Ed

Name one reputable biologist or paleontologist that says that the platypus is a transitional form between reptiles and mammals.

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Ed: There is evidence that fully developed birds lived before archaeopteryx so it is unlikely to be a transitional form. jtb: According to the creationists, Archaeopteryx IS a fully-developed bird (and also 100% dinosaur, Compsognathus, with feathers attached by evolutionist fakers). But, like the platypus, a transitional form can be still in existence even after the period of transition.

I think archaeopteryx is 100% bird but still a mosaic form. Just as the platypus is 100% mammal but just a mosaic form.

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jtb: But Protoavis, which predates Arcaeopteryx by 75 million years, is known only from a single badly-crushed skull. It might have been birdlike, or it might not.

I think I will go with the opinion of the well known paleontologist rather than an unknown hyperskeptical, antagonistic atheist that posts on an atheist board 20 hours a day.

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Ed: Homo erectus is plainly human. There is evidence of erectus and sapiens interbreeding. See the website I mention in my post to lpetrich above where modern Australian aborigines have many of the same characteristics of erectus. jtb: Homo Erectus is plainly not Homo Sapiens, and nobody is claiming that it is (except creationists, of course). As we all evolved from Homo Erectus, "transitional forms" between Erectus and Sapiens are to be expected. How does their existence pose a problem for evolution? Obviously, it does not.

Actually there are some evolutionists that think that it is homo sapiens, read the book "Java Man" with contributions by Roger Lewin.

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jtb: Some scientists propose that Sapiens evolved from Erectus in Africa, and then moved out to displace Erectus everwhere else (the "Out of Africa" hypothesis). Others believe that Erectus evolved into Sapiens all over the place. There is plenty of middle ground between those positions, involving a combination of a migration of Sapiens and intermingling between archaic Sapiens and Erectus at various stages and locations.

Yes, but as I stated above since sapiens and erectus could hybridize then it was plainly 100% human and not a transition form.

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Ed: No, beginning with the discovery of DNA, the evidence for creation has grown with each passing year. jtb: There is still absolutely no evidence whatsoever for creation. Of course, you can multiply zero by a series of ever-larger numbers if you like, but you'll still get zero. However, the evidence for evolution has indeed grown since the discovery of DNA, with genome amalysis illustrating the pattern of relationships between species.

But DNA is a complex linguistic code and they have only ever been produced by a mind.

Ed

Yes, I did, see above.

Ed

No, the first sentence is the definition of personal and the second is the definition of person.

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jtb: My cat, presumably a non-PERSON according to you, can produce the PERSONAL (personal communication, with me).

Actually cats do have some aspects of personhood but they are not fully persons. As I stated above personal communication is usually propositional, so are you claiming that your cat talks to you? That doesnt sound very scientific.

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jtb: Therefore, "only persons can produce the personal" is refuted. If you wish to define PERSONAL as "that which is produced by a PERSON", then "only persons can produce the personal" is obviously a worthless tautology. Therefore the argument against God stands: only cows can produce the cowish, therefore God is eliminated as creator by the Law of Sufficient Cause.

See my definition of personal above. It is not ANYTHING that is produced by persons it is only those things that are intriniscally related to personhood.

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Ed: I am afraid I can. It has been scientifically proven that QE requires time while it has not been proven that the law of causality is not valid outside time. Since noone has ever experienced outside time. But it is rational to assume that the law is valid outside time until proven otherwise since it appears to be universally valid within time. The burden of proof is on those who claim that you throw out the LoC outside time. jtb: Name ONE occasion where an event in the FUTURE has caused an event in the PAST. Causes precede their consequences in time. This is obvious, and confirmed empirically throughout human history (your own criterion of "proof").

They may precede consequences outside time also, the only way you could know that they don't is if you are omniscient. But also the law of causality can be understood without reference to a sequence of time, ie it is that which it takes to produce the thing.

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lob: Time has nothing to do with relative positions of objects and a lack of time clearly precludes causality. If you'd actually think about it you'd see it was obvious. Causality is by definition intimately interwined with the notion of time, thus my proof is the mere fact that in an absense of time causality becomes undefined. Please define for me a time-independent notion of causality. Evidence time has nothing to do with the relative positions and motions of objects? Explain to me how YOU measure time in this universe. A time independent way of understanding causality is "that which it takes for a thing to exist". jtb: (emphasis mine). The Eddian Lie Reflex kicks in again. Lobstrosity never claimed that time wasn't relevant to MOTION, only POSITION. So let's lie about what Lobstrosity is claiming, to pursue a strawman and evade the issue. Do you seriously believe that we wouldn't notice?

But time IS also relevant to position. For example your position on the earth determines what the time is where you are. I assume you are referring to me failing to mention motion in my first post. It was nothing sinister, just an oversight. Calm down.

lpetrich

Ed:
Name one reputable biologist or paleontologist that says that the platypus is a transitional form between reptiles and mammals.

Depends on how one defines "transitional form". But check on this nice discussion -- platypuses have both mammalian and reptilian features.

I think archaeopteryx is 100% bird but still a mosaic form. Just as the platypus is 100% mammal but just a mosaic form.

Actually, Archaeopteryx looks much like a pigeon-sized theropod dinosaur with feathers. And it lacks such distinctive features of present-day birds as

A beak
Lack of teeth
Short tail
Big breastbone (attachment point for flight muscles)

I think I will go with the opinion of the well known paleontologist rather than an unknown hyperskeptical, antagonistic atheist that posts on an atheist board 20 hours a day.

As opposed to some unknown antagonistic quasi-fundie who is hyperskeptical about every belief system but his?

Actually there are some evolutionists that think that it is homo sapiens, read the book "Java Man" with contributions by Roger Lewin.

Which only goes to show that fundies and quasi-fundies often think of the corpus of scientific research as something to be quoted the way they quote the Bible.

You don't do research by quoting only those who tell you what you want to hear -- let's see Ed try to do willdlife biology in that fashion.

Yes, but as I stated above since sapiens and erectus could hybridize then it was plainly 100% human and not a transition form.

Except that the "evidence" for hybridization has been seriously questioned. Also, does this mean that Equus caballus and Equus asinus are one species? That Panthera leo and Panthera tigris are one species?

But DNA is a complex linguistic code and they have only ever been produced by a mind.

Ed ought to study some artificial-life simulations some time.

And if a "mind" had done it, it must have been the work of a large number of minds over the last 4 billion years.

Jack the Bodiless

It's been awhile since I read that book, but I don't recall any claim that "evolutionists" think that Homo Erectus is Homo Sapiens (and I'm pretty sure I would have remembered THAT). Obviously, certain fossils are "borderline", but that's not what you're claiming.

I still have that book in my bookcase. Please cite the chapter and paragraph in which an "evolutionist" states that Homo Erectus is actually Homo Sapiens.
As EVERY scientist agrees that Sapiens evolved from Erectus, then OF COURSE they could hybridize (at least initially).

Erectus is plainly a transitional form. Nobody has EVER found Sapiens specimens in the same strata as early Erectus, because Erectus predates Sapiens (an appearance of Sapiens with late Erectus would be no problem, as a transitional can continue to exist after the time of transition, as previously noted).

And if Erectus is "100% human" and the Austrlopithecines are "100% ape", then your ongoing refusal to address Homo Habilis (after your rather pathetic attempt to deny its existence) speaks volumes. We have an unbroken sequence of transitional forms linking Sapiens to the australopithecines, via Erectus, Ergaster and Habilis.
And cows have only ever been produced by a cow.
No, you did not. We're still waiting.
Likewise, the "cowish" is anything intrinsically related to what a cow is, and cannot be produced by a non-cow.

You need a definition of "personal" that stands alone. A definition that allows you to TEST whether "the personal" can indeed be produced by a non-person, rather than your blatantly fradulent attempt to make this "impossible" by playing with definitions.
Yes, my cat talks to me. Not in English, but most humans can't do that either.
Therefore, because "the cowish" is intriniscally related to being a cow, it is absolutely impossible for God to create cows.

ps418

Perhaps what you meant to say is:

Arguments from authority are weak to begin with. Your argument from authority is incredibly weak, even as an argument from authority. I will consider this further support for my hypothesis that you are a masochist who enjoys being made to look ignorant and dishonest.

Patrick

Ed

You are being absurd, Gunner. There is no comparison. We are talking about subatomic particles, they are almost like another universe. There could be all kinds of things that we cannot detect at that level including causes of events at this stage in our research. There is no comparison with swords hanging over my head.

GunnerJ

Just answer me:

How did you know that when you clicked "Reply," that you'd live to see the post come up? That the last thing you felt wouldn't be a metal edge spiking through your skull?

Put simply, how did you know that the sword wasn't there?

I await your answer with baited breath.

-GunnerJ (formerly known as Rimstalker)

Ed

Who is laughing? As a scientist myself I am not happy when scientists are fooled into coming up with the wrong theory.

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Ed: The definition that I am using is anything intrinsically related to what a person is. A person is a being that has a will, conscience, emotions, intellect, communicates propositionally, and etc. lp: Except that gametes, fertilized egg cells, and early embryos have NONE of these features.

But we know from experience that fertilized egg cells and embryos have those features in potential form.

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Ed: It is not just me, NOONE has ever seen impersonal processes create the personal while millions have seen persons produce the personal. lp: The way that NOONE has ever seen non-cowlike processes create the cowlike, while millions have seen cows produce the cowlike?

Yes, but we know that there are things in this universe more complex than cows, ie persons. So a cowlike creator is unlikely.

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(pseudogenes being nonfunctional...) Ed: But now my hunches from creation theory are being confirmed by these new studies. lp: This suggests that SOME pseudogenes can acquire new functions, but that does not mean that ALL pseudogenes are fully-functional in some way.

Yes, but the ones that are not presently functional may have been functional in the past.

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Ed: No, God wants us to know that there is only one creator, if every species was a weird mosaic then it would appear as if there were multiple creator/designers. lp: I have no idea why weird mosaics would necessarily look like multiple designers while a hierarchy of features would not.

For the same reason that if you get multiple architects to design a library, you get multiple different designs for the same functional purpose.

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lp: Especially features that show an abundance of convergent but not-exactly-alike evolution. The eyes of vertebrates and squid/octopuses have a video-camera-like architecture, but they differ in lots of details, with vertebrates having one characteristic architecture (neurons in front of the photoreceptor cells, etc.) and squid/octopuses another (neurons behind the photoreceptor cells, etc.). Birds, bats, pterosaurs, and insects have characteristic wing architectures, one for each group. Grasping organs were invented from frontmost limbs several times, though they show a variety of differences in detail. Human hands vs. elephant-trunk tips vs. lobster/crab and scorpion claws. Etc.

This is exactly what you would expect from a single designer that show an overarching similarity but differences in detail to provide diversity and yet show the individualism of the designer.

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Ed: By using a basic blueprint (DNA, cells, body plan patterns and etc.) that is evidence there is only one designer. If there was no such thing as a basic blueprint, Darwin would never have been able to propose the theory of Evolution! lp: Actually, Darwin did NOT invent the idea of descent with modification -- he made a strong case for it, one that was independent of the ultimate mechanism of heredity. And much of his case was based on relatively small-scale examples of evolution, one that did not require a shared "basic blueprint". However, many large-scale features do turn out to be shared, which has made it possible to infer large-scale evolution.

I never said he invented it, but he is the one that popularized it to the point where the majority of scientists accepted it. And he would never have been able to convince them if there was not already underlying patterns in the morphologies of organisms.

Ed

I am referring to a normal healthy adult. All those others you mention have these abilities but in potential form.

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PS- What about ability to learn to use vB code? Shouldn't that be on the list somewhere?

How do you know I am not pretending to use it incorrectly?