Thanks CTD, for providing more evidence for cognitive dissonance by creationists.
What ever happened to the rest of Darwinism? If the new version doesn't mention the rest, one might wonder if it's been abandoned (provided one were so gullible). One might also conclude that the rest is too weak, and the evopusher lacks confidence. But in any case, the trimmed down, 'streamlined', repackaged version differs from the old.
Interesting that I note the actual theory as proposed by Darwin - descent with modification - and show how it is the same as what is now used - the change in hereditary traits in populations from generation to generation ...
... and all you can do is wave your hands and talk about a mysterious "rest" -- without even hinting at what this mythical "rest" is composed of. You imply something is missing but don't say what it is.
The fact is that you can't produce any such "rest" of the theory proposed by Darwin, and that what you are engaged in is self delusion, likely due to cognitive dissonance. The fact is that the theory of evolution today is little different from the theory of evolution as originally proposed by Darwin, other than to include more information on the actual mechanisms by which descent with modification occurs.
Darwin spent a lot of time reviewing the evidence of the natural history of life on earth, fossil and geological, and from the fossil evidence to what we have learned from animal husbandry and the breeding of animals by selecting for desirable (to humans) traits from the ones that occur naturally.
Darwin also spent some time theorizing on some of the possible mechanisms by which descent with modification occurred, some of which was (gasp) wrong (the heredity of acquired traits) and some of which has proven fairly accurate, predicting in effect the field of genetics.
Darwin also spent some time discussing existing (at the time) problems with the theory due to the limited (at the time) evidence from the natural history of life on earth.
But if you can show that he had some other even more major theory than the descent with modification theory, then please, by all means, present it -- along with the chapter for reference.
For instance this quote is from the section "
CHAPTER XV RECAPITULATION AND CONCLUSION":
That many and serious objections may be advanced against [color:"red"]the theory of descent with modification through variation and natural selection[/color], I do not deny. I have endeavoured to give to them their full force. Nothing at first can appear more difficult to believe than that the more complex organs and instincts have been perfected, not by means superior to, though analogous with, human reason, but by the accumulation of innumerable slight variations, each good for the individual possessor. Nevertheless, this difficulty, though appearing to our imagination insuperably great, cannot be considered real if we admit the following propositions, namely, that all parts of the organisation and instincts offer, at least, individual differences- that there is a struggle for existence leading to the preservation of profitable deviations of structure or instinct- and, lastly, that gradations in the state of perfection of each organ may have existed, each good of its kind. The truth of these propositions cannot, I think, be disputed.
(color used for emPHAsis).
Conclusion:
THE theory that Darwin proposed was descent with modification. The main mechanisms for the theory are variation - the preponderance of variation in all forms of life - and natural selection - the differential ability of organisms to survive and breed in different ecologies.
Here is an on-line version of "
Origin of Species" for your ready use and perusal:
http://www.zoo.uib.no/classics/darwin/origin.chap15.htmlIn particular if you can provide a reference where Darwin says that rocks must necessarily turn into people, do by all means please provide this valuable reference for what Russ claims. Good hunting.
I'm not aware of any evidence that says any such thing.
The fact that you - personally - are not
aware of such evidence has no bearing on whether it exists or not. All it can show is that you are either ignorant of the evidence, have not really looked for it, or are busy pretending to yourself that it doesn't exist for any number of reasons ... one of which involves cognitive dissonance.
What we actually have, even if one imagines unlimited timespans, is a record of lifeforms without precursors and without any of them changing into a new kind of lifeform. Yet we have people imagining such changes took place in spite of a vast amount of evidence.
This is an example of just such ignorance, as it is rather obviously false to anyone that looks for the evidence. No two individuals are the same, no two fossils are the same, and layer by layer there is evidence of change in forms.
http://www.don-lindsay-archive.org/creation/foram_article3.html Had Darwin been able to examine the fossil record of forams, he could have fortified many of his arguments on how new species come into being.
The famous naturalist always held that new plants and animals arise from unstable varieties sprung off from old species. Competition among varieties, pressured by the law of "survival of the fittest," inevitably leads to populations that are so profoundly different that they become sexually incompatible (incapable of producing offspring) with populations other than themselves. And voila, a new species is born.
The pattern is exactly what Arnold and Parker have found in the forams. It is but one of a number of observations that the FSU team has made thus far about what arguably is nature's crowning achievement -- the act of speciation itself.
Frustrated by only rudimentary information dug from typical fossil finds, modern-day biologists intent on finding hard evidence on how speciation works have resorted to designing intricate lab experiments using live organisms. Some lines of research based on fruit flies, for example, are now legendary among developmental biologists.
"You could work on fruit flies for an awfully long time and not come close to seeing what we're seeing in a record stretching back nearly 70 million years," Parker said.
"We've literally seen hundreds of speciation events," Arnold added. "This allows us to check for patterns, to determine what exactly is going on. We can quickly tell whether something is a recurring phenomenon -- a pattern -- or whether it's just an anomaly.
"This way, we can not only look for the same things that have been observed in living organisms, but we can see just how often these things really happen in the environment over an enormous period of time."
And you can read more about forams here:
http://www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/fosrec/Wetmore.htmlhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foraminifera(Note that foraminifera are a
Phylum not a speces. Humans are in the phylum of Chordata - animals with a notochord and they include vertebrates, which include primates, which include apes, which include humans.)
Then there is the evidence of horse evolution:
http://www.flmnh.ufl.edu/natsci/vertpaleo/fhc/Stratmap1.htmFossils that show plenty of changes while still being in the horse family.
Or there is Pelycodus:
http://www.mun.ca/biology/scarr/Pelycodus_gradual.htm Successive fossils in the Pelycodus fossil record show the gradual evolution of increased size, which can be recognized as a series of species. The coexistence of two simultaneous size trends indicates a speciation event.
See the diagram to see what they are talking about.
Neither foraminifera fossils, the Horse fossils, nor the pelycodus fossils show "stasis" so your assertions is shown to be false.
So when creationists use the term 'evolution', they must always be equivocating.
Yes, when ever they conflate more than one scientific use of the term with another that is totally unrelated. Astronomers also talk about the birth of stars, but nobody images that this is from stars having sex, getting pregnant and then a "mommy" star giving birth to a "baby" star.
Only evolutionists are allowed to define and use the term.
Actually you are correct: only scientists get to define the terms they use and the conditions for using those terms within the science. This is science develops the terminology specific to the science.
Certainly astronomers do not get to define how the term "evolution" (or "birth") is used in biology. Most certainly people who don't have a clue about science don't get to redefine the scientific terminology -- they get to learn it and learn to apply it properly or they only demonstrate their ignorance of the scientific terminology and the proper scientific usage of the terminology.
On the contrary, creationists have been requesting evidence for quite some time in this forum. Perhaps you're confused. We'd like to see evidence - not more fairy tales.
If you were really interested in seeing the evidence you would have found it, you wouldn't need me to list just some of the pervasive evidence of evolution that easily show your assertions to be false. What I see here is a pervasive pattern of ignoring evidence that is presented -- such as about the real changes that have occurred in coelacanths -- in order to avoid confronting the evidence of objective reality: engaging in cognitive dissonance, not debate.
Enjoy.
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Note: my time is limited, so I only choose threads of particular interest to me and I cannot guarantee a reply to all responses (particularly if they do not discuss the issue/s),
and I expect other people to do the same. Thank you for your consideration.[/color]
