely independently of Evolutionary Biology.

Science isn't a proving sort of thing. In any case, this has already been explained to you. Mutations occur. End of.

Science deals with inductive proofs, which I’d accept from you. How do mutations occur and how are they preserved and expressed in a population? You have not established any of this.

According to what theory? As I said, it's clear that you haven't taken the time to even -begin- to learn what modern synthesis is.

Your modern synthesis is nearly 80 years old; it’s not really that modern. What I said was completely accurate according to Neo-Darwinian theory, you asserting otherwise does not change that.

You'd be discussing a deleterious mutation in this case, not a beneficial or neutral one.

No, there’s a fitness cost associated with all classes of mutations, learn your theory.

It's a perfect analogy. It doesn't "serve a purpose" in animals with access to air and aerobic respiratory systems. Not that this would matter, as the process we're discussing doesn't give a shit about purpose. Nevertheless, the ability to carry out complex mental tasks - to think ahead, to plan, to communicate, to abstract - this all served us very well, so suggesting that adaptations to the apparatus that makes this possible would serve no purpose is a -bit- shaky. Hilariously - none of this matters- sit back and enjoy while I explain why, again.

Anaerobic respiration serves no purpose? I think the body being able to function without adequate levels of oxygen is a very important trait to have, try to run farther than 600 meters and you’ll find out.

In essence, you're asking me why a trait would be expressed before whatever you imagine it's purpose to be has materialized. The answer is that it is unlikely that it would, evolution is not a matter of responding to the environment. Any organism left behind the ball is more likely to wind up in the "also ran" pile than an organism that already possesses the mutation, one that is in front of the ball - selectively neutral.

That does not explain why all of the organisms possessed that trait once it was needed, that implies something weeded out the organisms that did not possess that trait thousands of years before it was needed. Unless you wanted to assert mankind was created with the ability, then that would make sense why everyone seems to have had it.

No one is saying that our cognitive apparatus was a selectively nuetral issue at the point where we became homo-sapiens. There had been a pronounced and decided bent towards precisely that for quite some time in our lineage.

Well you did in fact just say it had to be a neutral mutation, now you’re changing your story; so since it was not selectively neutral, we’re back to what selective pressure selected against it?

The theory requires no defense from me Stat. Again, it's the unifying theory of biology. You're certainly free to reject any part of it that you like - but your rejection does not alter the reality of the situation.

Scientific facts are not established by majority opinion within the Scientific Community, claiming something is the unifying theory of Biology is utterly meaningless. Whether you like it or not you do have to defend your position.

Common descent was first proposed in 1740. Those who proposed common descent expected to find vast uniformity between all living creatures, uniformity that they themselves probably weren't all to justified in expecting (upon what basis would you propose uniformity between an octopus and a human being in 1740?).

Easy, all life on Earth has a common creator, therefore all life is going to possess similarities at the fundamental level; just like all works by Salvador Dali have similar fundamental characteristics. I ask for a prediction that could not have been made unless someone believed in Common Descent and you gave me one that is completely consistent with the modern Creation model.

Modern synthesis is the unifying theory of biology.

You keep making that baseless assertion. Not a single one of the dozens of Biologists I work with on a daily basis have ever needed to refer to Darwinian Theory in their published work. This is just something Evolutionists like to assert in order to get skeptics to stop asking tough questions.

Evolution does occur without selective pressures. Selective pressures modify the outcome of evolution as measured by population genetics. The only fantastic claims in this thread have been the those claims that arose as you attempted to explain "how evolution works". Evolutionary theory doesn't give a shit if someone is an atheist or not, and regardless of a person religious affiliations the evidence is what it is.

Complete nonsense. Give me a scenario where an organism can evolve without any selective pressures, you keep asserting that is possible and yet you do not support that claim. If you’re answer is going to be mutations then explain what causes the mutation.

They support no such thing. They find it useful to include something that sounds sciencey - because apparently, even though they wish to propose magic, it makes them uneasy to have it stated so bluntly. No freebies Stat.

They absolutely do support it; you have no idea what you’re talking about.

“Poorly-informed anti-creationist scoffers occasionally think they will ‘floor’ creation apologists with examples of ‘new species forming’ in nature. They are often surprised at the reaction they get from the better-informed creationists, namely that the creation model depends heavily on speciation.

It seems clear that some of the groupings above species (for example, genera, and sometimes higher up the hierarchy) are almost certainly linked by common ancestry, that is, are the descendants of one created ancestral population (the created kind, or baramin). Virtually all creation theorists assume that Noah did not have with him pairs of dingoes, wolves and coyotes, for example, but a pair of creatures which were ancestral to all these species, and probably to a number of other present-day species representative of the ‘dog kind’.

Demonstrating that speciation can happen in nature, especially where it can be shown to have happened rapidly, is thus a positive for creation theorists.” – Dr. Carl Wieland, co-founder of Creation Magazine, Journal of Creation, and Creation.com

TLDR Version. You appear to be entirely unaware of what modern synthesis is and what it entails, though you feel compelled to argue against it, and from this point of ignorance you;re stumbling trying to understand evolutionary theory. This is obviously in addition to the barrier presented by believing in djinn but not geology.

You’re the one who believes that Evolution occurs independently of selective pressures, no Evolutionist worth his salt is going to assert that. It’s obvious that you do not understand Evolution or Creation well enough to engage in any meaningful discourse on the subject.

-Evolution is not a top down directive whereby an individual organism mutates in response to it's environment or any goal.

I never said that it was, please stop misrepresenting my argument.

For example, birds weren't jumping of cliffs trying to evolve wings-any more than human beings were doing trig, trying to evolve a bigger brain.

More misrepresentation of my position. The ability to fly would not have been preserved in a population unless there was a selective pressure (predation) present that weeded out those organisms in the population that did not develop that ability (most likely by mutation). Since there is no selective pressure that could weed out Humans that did not have the ability to do calculus thousands of years before there was a need to do calculus it is ridiculous to believe that the entire Human race developed that ability and passed it on for thousands of years before there was a need for it.

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-All that is required for evolution to have occurred is mutation. Mutations can be deleterious, neutral, or beneficial. Only the latter two will express themselves in an existent population (though the former could also be said to express itself if only as an indicator o what didn't work at the time. Of those two - either will satisfy biological continuity and inheritance - until they don't (while deleterious mutations are obviously a non-starter neutral and beneficial mutations can become deleterious, as they can swap places with each other - regardless of whatever classification we may be justified in giving them at some point in the past)

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Natural selection is still required in order for these mutations to become fixed in a population.

-Modern synthesis is the unifying theory of biology.

No it’s not.

True, but you have probably noticed that even they (the mentally ill) have a pecking order. Our resident liar is fairly high up in that order. Well, top half anyway.

You should stick with dishonestly attributing quotes to the wrong people in history.