lpetrich

Radorth:
I guess you missed the part where we talked about Augustine postulating evolution 1400 years before Darwin.

And I wonder how in the world St. Augustine posited descent with modification of life on a massive scale.

The best place to argue this here is Evolution/Creation; I wonder when Radorth will post Augustine's alleged Theory of Evolution there.

In any case, the question is which of the 400 theories should we believe?

I'm waiting to see a list of them.

BTW, the latest one is that humans evolved from an aquatic ape.

How is this any more absurd than the miracles of the Bible?

Sheesh.

I wonder when Radorth will remember what Jesus Christ said about hypocrisy -- don't accuse others of what one is guilty of.

Apparently there were big problems with humans evolving from land animals (For example, how come babies know instinctively how to swim?)

A survival reflex -- a sort of instinctive response to finding oneself in water, perhaps.

wade-w

I wish you'd actually come out and say what this brilliant theory of Augustine's actually was, instead of just asserting that it existed. No one here claims that Darwin was the first to come up with some sort of theory of evolution. Lamarck's theory was well before Darwin, for one example.

And "latest"? The aquatic ape idea is far from "recent" Radorth, unless you consider 43 years to be recent. And it has never been a mainstream theory. Insinuating that it was is disingenious at best.

Bumble Bee Tuna

Forgive me, but I fail to see how this is at all relevant to what Goober said. Care to elaborate?

-B

Radorth

It's getting more attention lately then. Like many evolutionary theories, it comes in and out of favor. I assume when some honest investigator raises an issue, the evolutionist faithful are forced to rummage arround in their repertoire.

Re: Ipetrich

It's not, but you are the one claiming to be strictly rational. That is why yours is the hypocritical stance.

Keep the faith men. It's about all you have.

"DNA evolved from chemicals in the ocean, and science will solve the world's problems as soon as we can get rid of the Christians."

If only I had that kind of faith....

Rad

Radorth

Well, can you see how it might be relevant to the thread at least?

I thought you weren't going to speak to the lowly Rad again.

Rad

Goliath

Radorth,

One source is my ca.1950 copy of the four volumes of The World of Mathematics. The other source that comes to mind is a book that was used in a course that I took on the history of Mathematics. It's title escapes me.

Sincerely,

Goliath

lpetrich

(the aquatic ape theory...)

Radorth:
It's getting more attention lately then. Like many evolutionary theories, it comes in and out of favor.

And what makes Radorth such a big expert on evolutionary biology?

I assume when some honest investigator raises an issue, the evolutionist faithful are forced to rummage arround in their repertoire.

Evolutionary biology, contrary to what the Radorths of the world seem to think, is NOT a religion.

Keep the faith men. It's about all you have.

Seems like projection to me -- Radorth projecting some obsession with *Faith*.

"DNA evolved from chemicals in the ocean, and science will solve the world's problems as soon as we can get rid of the Christians."

Like who allegedly believes all of these things?

And what makes Radorth think he's such an expert on prebiotic chemistry?

Celsus

Yes. There are certain cases in history is extremely fraught with difficulty, and there are other cases where history is much less in dispute. Consider that the further back in time you go, the less likely (in general) you are to have a full view of what actually happened. At the same time, it is entirely dependent on the amount of evidence that we have. Thus while we have a surprisingly sparse record of the United Monarchy in Israel/Palestine with much disputes in the meantime, move back a thousand years and you'll find archaeologists are extremely confident about making positive arguments about historical Egypt. All of it is entirely dependent on the evidence at hand, and in some cases, the evidence is not as forthcoming as previously thought.

Hence, I am quite happy to discard the destruction of the Library of Alexandria by Christians as a myth, because I don't myself put a great weight on uncorroborated ancient literature. It's astonishingly similar to the way I've discarded the Gospel view of Jesus as a myth.

Joel

hinduwoman

If there were pro-Christian scientists, there were also devout Christians who felt that too much Xianity had hindered intellectual accomplishment:

Learning and Rome alike in emporia grew
And arts still followed where her eagles flew.
From the same foes at last both felt their doom,
And the same age saw learning fall and Rome.
With tyranny then superstition joined
As that the body, this enslaved the mind;
Much was believed, but little understood,
And to be dull was construed to be good;
A second deluge learning thus overrun,
And the monks finished what the Goths begun.

--- Alexander Pope