Freethought & Rationalism Archive

lpetrich · 07-21-2002, 09:12 PM

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Ed:
... Special creation would not be able to account for true transition forms.

And how would one recognize a "transitional form"?

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Ed:
So ancient humans may have been more variable than the species you mention like domestic dogs.

Any good reason to suppose that to be the case, other than taking taxonomic nomenclature too literally?

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Ed:
Because we know from living in the computer age that only a mind can develop an adaptable system or programmed system.

lp: And how is that supposed to be the case?
Ed:
Because that is the only way they have come into existence that we know about.

That Ed knows about, but Ed ought to look at simulated-evolution experiments, as with software like "Tierra". They are rather far from creating full-scale minds, but they have produced a lot of very interesting complexity.

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lp: (a designer) ... And even if one could be inferred, how can we be sure that it isn't something like little green men in a flying saucer?
Ed:
Well we cant be sure that they didnt design life but they can be eliminated using logic as the creators of the universe. And most likely whatever produced the universe also created life.

Two non sequiturs right there.

Ed · 07-23-2002, 07:49 PM

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Originally posted by Oolon Colluphid:

Originally posted by Ed:
lp: How does one expect ANYTHING from some hypothesis of miraculous special creation?

Ed: The same way one expects anything from something that actually happened.

OC: And Ed’s impression of the fabled Oozelum bird continues! That is so circular that its head is up its own place Ed talks through![/b]

No, need for the personal attack. How is that circular?

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Ed: Because we know from living in the computer age that only a mind can develop an adaptable system or programmed system. And living organisms display adaptability and "programming".

OC: Wrong. We know no such thing, just because it is the only version we have encountered. I guess you need to tell us your definition of ‘adapt’.

We may not know for certain, but it is a logical inference.

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OC: If, as is proposed, life (please also define) began as simple self-replicating molecules -- ie chemistry -- what, precisely, would you call a random change in one such molecule that gave it an advantage -- say, speed of replication -- over unmutated versions? Please explain the “adaptability and programming” present in a few bases of RNA. Once you’ve got self-replication, you will automatically get adaptation... and all the microevolution you can eat. Repeat, oh, say four billion years...

I gave a definition of life in one of my first posts to you. Your question is a non sequitor given that the theory that life began as replicating molecules is extremely problematic.

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OC: If you like, you can invoke your god to light this particular blue touchpaper... but it doesn’t look much like Genesis 1&2!

Huh?

[b]

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Ed: One sign of that adaptibility is microevolution.

OC: Yeah yeah... the sort of microevolution that means that all the variation within a Family is possible. I’m sure we must have asked this already, but please justify the boundaries to Families. If such diversity can be via ‘microevolution’, please state plainly why, say, birds could not evolve from dromeosaurs.

TTFN, Oolon

Because that is the level that seems to fit the hebrew term for "kinds" in Genesis and that ancient peoples could differentiate.

Ed · 08-04-2002, 07:51 PM

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Originally posted by Morpho:
[Lurk mode off]
Whoa Nelly, you're waaay out there on this one Ed. You've forgotten some of your basic environmental science - assuming you ever knew any.

Originally posted by Ed:
Huh? If they evolved to specialize in different things then they would no longer be the same species and would therefore no longer be their ancestor! Sorry daydreamer, but you are not making any sense.

Morpho: Although I find it a bit odd, evidently you've never heard of Darwin's 14th finch (Pinaroloxias inornata). It's a classic example in a lot of the literature. Because of the spatial restrictions of its island home, it's unable to undergo complete speciation. (Remember the old s=ca^z rule of biodiversity? You ARE supposedly a wildlife biologist specializing in environmental impact assessments, right?). Juvenile finches "select" an adult whose behavior they emulate. There are finches who follow sandpipers, and eat snails and other shoreline crustaceans, there are finches who follow flycatchers and eat insects, there are finches who mimic warblers, etc. There are nectivore finches, seed eaters, fructivores, etc. These juveniles may follow a particular behavior for a few weeks or their entire lives. The key point is that the entire population interbreeds freely. IOW, they're all still P. inornata.
In what may well be a unique variant case of ESS, a small population of finches has apparently both solved the inter- and intra-specific competition dilemma based on limited resources AND neatly avoided the mutation catastrophe problem that would occur in the case of extreme micropopulation fragmentation due to the development of behavior-based reproductive barriers. IOW, the finches specialize in different things BUT REMAIN THE SAME SPECIES. Your assertion is utterly without foundation (que sorpresa ).[/b]

Well I am back from vacation, sorry I took so long to respond to your post Morpho. I don't deny there may be a few extremely rare cases like the example you give. which even you admit is a "unique case". But generally a different species occupies each ecological niche in an ecosystem.

[b]

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morpho: As to your second assertion:

Ed: The reason there are so many bird species living in the jungle is because there are so many niches available without overlapping.

morpho: Yes, there are significantly more niches overall in a tropical rainforest (what's a jungle, btw?) - Rappaport's Rule applies, obviously. However, that begs the question of the fierce interspecific competition within this community at every level. The competition is quite apparent to anyone who's spent any time at all in the tropics. You can see intraspecific competition in the desperate "race for the sun" when a hole opens in the canopy. You can see interspecific competitition in rainforest adaptations of trees like the strangler fig (Ficus spp.) or parasitic orchids. You can see it in the mosaic (source-sink) distribution patterns among different populations of the same organism caused by niche competition, etc. In short, "over-lapping niches" are the rule in the tropics.
Ed, I'm beginning to wonder if you've ever been outdoors at all. What kind of EIAs do you perform, anyway?

The race for the sun is not technically a ecological niche. Plants need the sun to live. And the parasitic orchid and the strangler fig use two totally different modes of attack thereby occupying two totally separate "niches". While there is some overlapping, generally it is minimal, unless there is a disturbance in the ecosystem's equilibrium, which in some cases does happen often.

lpetrich · 08-04-2002, 09:23 PM

Quote:

Ed:
I gave a definition of life in one of my first posts to you. Your question is a non sequitor given that the theory that life began as replicating molecules is extremely problematic.

How is it any more problematic than (say) the theory that the Earth's first organisms had been placed there by time travelers from the future? That theory could nicely explain the "origin" of life by proposing that there is a closed causal loop -- the first life form in temporal sequence multiplies and produces evolution that leads to the seeders of that life form.

Quote:

(Created kind being a family)
Ed:
Because that is the level that seems to fit the hebrew term for "kinds" in Genesis and that ancient peoples could differentiate.

That does not really say anything; it does not say what a "family" really is.

Ed is supposed to be a wildlife biologist. Yet he uses NONE of his supposed professional knowledge here.

Ed · 08-07-2002, 08:06 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by lpetrich:

lp: Also, a local flood can easily be imagined to be worldwide by someone not familiar with much of our planet's surface area. And how much of that area were the writers of the Bible familiar with? Not much.
Ed:
Yes, some scholars think that the term "earth" in flood account refers just the inhabited part of the planet and not the entire planet, thereby being a "localized" flood.

lp: However, humanity had spread over much of this planet's land surface while having only Paleolithic technology, so this means a lot of area to flood.

I think I ought to have been clearer as to what I had had in mind by a local flood: flood of some river valley.[/b]

Well if was local then it must have occurred before the Paleolithic period because the scriptures say that all humans except for Noah and his family were killed.

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Ed:
But there are other descriptions in the account only seem to fit a worldwide flood so I have not been convinced by the biblical evidence that the flood was local.

lp: It would seem that the Bible is the only source that really counts for Ed -- the only way that something is meaningful for Ed is if it can be shown to follow from an interpretation of the Bible, it would seem.

No, there are two main revelations from God, special revelation (the scriptures) and natural revelation (creation or nature) therefore they are complementary, we just have to use our reasoning skills that God has given us to learn how they are complementary. And in some cases it is not always clear.

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Ed:
I have just tried to show there is not strong conclusive evidence that there was NOT a worldwide flood.

lp: And in the process, Ed, you've only illustrated your abysmal ignorance of geology. Yes, ignorance. Coupled with a remarkable talent for inventing specious "maybes" and hollow excuses. Such as claiming that you are not a geologist. And that you were not really advocating big-sediment Flood Geology after several pages of doing exactly that. And now this.

Mainstream geologists have concluded that the global form of Noah's Flood had never happened; Ed, explain to us why you think that they are wrong.

Just being part of the majority does not mean you are correct, there are many examples in the history of science where the majority was shown to be wrong eventually. I am not qualified to give you the specifics not being a geologist.

[b]

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Ed:
Actually just recently I read about some possible evidence for a worldwide flood. There are large caches of animal bones in what geologists call "rubble drift in ossiferous fissures." These have been found all over the world. The only reasonble explanation for this type of phenomenon is huge hydraulic action.

lp: Which can be produced by LOCAL floods. I repeat, LOCAL floods, as in a flood of a river valley. And such fossil graveyards have been known about for a long time. Ed, I suggest that you read some of the literature on "taphonomy", which is the study of how fossils form and what gets fossilized. There are other mechanisms that can produce concentrations of fossils, such as swamps acting as "carnivore traps". Some big animal gets mired down and attracts some big carnivores, which in turn get mired down and attract some more big carnivores, etc. The La Brea Tar Pits of the Los Angeles area are a late-Pleistocene example of this effect.

And yes, some gigantic local floods have been known to happen, such as the late-Pleistocene Missoula floods and similar floods in the Altai mountains. But these were nothing like Noah's Flood -- and a wooden boat like Noah's Ark I imagine would easily be smashed into driftwood by one of those floods.

But these sites could also be remnants of a global flood.

lpetrich · 08-07-2002, 08:58 PM

Quote:

(Noah's Flood)
Ed:
Well if was local then it must have occurred before the Paleolithic period because the scriptures say that all humans except for Noah and his family were killed.

Except that there is no evidence that our species has ever gone through a 8-individual bottleneck; there have been attempts to estimate the size of previous population bottlenecks by studying present-day genetic diversity.

And Noah's Ark has never been found, despite it being a potentially prominent artifact.

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lp: It would seem that the Bible is the only source that really counts for Ed -- the only way that something is meaningful for Ed is if it can be shown to follow from an interpretation of the Bible, it would seem.
Ed:
No, there are two main revelations from God, special revelation (the scriptures) and natural revelation (creation or nature) therefore they are complementary, we just have to use our reasoning skills that God has given us to learn how they are complementary. And in some cases it is not always clear.

Where does the Bible officially state its incompleteness? Not to mention this theory in explicit terms. Yes, explicit.

And I'm annoyed at the thought of a supposedly perfect being who wants to tease us by presenting us with lots of misleading features.

Quote:

(Big-sediment Flood Geology being universally rejected)
Ed:
Just being part of the majority does not mean you are correct, there are many examples in the history of science where the majority was shown to be wrong eventually. I am not qualified to give you the specifics not being a geologist.

And is Ed willing to come to similar conclusions about the Bible, that it contains serious errors?

And if Ed disclaims expertise in geology, then he ought not to comment on it.

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(fossil graveyards, the Missoula and Altai Pleistocene superfloods...)
Ed:
But these sites could also be remnants of a global flood.

Except that they clearly are not. Most of the Earth was unaffected by these big floods, which would happen repeatedly.

One almost has to appreciate Ed disclaiming expertise in geology, because he is showing clear geological illiteracy here.

Coragyps · 08-08-2002, 06:33 AM

Quote:

No, there are two main revelations from God, special revelation (the scriptures) and natural revelation (creation or nature) therefore they are complementary, we just have to use our reasoning skills that God has given us to learn how they are complementary. And in some cases it is not always clear.

"not always clear."

Really? No shit?

Ed · 08-08-2002, 08:52 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by lpetrich:

Ed:
Humans more than excel at language and abstract reasoning, they are the only creatures that can do such things. While chimps have been taught to simplistically use sign language, they have not used grammar and syntax correctly which are the fundamentals of true language skills.

lp: Although that is certainly true, chimps' mental abilities are nothing to sneeze at; they can make nontrivial tools and they can recognize themselves in mirrors. And they even wage systematic warfare on each other.[/b]

I dont deny that chimps are very intelligent animals but human intelligence is at least a magnitude greater.

Quote:

Ed:
Actually most of the evidence points to homo erectus and homo sapiens being the same species. I think they are both homo sapiens.

lp: I've seen the Turkana Boy fossil, and he both looks almost human below the neck and not-quite human above the neck. His skull has brow ridges, no forehead, and no chin sticking outward.

And in the places where H. erectus lived, we discover no evidence of such H. sapiens behavioral capabilities as painting on the walls of caves.

The two species seem more different than the wild members of:

Canis: wolves, coyotes, jackals

Equus: horses, donkeys, zebras

Panthera: lions, tigers, leopards

Is Ed such a big taxonomic lumper that he considers each of these three groups to be one species?

How do you differentiate between H. erectus paintings from H. sapiens paintings since there is a large overlap of coexistence?

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(on being "personal")
Ed:
I am not just referring to intelligence. Only humans have a true will, a conscience, abstract thinking.

lp: One must be able to look from the outside and work out the presence of these features; introspection is cheating, because the results of it must be communicated, and doing that depends on having high-level language skills, which may not be present.

And there is the question of what a "true will" is. If it is related to having a sense of self, then there is evidence that chimpanzees, orangutans, dolphins, elephants, and maybe gorillas have a sense of self -- at least if self-recognition qualifies as evidence of such a sense. However, self-recognition is absent from most of the animal kingdom, despite the numerous opportunities that some experimenters have presented.

A true will enables one to refuse food even when hungry, animals cannot do this.

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lp: As to having a conscience, there is some evidence of that in chimpanzees, which are known to choke back impolitic calls. This may only mean that they are able to suppress potentially-troublesome impulses, however. Again, that is rare away from the great apes.

They may have just stop their calling when they noticed that a predator was in the area.

[b]

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lp: As to abstract thinking, it is an interesting question how much chimpanzees are capable of doing, since they can make nontrivial sorts of tools. Yet again, this ability is rare outside of the great apes.

What do you call nontrivial tools? Some birds use tools but no one claims that they think abstractly.

Ed · 08-09-2002, 08:17 PM

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Originally posted by Happy Wonderer:


How do we know? There is a lot about animal behavior that we don't understand. What are the measurable signs of a "true will" or a "conscience?"

Research on abstract thinking seems to support the hypothesis that dolphins, at least, are capable of it. I don't think you should dismiss Koko's abilities too lightly, either.
<a href="http://www.geocities.com/marineanimalwelfare/bibliogr.htm" target="_blank">Dolphin intelligence?</a>

HW

Hello Happy. See above about what a true will is. And one sign of a conscience is a system of justice, no animal society has such a thing. Your website link only shows that dolphins are very intelligent animals and may be self aware and can generalize, this is hardly abstract thinking.

Happy Wonderer · 08-10-2002, 08:16 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Ed:


Hello Happy. See above about what a true will is. And one sign of a conscience is a system of justice, no animal society has such a thing. Your website link only shows that dolphins are very intelligent animals and may be self aware and can generalize, this is hardly abstract thinking

Er, how would you consider "generalization" not to be a form of "abstract thinking"? These are technical terms. "Abstract thinking" doesn't mean "thinking about abstractions such as truth, justice, and origins"...

HW

[ August 10, 2002: Message edited by: Happy Wonderer ]

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