The "damnable doctrine" of Charles Darwin

[geauxtohell]

I am pretty sure Darwin was apolitical, so to blame the miss-steps of the British empire on him is somewhat of a stretch. Other than that, it's the usual pejoratives against one of the greatest minds of the 1800s. Darwin lost faith after his daughter died and stopped attending Church? Oh my!

Darwin is venerated simply because he laid the ground work for evolutionary theory. He was not the first person to notice that species change over time, and he is far from the last.

Other than that, modern evolutionary theory only proximately resembles "The Origin of Species". Like any good scientific theory, it has been improved upon. The emergence of molecular biology has only reinforced what Darwin came up with by observing nature with his own two eyes.

If evolution is an affront to your Christian sensibilities, you don't have to subscribe to it. You are free to believe whatever you want.

What you are not free to do, is take your articles of faith and juxtapose them on the scientific method.

You do your thing, we will do ours.

 

[Sunni Man]

One day the zoo-keeper noticed that the gorilla was reading two books - the Bible and Darwin's "The Origin of Species". In surprise he asked the ape, "Why are you reading both those books"?
"Well," said the gorilla, "I just wanted to know if I was my brother's keeper, or my keeper's brother."

 

[SmarterThanHick]

haha! it's funny cuz it doesn't understand evolution!

 

[rdean]

Look gocomeau, I am not in a class and you aren't my teacher.

I have B.S. degree from a major university.

So I am quite familiar with what you have posted so far, and am well versed in scientific methodology.

If you have a point, let's cut to the chase and make it.

I have no doubt you have a BS. Actually, you have a double BS. A BS in BS.

Trying to compare faith and science is not possible.

Acceptable Definition of science: knowledge or a system of knowledge covering general truths or the operation of general laws especially as obtained and tested through scientific method b : such knowledge or such a system of knowledge concerned with the physical world and its phenomena : natural science

Acceptable Definition of faith: Belief that does not rest on logical proof or material evidence.

Def of religion: the practice of religious beliefs; ritual observance of faith.

Def of Supernatural:
1. of, pertaining to, or being above or beyond what is natural; unexplainable by natural law or phenomena; abnormal.
2. of, pertaining to, characteristic of, or attributed to God or a deity.
3. of a superlative degree; preternatural: a missile of supernatural speed.
4. of, pertaining to, or attributed to ghosts, goblins, or other unearthly beings; eerie; occult.

So you see, there is no connection between Religion and Science. They are opposites. One deals with the world we live in and the other deals with the world of "imagination".

 

[Sunni Man]

haha! it's funny cuz it doesn't understand evolution!

Lighten up son, it's just a joke.

Not ment to explain evolution.

But plays on the puplic's simple idea of evolution

 

[Sunni Man]

Look gocomeau, I am not in a class and you aren't my teacher.

I have B.S. degree from a major university.

So I am quite familiar with what you have posted so far, and am well versed in scientific methodology.

If you have a point, let's cut to the chase and make it.

I have no doubt you have a BS. Actually, you have a double BS. A BS in BS.

LOL!!! rdean You really have a great sense of humour for a gay man

 

[SmarterThanHick]

LOL!!! rdean You really have a great sense of hunour for a gay man

yeah that's how I was using it, my fine hypocrite.

hypocrite???

you still confused about the hypocrite comment?

 

[N4mddissent]

N4mddissent, my use of Einstein is mainly humour.

I don't venerate him as you suggest. He was just smart man with a screwed up social life.

Do you think someone took his picture while he wrote "Duh" on a chalk board?

Please get a grip and try to chill

I'll try to get a grip. All I did was point out the irony of you having a man of science as your avatar while you argue the anti-science position. You were the one who started trying to use Einstein quotes for justification.

I have no problem "chilling". Once I beat someone with my Truth Stick, I am content to relax until my bullshit meter goes off again.

 

[gcomeau]

Since you say you are familiar with what I've posted to date, and apart from repeating your 'saying' you have made no attempt to refute any of it, can I take that as acceptance of the accuracy of what has been presented so far and move on to the next stage?

Ahem... Sunni Man?

 

[gcomeau]

Actually, I'm just going to take the day of silence to be an indication there's nothing there you want to argue and go ahead with step 2. Like I said, we were getting to the parts where we establish the evidence for evolutionary theory...

The Geologic Column

When the geologic column was first being mapped out by geologists they could only establish relative dates of the position of formation of a given layer in the column based on the premise that 'layers buried further down' = 'older than newly formed surface layers'… with care being taken to ensure you weren’t analyzing something like an overthrust where one section of plate has pushed up on top of another one. Then came radiometric dating which allowed them not only to independently test that hypothesis but to assign specific age values to each of those layers… resulting in the modern understanding of the geologic column. For example, in Glenn Morton’s article on the geologic column at Talk.Origins (The Entire Geologic Column in North Dakota) one of the references used is a well dug in North Dakota to a depth of over 15 thousand feet. The following layers were encountered at the respective depths: (Fm = Formation, Lm = Limestone, Grp = Group)

Tertiary Ft. Union Fm ...............................100 feet
Cretaceous Greenhorn Fm .......................4910 feet
Cretaceous Mowry Fm............................ 5370 feet
Cretaceous Inyan Kara Fm.......................5790 feet
Jurassic Rierdon Fm................................6690 feet
Triassic Spearfish Fm..............................7325 feet
Permian Opeche Fm................................7740 feet
Pennsylvanian Amsden Fm.......................7990 feet
Pennsylvanian Tyler Fm...........................8245 feet
Mississippian Otter Fm.............................8440 feet
Mississippian Kibbey Lm...........................8780 feet
Mississippian Charles Fm..........................8945 feet
Mississippian Mission Canyon Fm................9775 feet
Mississippian Lodgepole Fm.....................10255 feet
Devonian Bakken Fm.............................11085 feet
Devonian Birdbear Fm............................11340 feet
Devonian Duperow Fm...........................11422 feet
Devonian Souris River Fm.......................11832 feet
Devonian Dawson Bay Fm.......................12089 feet
Devonian Prairie Fm...............................12180 feet
Devonian Winnipegosis Grp.....................12310 feet
Silurian Interlake Fm..............................12539 feet
Ordovician Stonewall Fm........................13250 feet
Ordovician Red River Dolomite.................13630 feet
Ordovician Winnipeg Grp........................14210 feet
Ordovician Black Island Fm.....................14355 feet
Cambrian Deadwood Fm.........................14445 feet
Precambrian.........................................14945 feet

The article also includes 25 other sites where the entire column has been observed.

The span of ages since associated with each of those eras since the advent of radiometric dating are:

Tertiary –------------------ 1.8 million -> 65 million years old
Cretaceous --------------– 65 million -> 145 million years old
Jurassic ----------------– 145 million -> 205 million years old
Triassic ----------------–205 million -> 250 million years old
Permian –---------------- 250 million -> 290 million years old
Pennsylvanian –---------- 290 million -> 325 million years old
Mississippian –------------ 325 million to 355 million years old
Devonian –--------------- 355 million -> 420 million years old
Silurian –----------------- 420 million -> 445 million years old
Ordovician –-------------- 445 million -> 490 million years old
Cambrian Deadwood Fm –- 490 million -> 545 million years old
Precambrian –------------------------ 545+ million years old

So, the further down we go, the older the dates we see. Exactly as predicted. But that isn’t the only indicator to consider, there is also the fossil composition of the geologic column. I’ll do a quick overview of which fossils are found in which layers for now... starting with what are dated as the oldest layers and progressing through to the youngest. Note that the precise locations of many of these "earliest known fossil" finds are constantly being adjusted to some degree as more and more fossil finds come in and the body of what is known is added to.... for example, not too many years ago the earliest known multicellular fossils were early Cambrian (540 million years old) but then someone found some in layers about 20 million years older than that and the date of the earliest known multicellular fossils got shifted back a few percent into the late Precambrian. This is to be expected... and will certainly continue to happen in the future.

Precambrian
--In the oldest dated layers of rock in the Precambrian there has never been a fossil found. Of anything. Ever.
--As we move to newer layers in the Precambrian we start finding fossils of single celled organisms at about the 3.5 billion year mark. They appear to be prokaryotes. We find fossils of nothing else.
--In still newer layers we begin finding fossils of what seem to be eukaryotic single celled organisms. (Prokaryotes have cell structures that lack mitochondria and nuclei, eukaryotes incorporate mitochondria and nuclei).
--In the late Precambrian layers leading up to the Cambrian, we begin finding fossils of small, simple, multicellular organisms (for example: the Ediacaran fauna) and also fossils of what appear to be simple chloroplasts.

Cambrian
--Once we reach the Cambrian we have the “Cambrian Explosion”. Keep in mind that this “explosion” takes tens of millions of years… some people have the unfortunate tendency to think this means that: *poof*… a bunch of different animals just all showed up simultaneously.
--By the end of the Cambrian we see the emergence of the earliest representatives of most existent phyla. Note that for the most part they look absolutely nothing like modern representatives of those phyla… another point on which people have an unfortunate tendency to become confused. They think that (for example) because we have brachiopods today, and brachiopods showed up in the Cambrian, therefore modern brachiopods have been around since the Cambrian. This is just plain wrong.
--Among the organisms first appearing in the Cambrian are: Arthropods (trilobites!), Molluscs, Chordates (near the end of the Cambrian), Brachiopods, etc…

Ordovician
--The first fossil Bryozoans show up in the Ordovician, little colonies of interconnected aquatic organisms that ten to inhabit rock surfaces, etc…
--The first coral fossils.
--Earliest jawless fish, although there is some evidence they may have shown up in the late Cambrian.

Silurian
--Fossils of jawless fish are abundant and diverse. Earliest fossils of fish with jaws are found.
--The first fossil evidence of any land organisms. Fungi, and also cooksonia, the earliest known plant with a vascular network.
--By the late Silurian we also find primitive fossil arachnids and centipedes.
--Note that we have four and a half billion years of rock layers and find no evidence of anything non-aquatic until the latest ten percent of them.

Devonian
--Earliest fossils of tetrapods (amphibians).
--Towards the end of the Devonian we find the earliest fossils of seed bearing plants.

Mississippian and Pennsylvanian (Combined = Carboniferous)
--Earliest amniote fossils.
--Tetrapod fossils become increasingly diverse.
--Land based plant fossils also diversify.
--Towards the end of the Pennsylvanian the earliest diapsid fossils are found (animals with two fenestrae. Ie: reptiles)

Permian
--For most of the Permian increasingly diverse examples of the previously mentioned groups are found…
--At the end of the Permian there appears to be a large scale mass extinction event. A massive number of species found in the fossil record prior to this time cease to be found at any point later (goodbye trilobites… you had a good run…).

Triassic
--The emergence of the dinosaurs in the fossil record. The popular giant versions are not found at this point in the fossil record… Triassic dinosaur fossils consist of smaller representatives of that group.
--Towards the very end of the Triassic we find the first fossils of small mammals.

Jurassic
--Dinosaur fossils get bigger and more diverse.
--Crocodiles show up.
--By this point in the fossil record aquatic life is extremely diversified. Sharks, rays, fish, squid, ammonites, all kinds of aquatic plants…
--Land plants also become increasingly diverse, as well as mammals.
--Near the end of the Jurassic, we have Archeopteryx. Clearly reptilian… but feathered.

Cretaceous
--Fossils of flowering plants (angiosperms) appear.
--Fossils of modern looking versions of some mammals and insects.
--Dinosaur fossils continue to diversify. A crowd favorite, T-rex, makes it’s appearance in the cretaceous layers. Unfortunately for it:
--At the very end of the Cretaceous there is another apparent mass extinction event, the K-T event. No further fossil evidence of dinosaurs and many other species found previous to this point in the fossil record are found in later layers. The K-T boundary marks the end of the Cretaceous period in the geologic column, a thin layer in the column with heavy iridium concentrations, found worldwide, leading to the hypothesis that there was a massive meteor/asteroid strike at this time which kicked up enough impact debris to lay down a coating over the entire surface of the planet. This event is more well known than the Permian mass extinction, even though it appears to have wiped out a smaller percentage of the extant species than did the Permian event.

Tertiary
--Within the Tertiary layers we find fossils of modern animal forms. Modern angiosperm plants, mammals, ray-finned fish, birds, etc…
--We begin finding the first primate fossils right near the KT boundary. They’re small… in appearance they resembled something like a squirrel. The first prosimian fossils (for example: Smilodectes) show up in the early Tertiary layers. The first ape and monkey fossils begin appearing in the mid-Tertiary layers. ( Apidium, Aegyptopithecus, etc…). Ape and monkey fossils continue to diversify throughout the later layers of the Tertiary. Approaching the end of the Tertiary the first Hominid fossils are found, dating back approximately 5-6 million years. It bears thinking on that hominid fossils occupy only the upper approximate 1% of the geologic column. Fossils of homo sapiens are not found in Tertiary layers.

Note that the well mentioned earlier was dug in a basin, beginning below the very upper layers (the Quaternary layers which are dated at 1.8 million years to present) which are populated with modern looking animal and plant fossils. Hominids of varying morphological similarity to homo sapiens are found throughout these layers, with fossils classified as archaic and then modern homo sapiens found in the most recent layers, dating as far back as several hundred thousand years... a fraction of a percent of the span represented by the column.

We never find mammal fossils embedded in pre-Carboniferous layers. We never find bird fossils in Permian layers. We never find primate fossils in Jurassic layers. We never find angiosperm fossils in the PreCambrian. We never find reptile fossils in the Ordovician layers. Etc.

It's a rather distinctive pattern.

Anything you want to take exception with here? Any lack of clarity on the significance of that pattern? Or can we move along to part 3?

 

[rdean]

Look gocomeau, I am not in a class and you aren't my teacher.

I have B.S. degree from a major university.

So I am quite familiar with what you have posted so far, and am well versed in scientific methodology.

If you have a point, let's cut to the chase and make it.

I have no doubt you have a BS. Actually, you have a double BS. A BS in BS.

LOL!!! rdean You really have a great sense of hunour for a gay man

Being called a "gay" is probably the nicest thing I've been called on this site.

Hey, weren't you the one who said dear old Albert had some type of "supernatural" beliefs, but I crushed that with a letter he wrote saying exactly the opposite?

No wonder you guys attempt to call me names. Just don't call me a Republican or an evangelical. Then I would have a breakdown. You see, I am pro America.

 

[Immanuel]

Being called a "gay" is probably the nicest thing I've been called on this site.

Hey, weren't you the one who said dear old Albert had some type of "supernatural" beliefs, but I crushed that with a letter he wrote saying exactly the opposite?

No wonder you guys attempt to call me names. Just don't call me a Republican or an evangelical. Then I would have a breakdown. You see, I am pro America.

I'm what some might call an evangelical and I am pro America. I am not a member of the "Religious wRong".

Now, crawl back under that rock you have been hiding under you frigging Right Wing Republican Evangelical and don't come out until you have repented of your sins!

Question, should I add "homophobic" to that?

Immie

 

[N4mddissent]

Now, crawl back under that rock you have been hiding under you frigging Right Wing Republican Evangelical and don't come out until you have repented of your sins!

Question, should I add "homophobic" to that?

Immie

Such language!

 

[rdean]

Being called a "gay" is probably the nicest thing I've been called on this site.

Hey, weren't you the one who said dear old Albert had some type of "supernatural" beliefs, but I crushed that with a letter he wrote saying exactly the opposite?

No wonder you guys attempt to call me names. Just don't call me a Republican or an evangelical. Then I would have a breakdown. You see, I am pro America.

I'm what some might call an evangelical and I am pro America. I am not a member of the "Religious wRong".

Now, crawl back under that rock you have been hiding under you frigging Right Wing Republican Evangelical and don't come out until you have repented of your sins!

Question, should I add "homophobic" to that?

Immie

An evangelical with common sense is far between and very few. I wish it were different. They constantly tell us how moral they are and then prove otherwise. I with that was also different.

 

[Ryan]

Personally I think "Darwinist" is a meaningless word because it's a label that some people attach to others. Because it's a label it has meaning for the labeller and not the labelled.

It's another pathetic attempt to claim that science is a religion

Scientology is a religion. Like it or not, "secular humanism" is a religion.

 

[Ryan]

Personally I think "Darwinist" is a meaningless word because it's a label that some people attach to others. Because it's a label it has meaning for the labeller and not the labelled.

People attach labels to themselves as well as others. Some maybe unfair but such a case does not make labels "meaningless" words and I wonder why "Darwinist" be considered such. Do you attach a inherent negative connotation to the term? Are there other terms you consider "meaningless words"? How does one communicate issues and pass along one's perception of events without some use of this type of adjectives or labels as you call them?

 

[Ryan]

Actually, I used the phrase "modern eugenics" identified the source of the term. The original point of mine was highlight some lesser known aspects of Darwin's 'doctrine.' Or, should Darwin be allowed to make some a judgement on Christianity without any likewise reflection upoun his views?

As far as your Newton analogy goes, it only works if you can give me quotes of Newton advocating pushing people off cliffs. What ya got on that?

Do you even know what an analogy is?

No, it does not require Newton to actually have said that for it to 'work'. It's an illustration of concept. It doesn't have to be based in historical reality. It holds if the comparison of the ideas involved is sound, which it is.

Your own response indicates that you were totally unaware of Darwin's views. You should be thakful for learning something.

My response indicates I don't care since they have nothing to do with the content of evolutionary theory and I don't look to Darwin for moral guidance. I would be equally uninterested if you told me the person who programmed my JMP software believed in Bigfoot and had some weird sexual fetishes. The software works, that's all I'm concerned with.

Evolutionary theory is supported by all available scientific evidence. That's all I'm concerned with.

Did you or did you not, try to establish a likeness between my original post and making the case of Newton being blamed because of his theory of gravity for any incidents of a person pushing another person off a cliff? That is essentially what I took your response to mean but please explain if I was somehow mistaken.

The problem, I found with that comparison that the theory of gravity is based on a laws of nature where as, eugenics is human manipulation of nature for a desired objective. That's the difference needed where two unalike things are compared but yet have something in common. Maybe that's more a simile then an analogy, you can explain since you doubt my understanding. Either way, the ethical question is essential so I will resubmit it and hope you answer.

Did Newton advocate pushing people off cliffs?

Put an X next to your answer.
Yes ( )
No ( )

 

[Immanuel]

Now, crawl back under that rock you have been hiding under you frigging Right Wing Republican Evangelical and don't come out until you have repented of your sins!

Question, should I add "homophobic" to that?

Immie

Such language!

Sorry, please forgive me!

Being called a "gay" is probably the nicest thing I've been called on this site.

Hey, weren't you the one who said dear old Albert had some type of "supernatural" beliefs, but I crushed that with a letter he wrote saying exactly the opposite?

No wonder you guys attempt to call me names. Just don't call me a Republican or an evangelical. Then I would have a breakdown. You see, I am pro America.

I'm what some might call an evangelical and I am pro America. I am not a member of the "Religious wRong".

Now, crawl back under that rock you have been hiding under you frigging Right Wing Republican Evangelical and don't come out until you have repented of your sins!

Question, should I add "homophobic" to that?

Immie

An evangelical with common sense is far between and very few. I wish it were different. They constantly tell us how moral they are and then prove otherwise. I with that was also different.

Tell me about it! Being of a religious persausion I find it very irritating listening to so called "men of God" who seem to have forgotten the basics of their faith. They are called to bring all men to God not to convict them of their sins.

Immie

 

[Ryan]

No, they don't, liar


I stand accused of being a "liar" by a half wit.

cite your source, liar

Is that really the best you can do to 'refute' reality?

Interesting how many of you people there suddenly are

At the time it was the "best" question I could come up with but I was in a bit of a hurry. Sorry to disappoint. Why did you not answer?

I do not know anything about the "many of you people."

 

[Fatality]

hitler was clearly a darwinist

1)'darwinist' is a meaningless word.

yeah, no, its pretty meaningful