Evolution is Fact

[Moontanman]

 

Nothing evolves from nothing. Something must exist first. Hence - creation.

 

Do you have any evidence to back that up what so ever?

 

Things do not just poof into existence or is that is what you believe?

 

:evil:

 

 

Belief does not figure into it, can you prove "nothing" can just "poof" into existence?

[Guadalupe]

Oh but things do indeed just pop into existence, particle-antiparticle pairs can and do just pop into existence.

 

How can you determine what was meant by day in the bible? The Bible is not a credible course of information. It has no basis in fact or evidence to back up any of it's claims.

 

 

 

Hi! Moontanman :)

 

According to your posts, you’re the first one to bring up biblical texts and the bible into all this, not me.

 

Please, would you be so kind enough to explain it me or us as to how long a day is according to the biblical text or bible?

 

 

 

 

:cup:

[HydrogenBond]

A mental construct sets the pattern for how the mind will organize reality. Once the pattern is set, new data will be interpreted using the pattern. This will fill in the pattern. One will not use another explanation outside the pattern, but will fit it into the pattern. If an explanation leaves the pattern, it is ignored.

 

When animal breeders breed animals, they have a goal in mind. It might be a certain body size, coat color, etc. They select the one with the desired features, and breed it again and again. The DNA, at least in part, selectively moves toward the goal due to the nature of breeding desired traits; breeder selection.

 

Nature does the same thing. One only has to know what the environmental potentials favors. This is the goal of the natural breeder. If the environment becomes cold, we know keeping warm will have selective advantage. Nature is like a breeder, with the conditions telling us what will have an advantage. Even if the DNA changes randomly, the environment has set the direction for advantage. Good heat loss genes will never make it there. We know that before the first breeding season.

 

In a steady state environment, where all the environmental potentials have already been satisfied, the DNA plays more of a leadership role, adding new things. But nature does not stay put for very long. For example, humans are defoliating the Amazon for lumber. This is a new environmental potential.

 

In the old jungle potentials, all the selective advantage ducks were lined up in a row. In the new environment that line is broken, because the potentials have changed. The next line of selective advantage is like a breeding program, with the new environment defining what will become the new advantages. One only has to read a changing environment and what will work best to see the future trends. It is just like a breeder seeing the trend of small dogs.

 

With the canopy open and more sun on the ground, full shade plants are screwed, unless they can evolve more light tolerance. Animals that could climb tall trees and jump from to tree for survival advantage, no longer have the same advantage, when there are no large trees to climb or when there are to few trees and/or far between. The new selective advantage specifications will shift. Many animals will fall by the wayside. In this scenario, even if the DNA changes randomly, the goals are sort of set, just like in the breeding kennel.

 

We like to preserve eco-systems because this helps with the pattern. Once we change the environment, the pattern is all messed up. This above mental construct is based on changes in potentials and doesn't work as well in fixed states. In fixed states little tweaks make all the difference. With environmental potential, there may be a need for al large genetic overhaul. Minor tweaks in the dinosaurs meant little, when the earth cooled. This began nature's breeding kennel. Mother nature needed animals that did this, this and this. But with nature not uniform, sub-potentials varied here and there, for other selective differentiations.

[Moontanman]

Hi! Moontanman :cup:

 

According to your posts, you’re the first one to bring up biblical texts and the bible into all this, not me.

 

Doesn't matter, I didn't use biblical text as a factual information source if you think I did then you need to look again.

 

 

Please, would you be so kind enough to explain it me or us as to how long a day is according to the biblical text or bible?

 

I don't care what the Bible says about days, weeks, months, or years, it's not a credible source.

 

HB, simplicity is a virtue dude!

[stereologist]

How can you determine exactly how long a day is according to the biblical text?

 

This has nothing to with with the thread. Go to a creationist forum is you want an answer.

[stereologist]

Nothing evolves from nothing. Something must exist first. Hence - creation.

 

At one time definitely no life. At a later time definitely life. In between could be a large range of maybes - between life and non-life. Some of it may be evolving. No sudden poof, rather a long drawn out gray zone is another possibility.

[Guadalupe]

 

Doesn't matter, I didn't use biblical text as a factual information source if you think I did then you need to look again.

 

I don't care what the Bible says about days, weeks, months, or years, it's not a credible source.

 

 

 

 

Hi! Moontanman :)

 

I don’t really understand you at all. First, on your post #424, you brought up the biblical texts. Second, on your post # 443, you also brought up the bible into all this as well. Third, on your post #447, you’re saying that it doesn’t matter and you don’t care…

 

Again, my original question to you from you post # 424 is how long is a day in biblical text?

 

 

 

 

:cup:

[Moontanman]

I would have to assume the bronze age people who thought up the fairy tales of the bible meant 24 hours just like we do today when we say day.

[Guadalupe]

I would have to assume the bronze age people who thought up the fairy tales of the bible meant 24 hours just like we do today when we say day.

 

 

 

Hi! Moontanman :)

 

You see, it wasn’t really that hard now was it? Thank you.

 

 

 

:cup:

[Buffy]

Hi! Buffy & Reason :)

Hi!

Nothing evolves from nothing.

Quite true. We have an 3958! You should read it in its entirety: it's quite edifying!

Something must exist first. Hence - creation.

Which is the source of the classical infinite regression: who created God? And who created the thing that created God? etc. ad nauseum. And that's just the Theological issue. If you're going to actually deal with reality, then you must deal with the fact that "to get something you must start with something" that is the source of the many Cosmological theories that posit that our universe is simply one of many, possibly an infinite bang-crunch-bang or possibly something stranger like a Multi-verse.

 

What your argument relies on is solely with the human mind's difficulty in understanding the infinite.

 

The crux of the issue is that you saying that you can't imagine that its possible not to require a creation doesn't make it so.

 

Plenty of Cosmological theories--many that are based on strong mathematical and evidentiary foundations--deal with this sort ofi infinity just fine.

 

So,

Things do not just poof into existence or is that is what you believe?

...it's not necessary for me to believe this, and indeed I don't, but it does not prove there was a creation.

 

And,

To begin the cycle with evolution, as you have done, will most definitely result in circular reasoning.

...I did not "begin the cycle with evolution" and unfortunately this would appear to back up my perception that you are indeed having trouble with the concept of infinity. I'd strongly encourage you to investigate the concept! It's quite fascinating!

 

Or should I say repetitive reasoning.

Just to clarify, repetitive reasoning is actually presenting the same arguments over and over without addressing any of the objections presented to them.

 

:cup:

:P

 

We want the facts to fit the preconceptions. When they don't, it is easier to ignore the facts than to change the preconceptions, :)

Buffy

[HydrogenBond]

When Darwin visited Galapagos, he visited a place that had stopped in time. In other words, the environmental potentials had long reached steady state. Life on the island reflected this. This created the impression of a long slow process of change, since that is how it occurs with steady state environmental potentials. He didn't create his theory of evolution based on observations within a rapidly changing environment. He used a slow changing environment. In all due respect, this construct may have been needed to help isolate the DNA, since the construct would imply something conservative that changes slowly within life.

 

If you look at a place like Yellowstone National Forest, which recovered from a huge forest fire, a new eco-system evolved quickly, in a matter of years. All the plants and animals we now see in that modified eco-system reached its selective advantage closer to seven days than to millions of years. This might suggest that bible creation theory was more based on observation within a rapidly changing environment, where all of a sudden new plants and animals take over, quickly.

 

The ancient didn't know about genetics and would just see the quick changing of the guard. It would be like visiting Yellowstone twenty years ago and making another trip today. All has changed like it was created new. It is not slow, unless one assumes is has to be a duplicate again. Darwin saw what was closer to a self duplicating environment because there was little potential for major change.

[stereologist]

When Darwin visited Galapagos, he visited a place that had stopped in time.

 

That isn't how evolution works. Nothing stops in time. Nothing prevents a so-called stable zone from being suddenly changed by new species.

 

All the plants and animals we now see in that modified eco-system reached its selective advantage closer to seven days than to millions of years.

 

Again, that's not how evolution works.

 

In the case of Yellowstone, there was recovery from a number of fires. Not the first time that has happened there. The recovery process involved succession of species. Species able to claim the areas that were burned did that. For instance, large areas were covered in swaths of purple fireweed. Eventually the lodgepole pines will reclaim many of the burned areas. This is not evolution, but changes in plant communities.

[Turtle]

... This might suggest that bible creation theory was more based on observation within a rapidly changing environment, where all of a sudden new plants and animals take over, quickly. ...

 

dude! i suggest that you knock it the hell off!!! not only do you not heed the admonitions here, but when you receive them you move to amp up the twaddle. :P :cup: your material adds nothing scientific and this quoted bit borders on proselytizing. :)

[freeztar]

I'd just like to remind everyone that evolutionary theory makes no claims about the creation of life. Such a subject is a topic for another thread.

[Qfwfq]

And I would invite HB to read The Origin of Species before making claims about what Darwin based his theory on.

 

BTW HB, natural selection is not "rhe natural breeder", I made a distinction which you failed to address.

[HydrogenBond]

In the case of Yellowstone, there was recovery from a number of fires. Not the first time that has happened there. The recovery process involved succession of species. Species able to claim the areas that were burned did that. For instance, large areas were covered in swaths of purple fireweed. Eventually the lodgepole pines will reclaim many of the burned areas. This is not evolution, but changes in plant communities.

 

With the forest floor clear, more lodgepole pine seedlings are able to grow from scratch compared to a dense forest of lodgepole pines, where the floor is crowded for water and nutrients and the canopy is blocking the sun. If we assume there is a certain rate of genetic change in the lodgepole pine, with more seedlings now able to grow to maturity, due more open space, better light, more soil, water availability, more genetic changes become integrated into the species simply due to numbers.

 

An abundance of purple fireweed means more individual plants of this species than before. This means orders of magnitude more seeds. Doesn't than mean more potential for genetic change simply due to higher numbers? The forest fire may allow a new sub-species of fireweed to develop in shorter time, than if it was restricted to a smaller area in the old forest. The pressure on the fireweed was eased by the fire or the change in environmental potential. I am not challenging genetics. I am simply using the same random rates and higher birth rates due to the change in the environmental stresses, which for the fireweed was eased.

[stereologist]

Fireweed is called fireweed for a good reason. It is one of the first plants to exploit areas that have burned.

 

The lodgepole pine issue. Lodgepole pines have closed cones. The cones open when raised to a high enough temperature open to release seeds.

 

I am simply using the same random rates and higher birth rates due to the change in the environmental stresses, which for the fireweed was eased.

 

So fireweed and lodgepole pines are capable of dealing with areas that have fires. They exploit the fires.

 

The issue here is that the change of species in an area which has burned exhibits plant succession, not evolution. You state that more of a plant exists and therefore evolution must be taking place. That is a conjecture. A change in plant communities is not evolution.