Do people who deny evolution realise how they sound to the scientifically literate?

[Naissur]

There's a member here who believes the earth is flat. Many people who themselves fail to acknowledge scientific theories are arguing with him. What's fascinating for me is this: do they realise that to a scientifically literate person they sound exactly like him when they argue against evolution? He gets points for consistency.

 

[The_Cosmos]

This is a lost cause mate, don't you bloody bother with these lot.

 

[Rooble]

Tag them

 

[Naissur]

This is a lost cause mate, don't you bloody bother with these lot.

You would think one would come to the realisation that scientific theories that one refuses to acknowledge, out of thousands of such theories, also happen to be the ones that happen to somehow disagree with one's religion (or one's interpretation of it). That's the critical assessment that creationists abysmally lack.

Tag them

@Burhan, @Sakandari, @Prince of Lasanod, @TekNiKo

 

[The_Cosmos]

You would think one would come to the realisation that scientific theories that one refuses to acknowledge, out of thousands of such theories, also happen to be the ones that happen to somehow disagree with one's religion (or your interpretation of it). That's the critical assessment that creationists abysmally lack.

@Burhan, @Sakandari, @Prince of Lasanod, @TekNiKo

I've pointed this out on several occasions, however, they completely ignore the definition of a theory in scientific terms and love to conflate it with a hypothesis. Let me define them before they jump on me

Scientific theory - "A scientific theory is a well-substantiated explanation of some aspect of the natural world, based on a body of facts that have been repeatedly confirmed through observation and experiment. Such fact-supported theories are not "guesses" but reliable accounts of the real world."

"Palaeontologist, evolutionary biologist, and science historian Stephen Jay Gould said, “...facts and theories are different things, not rungs in a hierarchy of increasing certainty. Facts are the world′s data. Theories are structures of ideas that explain and interpret facts.”

Hypothesis- A scientific hypothesis is the initial building block in the scientific method. Many describe it as an “educated guess,” based on prior knowledge and observation.

Science is built on walking down wherever the evidence leads, whilst religion demands the evidence conform to its already stated presuppositions.

 

[Naissur]

I've pointed this out on several occasions, however, they completely ignore the definition of a theory in scientific terms and love to conflate it with a hypothesis.

This is how you know someone is completely clueless about science. I'm not aware of any developed country where someone can pass high school science class without learning that distinction. To try and argue against a scientific theory without knowing that distinction is like someone who doesn't understand simple binary operations trying to disprove a major theorem in mathematics. So shocking it's impressive!

 

[The_Cosmos]

This is how you know someone is completely clueless about science. I'm not aware of any developed country where someone can pass high school science class without learning that distinction. To try and argue against a scientific theory without knowing that distinction is like someone who doesn't understand simple binary operations trying to disprove a major theorem in mathematics. So shocking it's impressive!

Nonetheless, there's striking correlation between education and irreligion. I very much do believe that if Somali children were properly educated on all aspects of science and its methodology, they'd eventually make the connections on their own. Human beings are naturally predisposed to give irrational positions more prevalence over the rational, no matter how insane they are. From a survivalist perspective, being predisposed to irrationality more than rationality is better for survival. Irrationality is built upon the idea of taking no chances, from a survival perspective, whilst being rational demands a moment of clarity and thoughtfulness. For example, an African hunter hears movement in the bushes in the middle of the night. He can either assume it's a predator and run, ensuring he takes no chances or stay and think it through and assume it's just the wind. We all know what's the better option. Moreover, this form of thinking is still prevalent as we see today.

Apologies for the science lesson. It's a fascinating topic.

 

[Ferrari]

Evolution could be disproven at some point.
After all, Newton believed in time being absolute until Einstein came along. I'd like to think Newton was smarter than Mr. Darwin and if Newton could make such a massive mistake, so can Darwin.

 

[Naissur]

Nonetheless, there's striking correlation between education and irreligion. I very much do believe that if Somali children were properly educated on all aspects of science and its methodology, they'd eventually make the connections on their own. Human beings are naturally predisposed to give irrational positions more prevalence over the rational, no matter how insane they are. From a survivalist perspective, being predisposed to irrationality more than rationality is better for survival. Irrationality is built upon the idea of taking no chances, from a survival perspective, whilst being rational demands a moment of clarity and thoughtfulness. For example, an African hunter hears movement in the bushes in the middle of the night. He can either assume it's a predator and run, ensuring he takes no chances or stay and think it through and assume it's just the wind. We all know what's the better option. Moreover, this form of thinking is still prevalent as we see today.

Apologies for the science lesson. It's a fascinating topic.

Absolutely! The more educated a society gets, the less religious it becomes - especially as scientific literacy rises. As Oscar Wilde once said, "Religions die when they are proved to be true. Science is the record of dead religions."

 

[Admin]

In all honest, I do not understand evolution. I know what it means but I do not understand it. Even after studying science I do not fully get it.

 

[The_Cosmos]

Evolution could be disproven at some point.
After all, Newton believed in time being absolute until Einstein came along. I'd like to think Newton was smarter than Mr. Darwin and if Newton could make such a massive mistake, so can Darwin.

That sort of thinking only creates problems. I mean, isn't that the case for everything? Why convict a man if he can be proven innocent one day? Of course you wouldn't support such a statement if the evidence is too overwhelming would you? Nonetheless, what you said is still problematic and I'll show you how.

In order for evolution to count as science, it must make predictions which can later on be falsified meaning that they can be wrong. Evolution has done that and these predictions turned out to be true. In fact, some of these predictions were made by Charles Darwin himself. Here's some:

1) Darwin predicted that precursors to the trilobite would be found in pre-Silurian rocks. He was correct: they were subsequently found.

2) Similarly, Darwin predicted that Precambrian fossils would be found. Hewrote in 1859 that the total absence of fossils in Precambrian rock was "inexplicable" and that the lack might "be truly urged as a valid argument" against his theory. When such fossils were found, starting in 1953, it turned out that they had been abundant all along. They were just so small that it took a microscope to see them.

3) There are two kinds of whales: those with teeth, and those that strain microscopic food out of seawater with baleen. It was predicted that a transitional whale must have once existed, which had both teeth and baleen. Such a fossil has since been found.

4) Evolution predicts that the fossil record will show different populations of creatures at different times. For example, it predicts we will never find fossils of trilobites with fossils of dinosaurs, since their geological time-lines don't overlap. The "Cretaceous seaway" deposits in Colorado and Wyoming contain almost 90 different kinds of ammonites, but no one has ever found two different kinds of ammonite together in the same rockbed.

Of course there are more predictions but I I've only given a few samples to show you the authenticity of evolution.

All of these are valid predictions as they could have been proven false, but non of them were. They all came out to be true.

Religion on the other hand makes claims that cannot falsified and predictions which cannot be falsified. Some have been proven false, whilst others simply couldn't be falsified. If it can't be falsified then it is not science.

 

[Naissur]

Evolution could be disproven at some point.
After all, Newton believed in time being absolute until Einstein came along. I'd like to think Newton was smarter than Mr. Darwin and if Newton could make such a massive mistake, so can Darwin.

But Newton's theory of gravity wasn't wrong. It was just improved by Einstein as you said, among others. You should note that the same thing happened with Darwin's theory of evolution. Of course it's not where it was when Darwin came up with it. Thousands of biologists worked on it since and that's still going on. If you are referring to falsifiability, then that's something every scientific theory has to have by definition.

 

[The_Cosmos]

In all honest, I do not understand evolution. I know what it means but I do not understand it. Even after studying science I do not fully get it.

Well, in its more basic understanding, evolution "is the process by which organisms change over time as a result of changes in heritable physical or behavioral traits."

"Evolution by natural selection is one of the best substantiated theories in the history of science, supported by evidence from a wide variety of scientific disciplines, including paleontology, geology, genetics and developmental biology."

The theory has two main points, said Brian Richmond, curator of human origins at the American Museum of Natural History in New York City. "All life on Earth is connected and related to each other," and this diversity of life is a product of "modifications of populations by natural selection, where some traits were favored in and environment over others," he said.

More simply put, the theory can be described as "descent with modification," said Briana Pobiner, an anthropologist and educator at the Smithsonian Institution National Museum of Natural History in Washington, D.C., who specializes in the study of human origins.

The theory is sometimes described as "survival of the fittest," but that can be misleading, Pobiner said. Here, "fitness" refers not to an organism's strength or athletic ability, but rather the ability to survive and reproduce.

http://www.livescience.com/474-controversy-evolution-works.html

 

[DeathWish]

You guys are monkeys but Alhamdulilah I am not.:siilaanyosmile:

 

[Ferrari]

That sort of thinking only creates problems. I mean, isn't that the case for everything? Why convict a man if he can be proven innocent one day? Of course you wouldn't support such a statement if the evidence is too overwhelming would you? Nonetheless, what you said is still problematic and I'll show you how.

In order for evolution to count as science, it must make predictions which can later on be falsified meaning that they can be wrong. Evolution has done that and these predictions turned out to be true. In fact, some of these predictions were made by Charles Darwin himself. Here's some:

1) Darwin predicted that precursors to the trilobite would be found in pre-Silurian rocks. He was correct: they were subsequently found.

2) Similarly, Darwin predicted that Precambrian fossils would be found. Hewrote in 1859 that the total absence of fossils in Precambrian rock was "inexplicable" and that the lack might "be truly urged as a valid argument" against his theory. When such fossils were found, starting in 1953, it turned out that they had been abundant all along. They were just so small that it took a microscope to see them.

3) There are two kinds of whales: those with teeth, and those that strain microscopic food out of seawater with baleen. It was predicted that a transitional whale must have once existed, which had both teeth and baleen. Such a fossil has since been found.

4) Evolution predicts that the fossil record will show different populations of creatures at different times. For example, it predicts we will never find fossils of trilobites with fossils of dinosaurs, since their geological time-lines don't overlap. The "Cretaceous seaway" deposits in Colorado and Wyoming contain almost 90 different kinds of ammonites, but no one has ever found two different kinds of ammonite together in the same rockbed.

Of course there are more predictions but I I've only given a few samples to show you the authenticity of evolution.

All of these are valid predictions as they could have been proven false, but non of them were. They all came out to be true.

Religion on the other hand makes claims that cannot falsified and predictions which cannot be falsified. Some have been proven false, whilst others simply couldn't be falsified. If it can't be falsified then it is not science.

Give it time. About 200+ years passed before Newton's theory on time and space was proven wrong by Einstein. Since you seem to know a lot about this subject, could you explain to us the part where a fish swam out of the ocean, survived on land and became a reptile like creature which later became a dinasour and eventually humans?

How can religion be so far fetched to people who believe in life and the universe being an arbitrary spantanous event?

 

[Admin]

Well, in its more basic understanding, evolution "is the process by which organisms change over time as a result of changes in heritable physical or behavioral traits."

"Evolution by natural selection is one of the best substantiated theories in the history of science, supported by evidence from a wide variety of scientific disciplines, including paleontology, geology, genetics and developmental biology."



http://www.livescience.com/474-controversy-evolution-works.html

I appreciate your response. Is religion or specifically abrahamic faiths compatible with evolution? A religious person can believe in evolution and god as the initiator right?

I'll watch that video now.

 

[Ferrari]

But Newton's theory of gravity wasn't wrong. It was just improved by Einstein as you said, among others. You should note that the same thing happened with Darwin's theory of evolution. Of course it's not where it was when Darwin came up with it. Thousands of biologists worked on it since and that's still going on. If you are referring to falsifiability, then that's something every scientific theory has to have by definition.

His theory on gravity isn't what I am talking about. He formulated a theory on space and time which he pretty much failed entirely and it was accepted until Einstein came and debunked it.

 

[Naissur]

In all honest, I do not understand evolution. I know what it means but I do not understand it. Even after studying science I do not fully get it.

Well, it actually isn't that easy - which is why I find it hilarious when people dismiss it outright as 'monkey business' - or say they have the read The Origin of Species (which is like claiming to know classical mechanics by saying you have read Newton's Principia Mathematica). The best place to learn is first year university biology texts, like this, which should be fascinating read for someone who did science. Richard Dawkins has written a few amazingly written popular books on this, but they delve into the social issues surrounding evolution which can be distracting.

 

[The_Cosmos]

Give it time. About 200+ years passed before Newton's theory on time and space was proven wrong by Einstein. Since you seem to know a lot about this subject, could you explain to us the part where a fish swam out of the ocean, survived on land and became a reptile like creature which later became a dinasour and eventually humans?

How can religion be so far fetched to people who believe in life and the universe being an arbitrary spantanous event?

As @Naissur stated, Newton was corrected by Einstein but his theory was never actually disproven. Even Darwin was corrected on many occasions but his theory of evolution is still with us, only getting stronger same with Newton. Nonetheless I'll answer you as best I can.

I would suggest you read this source for more information as I will be quoting only bits of it.

http://evolution.berkeley.edu/evolibrary/article/fishtree_09

Like other sarcopterygians, the coelacanth has "lobe-fins," muscular fins with a single bone that articulates with the rest of the body. Most fishes (the Actinopterygii, or ray-finned fishes) have several bones at the bases of their pectoral fins, and their fins are composed of a set of webbed rays, not muscle- and skin-covered bone.

Lobe fins are rare among living fish and are only possessed by the coelacanth and lungfish. However, lobe limbs are possessed by many living organisms — including humans. That's because we, and in fact all tetrapods (four-limbed vertebrates, many of which live on land), share a more recent common ancestor with the coelacanth and lungfish than we do with ray-finned fishes. We tetrapods are sarcopterygians too!

Tetrapods evolved from a group of organisms that, if they were alive today, we would call fish. They were aquatic and had scales and fleshy fins. However, they also had lungs that they used to breathe oxygen. Between 390 and 360 million years ago, the descendents of these organisms began to live in shallower waters, and eventually moved to land. As they did, they experienced natural selectionthat shaped many adaptations for a terrestrial way of life. Like other terrestrial sarcopterygians, modern humans still carry the evidence of our aquatic past in the way our arms and legs attach to our bodies, as well as in the many other features that link us to our fishy origins.

This explains life from water to land. Now, you've also pretty much asked for the entire evolutionary process from fish to human and of course I can't give you all of this and nor do I need to. I'll simply give you the most important part... human evolution. The one you lot find most objectionable.

Evidence for human evolution is extensive. There are fossils and DNA evidence. As there are so many, I'll link you the Wikipedia page that'll give you all of the evidence gathered for human evolution.

Genetic evidence;

The closest living relatives of humans are bonobos and chimpanzees (both genus Pan) and gorillas (genus Gorilla).[94] With the sequencing of both the human and chimpanzee genome, current estimates of the similarity between their DNA sequences range between 95% and 99%.[94][95][96] By using the technique called the molecular clock which estimates the time required for the number of divergent mutations to accumulate between two lineages, the approximate date for the split between lineages can be calculated.

The gibbons (family Hylobatidae) and then orangutans (genus Pongo) were the first groups to split from the line leading to the hominins, including humans—followed by gorillas, and, ultimately, by the chimpanzees (genus Pan). The splitting date between hominin and chimpanzee lineages is placed by some between 4 to 8 million years ago, that is, during the Late Miocene.[3][97][98] Speciation, however, appears to have been unusually drawn-out. Initial divergence occurred sometime between 7 to 13 million years ago, but ongoing hybridization blurred the separation and delayed complete separation during several millions of years. Patterson (2006) dated the final divergence at 5 to 6 million years ago.[99]

Genetic evidence has also been employed to resolve the question of whether there was any gene flow between early modern humans and Neanderthals, and to enhance our understanding of the early human migration patterns and splitting dates. By comparing the parts of the genome that are not under natural selection and which therefore accumulate mutations at a fairly steady rate, it is possible to reconstruct a genetic tree incorporating the entire human species since the last shared ancestor.

Fossils evidence:

There is little fossil evidence for the divergence of the gorilla, chimpanzee and hominin lineages.[100] The earliest fossils that have been proposed as members of the hominin lineage are Sahelanthropus tchadensis dating from 7 million years ago, Orrorin tugenensis dating from 5.7 million years ago, and Ardipithecus kadabba dating to 5.6 million years ago. Each of these have been argued to be a bipedalancestor of later hominins but, in each case, the claims have been contested. It is also possible that one or more of these species are ancestors of another branch of African apes, or that they represent a shared ancestor between hominins and other apes.

The question then of the relationship between these early fossil species and the hominin lineage is still to be resolved. From these early species, the australopithecines arose around 4 million years ago and diverged into robust(also called Paranthropus) and gracile branches, one of which (possibly A. garhi) probably went on to become ancestors of the genus Homo. The australopithecine species that is best represented in the fossil record is Australopithecus afarensis with more than one hundred fossil individuals represented, found from Northern Ethiopia (such as the famous "Lucy"), to Kenya, and South Africa. Fossils of robust australopithecines such as Au. robustus(or alternatively Paranthropus robustus) and Au./P. boisei are particularly abundant in South Africa at sites such as Kromdraai and Swartkrans, and around Lake Turkana in Kenya.

The earliest member of the genus Homo is Homo habilis which evolved around 2.8 million years ago.[4] Homo habilis is the first species for which we have positive evidence of the use of stone tools. They developed the Oldowan lithic technology, named after the Olduvai Gorge in which the first specimens were found. Some scientists consider Homo rudolfensis, a larger bodied group of fossils with similar morphology to the original H. habilisfossils, to be a separate species while others consider them to be part of H. habilis—simply representing intraspecies variation, or perhaps even sexual dimorphism. The brains of these early hominins were about the same size as that of a chimpanzee, and their main adaptation was bipedalism as an adaptation to terrestrial living.

During the next million years, a process of encephalization began and, by the arrival (about 1.9 million years ago) of Homo erectus in the fossil record, cranial capacity had doubled. Homo erectus were the first of the hominins to emigrate from Africa, and, from 1.8 to 1.3 million years ago, this species spread through Africa, Asia, and Europe. One population of H. erectus, also sometimes classified as a separate species Homo ergaster, remained in Africa and evolved into Homo sapiens. It is believed that these species, H. erectus and H. ergaster, were the first to use fire and complex tools.

The earliest transitional fossils between H. ergaster/erectus and archaic H. sapiens are from Africa, such as Homo rhodesiensis, but seemingly transitional forms were also found at Dmanisi, Georgia. These descendants of African H. erectus spread through Eurasia from ca. 500,000 years ago evolving into H. antecessor, H. heidelbergensis and H. neanderthalensis. The earliest fossils of anatomically modern humans are from the Middle Paleolithic, about 200,000 years ago such as the Omo remains of Ethiopia; later fossils from Es Skhul cave in Israel and Southern Europe begin around 90,000 years ago (0.09 million years ago).

As modern humans spread out from Africa, they encountered other hominins such as Homo neanderthalensis and the so-called Denisovans, who may have evolved from populations of Homo erectus that had left Africa around 2 million years ago. The nature of interaction between early humans and these sister species has been a long-standing source of controversy, the question being whether humans replaced these earlier species or whether they were in fact similar enough to interbreed, in which case these earlier populations may have contributed genetic material to modern humans.[101][102]

This migration out of Africa is estimated to have begun about 70,000 years BP (Before Present) and modern humans subsequently spread globally, replacing earlier hominins either through competition or hybridization. They inhabited Eurasia and Oceania by 40,000 years BP, and the Americas by at least 14,500 years BP.[103]

Here, look at the human family tree:

http://humanorigins.si.edu/evidence/human-family-tree

How can religion be so far fetched to people who believe in life and the universe being an arbitrary spantanous event?

Well, nobody claimed that life and the universe came as the result of a spontaneous event. That's something you just claimed. Nonetheless, evolution and the Big Bang are backed up by scientific evidence.

Anyways, why is it problematic to state the universe came from a spontaneous moment of you believe that you god just is, and that he created everything out of nothing?! If the universe must have a creation then so does your god, if we are to stay logically consistent. If you invoke infinite regression to rebuke this, then why don't you just stop where the evidence stops? If you make the claim that the universe must require a creator, then your god must require a creator too. Otherwise, it's just special pleading. "My god just is because he is god". Not saying that is what you said.

 

[The_Cosmos]

I appreciate your response. Is religion or specifically abrahamic faiths compatible with evolution? A religious person can believe in evolution and god as the initiator right?

I'll watch that video now.

The head of the genome project was a Christian, and many other pro evolution scientists are also believers in a god. The problem arises when you hold a literalistic interpretation of your holy books which then contradict the scientific evidence at hand.

In my eyes, you can believe that evolution was initiated by whatever deity you believe but I would argue that it invokes a fallacious form of thinking that is called 'the argument from ignorance'. Evolution doesn't disprove god, it only shows that you don't need to invoke a supernatural deity.