Argument #2: Evolution Of Species

[Revelation777]

Rev, we already know that otherwise smart people can have enormous blind spots when it comes to their religious beliefs, and we already know that smart people can be wrong! Quit it with the arguments from authority and give us something real. Give us a scientific test that found evidence of creation, give us some peer reviewed, mainstream work that shows why evolution stops at the species level...

Give us anything beyond trite platitudes and refusals to admit when you've fallen victim to creationist dishonesty!

Also, I asked you a question on page six that I think is very important, that you still haven't responded to despite my repeating it later on. Could you give us an answer on this:

And when you do address them, your response is nothing more than "nuh uh!" But let's have some fun with this: all I said was "human chromosome 2," that was literally the extent of my allusion to genetics. You could have looked it up because that was plenty to light a google search up, but instead you just tell me about "similarities," a word that I never used, and actually- and this is the smoking gun for how little you know what you're talking about- isn't applicable to the situation at hand anyway.

You told me that similarities in genetics doesn't constitute proof, when the thing I was talking about has nothing to do with similarities. Be honest, Rev: did you even look up human chromosome 2 before you responded?

What is it, and why are scientists claiming that it's proof of our common ancestry with apes? It's certainly not because the chromosome is similar to ape chromosomes, so... why? What information do you have on this right now, before you look it up for the first time now you've been called out, and why did you think it was okay to disagree with me without even knowing what we were disagreeing on?

Are you that completely lazy and dishonest that you won't even do a cursory wikipedia search on the things people point you to, in a thread you've made ostensibly about people debating these issues with you?

Have you even opened a single other link that's been posted to you on this thread?

I just want you to know there are and were brilliant men and women who embrace a God. That is all from those quotes.

---

Rev, we already know that otherwise smart people can have enormous blind spots when it comes to their religious beliefs, and we already know that smart people can be wrong! Quit it with the arguments from authority and give us something real. Give us a scientific test that found evidence of creation, give us some peer reviewed, mainstream work that shows why evolution stops at the species level...

Give us anything beyond trite platitudes and refusals to admit when you've fallen victim to creationist dishonesty!

Also, I asked you a question on page six that I think is very important, that you still haven't responded to despite my repeating it later on. Could you give us an answer on this:

And when you do address them, your response is nothing more than "nuh uh!" But let's have some fun with this: all I said was "human chromosome 2," that was literally the extent of my allusion to genetics. You could have looked it up because that was plenty to light a google search up, but instead you just tell me about "similarities," a word that I never used, and actually- and this is the smoking gun for how little you know what you're talking about- isn't applicable to the situation at hand anyway.

You told me that similarities in genetics doesn't constitute proof, when the thing I was talking about has nothing to do with similarities. Be honest, Rev: did you even look up human chromosome 2 before you responded?

What is it, and why are scientists claiming that it's proof of our common ancestry with apes? It's certainly not because the chromosome is similar to ape chromosomes, so... why? What information do you have on this right now, before you look it up for the first time now you've been called out, and why did you think it was okay to disagree with me without even knowing what we were disagreeing on?

Are you that completely lazy and dishonest that you won't even do a cursory wikipedia search on the things people point you to, in a thread you've made ostensibly about people debating these issues with you?

Have you even opened a single other link that's been posted to you on this thread?

What if there is dishonesty among atheists?

[pocaracas]

What if there is dishonesty among atheists?

But there is. After all, they're human.
Even among scientists. Even among peers working in the same field, in the same institution!
They're human, they're stupid, sometimes.

But overall we can find that the discoveries and concepts that they have brought forward will outlast their mentalities.
Newton is not remembered for his pursuit of Alchemy... nor for his devotion to whichever saint he prayed the most... but for his work in physics.

[Esquilax]

I just want you to know there are and were brilliant men and women who embrace a God. That is all from those quotes.

I know, and I don't care. The intelligence of a person who believes a thing doesn't impact the truth of that thing. All you've shown is that this set of brilliant people believed one wrong thing about the origins of the universe. That's not a hugely convincing claim.

What if there is dishonesty among atheists?

I've never for a moment implied that there wasn't. But that doesn't impact the quality of your sources at all; even if every last one of us was lying right now, that wouldn't mean that your sources suddenly become truthful.

It is a demonstrable fact that you, or the people you are quoting, have lied in the execution of those quotes. It is also a demonstrable fact that when you responded to something I said to you at the beginning of this thread, you did so in a completely nonsensical manner that in no way applies to what I had said, indicating that you hadn't bothered to even look at what I'd shown you before you responded. Those questions I asked earlier still need answering, and I don't care if you can point around this thread and show that everyone here has been lying through their teeth from the beginning, that doesn't change that.

[Clueless Morgan]

In 1999, Dr. Stephen Taylor wrote,

The Creation Research Society currently has a membership of 650 scientists, each one holding a Master’s degree or above in a recognized field of science. In a recent article Dr. Russell Humphreys, physicist at Sandia National Laboratories, New Mexico, estimates that there are around 10,000 practicing professional scientists in the USA alone who openly believe in a six-day creation.

And Project Steve just inducted its 1337th Steve to the project, what's your point?

As of 5/6/14
NCSE welcomes Steve #1337
Stefan Gerhold
Vienna Institute of Technology

NCSE's "Project Steve" is a tongue-in-cheek parody of a long-standing creationist tradition of amassing lists of "scientists who doubt evolution" or "scientists who dissent from Darwinism."

[snip]

Project Steve pokes fun at this practice and, because "Steves" are only about 1% of scientists, it also makes the point that tens of thousands of scientists support evolution. And it honors the late Stephen Jay Gould, evolutionary biologist, NCSE supporter, and friend.

We'd like to think that after Project Steve, we'll have seen the last of bogus "scientists doubting evolution" lists, but it's probably too much to ask.

http://ncse.com/taking-action/project-steve

There are over twice as many scientists with the name Steve, or variations of it, than there are scientists willing to go on record as 6-day creationists.

If 1,337 Steves represent about 1% of the scientific community, then there are about 133,700 scientist of every name who agree with the Theory of Evolution.

Compared to 650.

Do you want to rethink your argument from popularity now?

And I want to see the facts and figures for how Russell Humphreys estimates his 10,000 figure, but even that is pointless if you're making an argument from popularity because you're still out numbered 13 to 1 if his estimate is accurate.

But I have a better idea: stop trying to prop up your argument with fallacious claims and start producing actual evidence for us to evaluate.

Oh, wait. You don't have any...

[Anomalocaris]

What if there is dishonesty among atheists?

There is undoubted dishonesty amongst atheists. But Christianity based creationism is the essence of dishonesty and there can't be anything but dishonesty amongst creationists like you.

[Confused Ape]

I just want you to know there are and were brilliant men and women who embrace a God. That is all from those quotes.

And I wanted you to know that not all brilliant religious people have embraced the Christian God. 21st century scientists aren't divided into Christians and atheists. There are scientists all around the world so some of them will be Hindus or Buddhists etc.

Kat MacMorgan, a Wiccan, must be intelligent because she has degrees in biology, psychology and anthropology. Is that a good enough reason to convert to Wicca?

[Michael Schubert]

Argument #2: Evolution of Species

The evolutionist Kerkut defined the “general theory of evolution” as “the theory that living forms in the world have arisen from a single source which itself came from an inorganic form.” He goes on to say, “The evidence which supports this is not sufficiently strong to allow us to consider it as anything more than a working hypothesis.” G. A. Kerkut, Implications of Evolution (Oxford, UK: Pergamon, 1960), p.157.

My argument is not that change doesn’t take place within species over time. My argument is that no matter how long the time frame, there is no substantial scientific evidence that a microbe has evolved into a human being. Additionally, there is no substantial scientific evidence that non-living chemicals can produce a living cell regardless of time and/or chance.

Even if that were true (which it isn't), that wouldn't be any evidence of a God that creates life using magic.

[Mister Agenda]

The game is actually over if you insist on asserting that the game is not over when someone makes a telling point instead of even trying to refute it. Identical retroviral insertions in related species is something that only makes sense in the context of evolution. If you don't address that, you lose.

This critiques your stance on this, I believe game is still in progress.

http://www.trueorigin.org/theobald1e.asp

Thanks for FINALLY addressing this. Although it is clearly still a challenge for you to argue in your own words, at least you offered more than a flip quip.

The 'critique' can be summarized as 'God can do anything so God could have put retroviral insertions into species that appear related for mysterious reasons'. Howeve, MY stance on this was that retroviral insertions only make sense in the context of evolution, which remains true: Once it was discovered that retroviruses could make heritable genetic alterations in germ line cells, in the context of evolution it followed that if the insertion took place BEFORE the organism diverged from its last common ancestor, the same insertion might be found in other species descended from that common ancestor. When we knew what to look for, we searched for such insertions, and found them right where common descent indicated they would be. In the case of humans, we found seven instances of shared ERVs with chimps. When we compare different humans, shared ERVs are considered absolute proof of common ancestry, the more ERVs in common, the more closely two humans are related, it is even possible to identify a specific individual ancestor for two people based on shared ERVs (turn out you and Hilda both had Linda Monague for a great, great grandmother), which can be confimed independently by family trees.

Creationism and ID could make no such predictions when this property of retroviral insertions was discovered. The discovery makes no sense in the context of those world views, it can only be 'another mystery'.

---

All human beings start out as microorganisms, but we evolved from hominids. You'd have to go back over 3 billion years to find a single-celled ancestor to humans.

Perhaps you should have titled this thread differently then, since abiogenesis is not a part of evolution. It wouldn't matter if God poofed the first microbe into existence, evolution applies thereafter.

And a more honest claim would be that there is no substantial scientific evidence that non-living chemicals can produce a living cell that you personally will ever find convincing because your mind is completely closed on the topic.

"All human beings start out as microorganisms, but we evolved from hominids. You'd have to go back over 3 billion years to find a single-celled ancestor to humans." Mister Agenda 2013 - AtheistForums.org

Ok, so you guys want a reputable recent quote,,,here you go.

Thanks! It doesn't suppport your position though, so I'm at a bit of a loss as to why you chose it. Were you under the impression that any of us think that a single-celled common ancestor to humans was more recent?

---

I would like to refer to the Bible but you guys don't want me to go there.

Only because it doesn't help your case to quote a text that none of the people you're arguing against thinks carries any authority on scientific matters.

[Jackalope]

I would like to refer to the Bible but you guys don't want me to go there.

Only because it doesn't help your case to quote a text that none of the people you're arguing against thinks carries any authority on scientific matters.

Indeed. It would be a bit like quoting Curious George to argue with quantum physicists. A bit of hyperbole, yes, but it's only to make the point clear - the bible has about as much to do with science as CG does to quantum physics: nothing at all.

[The Valkyrie]

In 1999, Dr. Stephen Taylor wrote,

The Creation Research Society currently has a membership of 650 scientists, each one holding a Master’s degree or above in a recognized field of science. In a recent article Dr. Russell Humphreys, physicist at Sandia National Laboratories, New Mexico, estimates that there are around 10,000 practicing professional scientists in the USA alone who openly believe in a six-day creation.

And Project Steve just inducted its 1337th Steve to the project, what's your point?

As of 5/6/14
NCSE welcomes Steve #1337
Stefan Gerhold
Vienna Institute of Technology

NCSE's "Project Steve" is a tongue-in-cheek parody of a long-standing creationist tradition of amassing lists of "scientists who doubt evolution" or "scientists who dissent from Darwinism."

[snip]

Project Steve pokes fun at this practice and, because "Steves" are only about 1% of scientists, it also makes the point that tens of thousands of scientists support evolution. And it honors the late Stephen Jay Gould, evolutionary biologist, NCSE supporter, and friend.

We'd like to think that after Project Steve, we'll have seen the last of bogus "scientists doubting evolution" lists, but it's probably too much to ask.

http://ncse.com/taking-action/project-steve

There are over twice as many scientists with the name Steve, or variations of it, than there are scientists willing to go on record as 6-day creationists.

If 1,337 Steves represent about 1% of the scientific community, then there are about 133,700 scientist of every name who agree with the Theory of Evolution.

Compared to 650.

Do you want to rethink your argument from popularity now?

And I want to see the facts and figures for how Russell Humphreys estimates his 10,000 figure, but even that is pointless if you're making an argument from popularity because you're still out numbered 13 to 1 if his estimate is accurate.

But I have a better idea: stop trying to prop up your argument with fallacious claims and start producing actual evidence for us to evaluate.

Oh, wait. You don't have any...

I've brought up Project Steve 3 times in this thread and all Rev does is ignore everything and keep posting the same bullshit.

I'm done arguing with this fucking idiot.