Denyse O’Leary quotes Steve Meyer’s question:
Why, he [Agassiz] asked, does the fossil record always happen to be incomplete at the nodes connecting major branches of Darwin’s tree of life, but rarely—in the parlance of modern paleontology—at the “terminal branches” representing the major already known groups of organisms?…
Was there any easy answer to Agassiz’s argument? If so, beyond his stated willingness to wait for future fossil discoveries, Darwin didn’t offer one.
and responds:
And no one else has either.
Oh, yes, they have, Denyse. That’s what what punk eek was. But it also falls readily out of any simulation – you see rapid diversification into a new niche at a node, and thus few exemplars, followed by an increasingly gradual approach to a static optimum, and thus lots of exemplars. But I present an even more graphic response: when you chop down a tree, and saw it up into logs for your fire, what proportion of your logs include a node?
Oh if you read “Origin” in ancient Hebrew you’ll find the word actually translates as “potato” not “day”. So Darwin is still infallible and inerrant.
YOUR WORLDVIEW HAS CORRUPTED YOUR THINKING, PaV.
Blas,
Here you go. http://i.imgur.com/WOQQbF7.gif
Assuming facts not in evidence.
Good question. The answer is simply when there is a better one to replace it. If all you have is a just working, rickety bicycle then that’s better then walking. Just. You know, bit like a wing et al.
What do you have in mind as a replacement theory? I was reading at UD earlier (forgive me hitcounter) that the Cambrian explosion was the designers “having fun” and messing around (Mapou IIRC). It seems to me just as good an ID based explanation as any other I’ve heard, based as it is on the same evidence as all the other ID based explanations I’ve heard.
So, PaV, the answer to when will the theory be thrown out is now! I’ve just done it. You can do it too, just try! You’ll be surprised at how easy it is!
The more interesting question is when will something come along and fill that gap we now have?
What say you Pav?
Can you fill that gap?
All you have to do is provide a more useful theory then the one you are trying to replace! If you can’t actually do that then on what basis are you rejecting the current theory anyway?
OMagain:
Yes, there is another working hypothesis: the genome is the result of intelligent action and design. This ‘theory’=’hypothesis’ (I prefer ‘hypothesis’) has already been put to the test. IDists have said that “front-loading” can take place–since ‘designers’ have, unlike NS, a view to the future, and have said that so-called “junk DNA” is very likely involved in ‘body-plan’ determination. As to the first, we find the protein used in animal limbs already present in a sea anemone. As to the second, we have recently found out that “pseudo-genes” are vitally important in laying down the wiring pattern in the developing brain.
Neither of these views was championed by Darwinian thinkers. So, not only is Darwinism wrong, but ID has a perspective that can more effectively guide future experimental investigations. Maybe it’s more limited in its scope; however, it is firmer and surer in its probing.
The ‘three ways’ are right there in the text I quoted. Why can’t you simply see them for what they are? They’re right there in front of your nose–i.e., they’re obvious.
Richard: why do you assume I’m an YEC? I’m not. If your first instinct is toward an ad hominem, then shouldn’t that be a sign to you that something is amiss?
Turns out he was pretty much correct.
No we have not. We have found extremely few, scattered singular examples here and there of pseudogenes having secondarily acquired some kind of function. That only leaves approximately 11.000 un-accounted for pseudogenes left.
And that’s still far from the totality of genomic junk, of which pseudogenes is still only a subset.
Go here and learn about it:
http://sandwalk.blogspot.dk/2008/02/theme-genomes-junk-dna.html
You’ve missed the mark again. Darwin was *shock* wrong about a few things. I don’t have to update my worldview though because “Origin..” doesn’t purport to be the word of the creator, or inerrant, or anything. So when you snipe “When will this theory be thrown out?” no one is using “Origin” as infallible, inerrant, or even current. Also, Darwin was Racisssss! Sal, tell us about puppies! So no, my first instinct was to laugh at your strawman.
PaV,
Usually “intelligent action” and “design” is expressed as “Intelligent design”, you have chosen to separate the two out. Any particular reason why?
Also when you say genome, do you mean the current one or some distant version of it in the past? Does your intelligent designer design occasionally or often? Recently or only in the distant past? How do you know?
A theory usually refers to something quite a bit more developed then what you have stated here, that the genome is the result of intelligent action and design.
Is there a definitive version of your theory (or hypothesis, as you prefer) available? You must have more then that.
Well, I would agree that front loading can take place and I’m not an IDist. It could, might and probably will happen if it has not already. And yes, designers have a view to the future.
Do you have a reference to a specific prediction made by an IDist, just a link would be fine, that at some point would be confirmed or not by further research?
I’d also then probably wonder why such research was not being done by ID supporters already, but perhaps another day.
And if you don’t have any such open prediction does that mean that there are no open questions regarding ID that research could answer? Does not sound like something that’s ready to replace anything anytime soon to me.
And sure, junk DNA and body-plan determination. I read the thing about the mouse faces too, or something.
I just don’t see how you then say “Ah-ha. Therefore ID”. I don’t see the causal chain there at all.
Do you have a reference to something specific here? This seems very thin grounds for the extraordinary claim of ID! to me.
And on the surface I am unimpressed. Don’t you think it unsurprising that in the small domain that is all living things vs everything else there is a high level of repetition and reuse, even in radically different ways?
Well, so what? If there is a definitive guide to what we’re currently calling “pseudo” or “junk” could you let me know what it is so that the next time something is discovered and does not go your way in a spectacular fashion you can just call it quits with ID? Otherwise we’re going to continue to find things out and you are going to continue to say As to the second, we have recently found out that “pseudo-genes” …
PaV,
What would make this (unreferenced) claim a strike in favour of front-loading rather than simple evolution? If the protein performs a function in the anemone, it can hardly be said to be ‘front-loaded’, waiting for limbs to be sprouted. Bear in mind also that we did not evolve from sea anemones. The ‘Darwinist’ would regard this sequence homology (I assume it is real) as evidence of common ancestry of anemones and limbed vertebrates. Why would that be an incorrect assessment?
It’s true that most protein coding genes, and the generalized HOX gene were invented by single celled organisms during the three billion years prior to the Cambrian.
Which makes claims of a sudden spurt of creativity in the Cambrian nonsense.
So what was Darwin wrong about?
It’s entirely correct. I’m waiting for PaV to tell us what is incorrect.
IDists have said that “front-loading” can take place–since ‘designers’ have, unlike NS, a view to the future
Funny that the designers have been caught several times by mass extinction events. Perhaps their ability as engineers is less than perfect. Or perhaps it takes millions of years for them to realize that most of their designs are duds, and extinctions are just their way of clearing the table. If so, you have to wonder why the cetaceans are so similar to the ichthyosaurs — why start over from scratch with a land-based mammal when tweaking the existing reptiles would have saved a lot of time. Seems that ID’s interventionist designers leave a lot to be desired.
Petrushka
A video of a crime is evidence.
A video of evolution is not BIOLOGICAL SCIENTIFIC evidence.
Even though it proves evolution.
The bible is a witness/video that evolution is not true. yet its not biological scientific evidence its not true.
Science demands a high standard of evidence before conclusions are made. tHe biggest thing here to do this high standard is one must do the subject in hand. biology must prove biology.
Evolution uses geology and mere biological data points to prove a biological hypothesis.
A great failure to understand what science is. Really true.
Fossils are just stills of pictures. There is no cartoon here of evolutionary change unless the geology is right about the deposition of same fossils.
I insist this nullify’s fossils as biological evidence for evolution.
EVEN if they did accurately portray descent.
Watch the creationist math here.
The really interesting question is why front loading looks exactly like evolution.
IDers say all sorts of goofy things PaV. Problem is they haven’t been able to come up with a single bit of positive evidence to support their claims.
Tell us more about this “front-loading” though. When was it done? How did the “front-loaded” designs manage to make it through the five major mass extinction events documented in the fossil record? How did the Designer front load for the Chicxulub asteroid strike?
You are making my point. We know of only a few examples because no one was interested in looking into what “junk DNA” did; because, after all, it was “junk”, and could be used to pound IDists. OTOH, if the IDist perspective was employed, then much more of this would have already been investigated, and we would find ourselves scientifically farther forward. Again: you make my point.
Of course, history will record what happens next. If it turns out that more and more “pseudogenes” display function, will you then denounce Darwinism? I bet not.
PaV, I keep junk in my garage, and occasionally use it. Sometimes I repair it and sometimes it’s used for spare parts.
You’ll of course be able to support this by quoting researchers and how they were influenced by the “ID perspective” to do things they weren’t doing anyway.
So you’re telling me that when Darwin writes: ” [I]f my theory be true, it is indisputable that before the lowest Silurian stratum was deposited, long periods elapsed, as long as, or probably far longer than, the whole interval from the Silurian age to the present day,” the fact that he turns out to be wrong about this means next to nothing? Really?
If Darwin is wrong about what would be “indisputable” based on his theory being “true,”, then common sense tells you that his theory is NOT “true.”
I’m a Catholic. Since the time of St. Augustine–he died in 430 AD–we have been warned not to take the Book of Genesis’ account of creation literally. So, your whole admonition about “inerrancy” is just silliness. And, then, to add to the silliness you simply fail to see that your reaction to Darwin being wrong is the kind taken only by someone who considers “evolutionary theory” to be “inerrant.” Open your eyes.
Pav: “…your reaction to Darwin being wrong is the kind taken only by someone who considers “evolutionary theory” to be “inerrant.” Open your eyes.”
Me: “Darwin was *shock* wrong about a few things.”
But exciting that you get take your worldview got a refresh a millennia and a half ago. Who says religion doesn’t learn like science?
But he wasn’t wrong PaV. The Silurian period was approx. 440 MYA to 420 MYA. The Earth is over 10 times older than that, and life has been here for well over 3 billion years.
You could learn the basic facts from any number of high school level textbooks. Maybe you should.
What is factually incorrect about the Darwin statement? I’m waiting to hear how it is wrong.
He’s still waiting for St. Augustine to send word…
This may explain why ID creationists don’t like high school textbooks.
But perhaps I’m just misreading the Darwin passage. Can anyone tell me how it is wrong?
They’re not the same thing. Speaking is an act of intelligence, as is analysis; but neither is necessarily part of an overall “design.”
Either the current genome or a distant genome will do. Both exhibit intelligence at work.
It would appear, based on the fossil record, that Design has occurred on multiple occasions throughout geological time. Will we ever be able to pinpoint this with exactitude? I doubt it. But this is simply due to our human limitations, and detracts very little, if anything at all, from the overall hypothesis.
Anyone espousing ID thought is run out of the ‘academy,’ so how, exactly, does one carry out research? One has to build upon a body of work to arrive at what would constitute a ‘theory.’ But this ‘body of work’ will only come about when the right kinds of questions are being asked by biologists and experimenters. Letting go of Darwinism likely would open up a lot of minds, and questions, and ‘labs.’
Consult Appendix A in Meyer’s book, Signature in the Cell.
Those are predictions based on an “Ah-ha” moment. The “Ah-ha” moment comes from investigating population genetics and evolutionary biology texts and finding that there is no reasonable answer as to how significant changes to the genome can occur even over geological time-frames.
Sir Fred Hoyle, an avowed atheist, dismissed Darwinism with a simple calculation of the protein cytochrome C–essential for DNA duplication, and, hence, for cell duplication– coming into existence by chance. It’s all rather obvious.
Well, why don’t you ask the scientists who did the lab work about what a “pseudo-gene” is since that was the term THEY used. And, of course . . .. “So what?” So nothing. If you swat the truth away so glibly, then nothing means anything in the end. It’s whatever you want it to be—or not want it to be.
Yes evolution must prove itself and creationists demand it HAS not done so.
We reject the evidences claimed.
In fact i assert there is NO biological scientific evidence for evolution.
Saying we reject it is just a intellectual frustration to persuade people who weigh issues. We are not just accepters of everything someone in authority tells us.
PROVE IT.
What are your top three biological scientific evidences for evolution. Top one!!
SCIENTIFIC. BIOLOGICAL. I ain’t seen a evolutionist believer ever make this case.
What in the fossil record leads to that conclusion? What are the occasions? Please be specific.
EXPELLED!! (rolls eyes)
Yet virtually every professional biologist and geneticist rejects your ignorance based personal incredulity. Funny that.
Any other Creationst PRATTs you want to share with us PaV? Not enough moon dust? Paluxy human/dino tracks? Polonium haloes? Go ahead and get them out of your system.
You ever going to explain how your front-loading got past the major extinctions? Or what was wrong with Darwin’s “Silurian” statement?
It would appear, based on the fossil record, that Design has occurred on multiple occasions throughout geological time
How can you say this when ID theory can only be scientifically demonstrated when a particular threshold of CSI is crossed or when an occurrence of three or more unique (de novo) proteins are required for a particular feature? Either one requires genomic analysis which can’t be done on fossils.
The article came out six years ago. Here’s this from the abstract:
Nearly one-fifth of the inferred genes of the ancestor are eumetazoan novelties, which are enriched for animal functions like cell signaling, adhesion, and synaptic transmission. Analysis of diverse pathways suggests that these gene “inventions” along the lineage leading to animals were likely already well integrated with preexisting eukaryotic genes in the eumetazoan progenitor.
As to “front-loading,” they tell us that “eukaryotic genes ‘inventions'” were already in place in a eumetazoan–its predecessor.
It’s not incorrect; it’s just unexpected— yet consistent with the idea of “front-loading.”
In all honesty, how could Darwinism “predict” such a thing as is found in the sea anemone?
A very nice theological argument. I refer you to Dr. Cornelius Hunter’s books.
PaV,
I suspect this is the first time an ID/creationist has referred to a complete lack of reading comprehension of basic science as “an Ah-ha moment.”
Disregarding the gratuitous “avowed atheist” insertion, ID/creationists love Fred Hoyle even thought they don’t know what Hoyle calculated and the fact that what he calculated was completely wrong by being completely irrelevant.
Hoyle’s tornado-in-a-junkyard argument is also a favorite of ID/creationists; but that argument is also dead wrong. Complex molecules are not made of junkyard parts; even middle school students know that.
Thomas Edison designed the light bulb by trial-and-error experiments. He eventually got it right. Even evolutionists will eventually get things right. It just takes a lot more time.
For the record – that would be the Dr. Cornelius Hunter who swore an oath with his employer, BIOLA university, that he believes in a literal Bible, a 6000 year old Earth, a literal six-day Genesis special creation with Adam and Eve, and literal Noah’s Flood?
What of scientific relevance does he have to say PaV? Please summarize it for us.
PaV
As a Catholic, I refer you to arguments against your position (both scientific and theological); Scientific Insights into the Evolution of the Universe and of Life, Pontifica Academia Scientiarum (2009)
Did sea anemones make it through the five major mass extinction events, or not? Well, then, if it was “front-loaded” in the sea anemone, then it would have all been right there even after the “extinction event” or we wouldn’t have sea anemones today. Simple logic.
LOL! So sea anemones were ‘front-loaded”, yet every other of the millions of species that didn’t make it through the extinctions – from trilobites to dinosaurs – weren’t front loaded. And all the living species today that weren’t present in the Cambrian weren’t “front-loaded”.
A brilliant display of Creationist logic PaV. Thanks for clearing that up.
Mike, you had two choices: either you could have pointed out the references where real calculations showed that evolution via RM+NS could produce the kinds of genomic inventions and growth in complexity that we see, or could simply use an ad hominem attack. Unfortunately you chose the latter.
It is not “gratuitous.” It’s very hard to call an “atheist” a “creationist.” That’s why it’s there. Just one more ad hominem I was hoping to avoid.
IDists don’t know what Fred Hoyle calculated? Really? You really do love ad hominems, don’t you?
Why don’t you tell us just exactly why what Fred Hoyle calculated was “completely irrelevant.” I’m interested to know.
” . . . [E]ven middle school students know that.” Another ad hominem. Wow, they just roll right off of your keyboard. Amazing.
And to think, IDists believed that “junkyard parts” and “complex molecules” were the very same thing. Who wudda thunk it?
PaV, what part of the Darwin statement is wrong? Be specific.
Pointing out that school children know things you don’t *isn’t* ad hominem.
Are you new to this?
Pav
It seems that you are offering a prediction of sorts: species that are front-loaded will survive extinction events, and those that are not, won’t. If I have misunderstood you, please clarify.
Silly boy, what he said was that those species that survived were obviously front loaded. Simple logic.
Did anyone say anything about “eukaryotic genes” being front-loaded in trilobytes or dinosaurs? If so, I don’t remember it.
I don’t recall anyone saying anything even remotely approaching reality about “front-loading”.
Since you know so much on front-loading, why don’t you list for us which genes were ‘front-loaded”? It had to be all the genes we currently see in extant species, right? Because everyone knows evolution can’t produce new genes, right?
All ID/creationists “thunk it.” Just look at any “Complex Specified Information” calculation. Just look at the writings of David L. Abel, William Dembski, the haughty calculations by the denizens over at UD. How about John Sanford’s “genetic entropy,” or Granville Sewell’s assertion that evolution violates “the principle behind the second law of thermodynamics” (as if he even knows what that means).
Why do ID/creationists keep referring to Hoyle’s “tornado-in-a-junkyard” argument as proof that complex molecular assemblies can’t happen naturally?
Do you even know why ID/creationists calculate the probability of molecular assemblies the way they do? You don’t, do you.
Cry ad hominem all you like; but the fact remains that not one ID/creationist in 50 years has ever understood a fundamental concept in science at even the high school level. They can’t even do simple high school level physics/chemistry calculations that reveal the complete nonsense of ID/creationist CSI calculations and assertions about complex molecular assemblies; molecular assemblies you can learn about in high school level textbooks. That includes you and every ID/creationist “PhD” since Henry Morris and Duane Gish founded the Institute for Creation Research back in 1970.
Pav,
A very nice theological argument.
Only if the designer must be God.
PaV, what part of the Darwin statement is wrong?
Actually, you could say that pretty much all forms ARE transitional. Most of them are transitioning towards extinction.