[andyt]

PublicAnimalNo9 PublicAnimalNo9:

This then begs the question, why do we even have a conscience? If we are just an accident of nature, why would we need an internal alarm to tell us what we're doing is wrong? Why are we the only species that instinctively knows what we're doing is wrong, WHILE we do it? Can't blame it on religion, because non-religious peole feel guilt and remorse as well.

[/quote]

All species have this internal alarm. Well covered in Konrad Lorenz's writing. Dogs seem to show a guilty conscience, very rare that animals will kill for fun, species have built in mechanisms to prevent intra species conflict turning deadly, etc. Actually it's non-humans that instinctively know they're doing wrong - for us it's much more a learned behaviour.

[sandorski]

PublicAnimalNo9 PublicAnimalNo9:

sandorski sandorski:

PublicAnimalNo9 PublicAnimalNo9:

Maybe you should go back and re-read that part before you make comments that show off your incredibly limited comprehension skills.

What did I miss?

*sigh*

PublicAnimalNo9 PublicAnimalNo9:

Then scientists determined that an earthquake had hit the region around the time of Joshua.

Although the trumpets may have been blown, it's pretty apparent that it was the EARTHQUAKE that was responsible. The miracle wasn't the trumpets blowing the walls down. The miracle was the timing of the event and Joshua somehow knowing just when to lay siege to Jericho.

If you believe all that, I got Beach Front property in Florida to Sell you, I'll throw in a Toll Bridge for Free!

The Event simply didn't happen the way described in the Bible. Much the same way Columbus didn't prove the Earth was round or that everyone though he was nuts and was going to sail off the edge of the Earth. Actual Events get twisted around and pure Fiction are added to them all the time.

[PublicAnimalNo9]

andyt andyt:

The quote discusses the origin of life. When I was taught evolution, the origin of life was not what was discussed. Sure I was taught about Miller's experiments etc, but evolution concerns itself with what happens after life has begun.

So let me turn tables. There seem to be two types of creationists. The ones that see God literally making all life fully formed, and the ones who say he just got the ball rolling.

If the first, we know that humans have been only around 70,000 years - did a big hand come from the sky and deposit Adam and Eve in Eden? And did they really commit incest to further populate the earth? There are other species that are also deemed to be no older than humans - God drop them off too? And any new species we find - it's always been there, we just didn't see it before?

For the second, if God got the ball rolling, but now evolution functions to changes species. Well great, you're an evolutionist who chooses to use a mythical story for the beginning of life. You certainly have no more evidence for your theory than the life out of inanimate matter people.

But Bart for instance seems to want it both ways. He says he believes in evolution, but not of the eye. So that means sometimes species develop by purely materialist ways, other times a hand comes down and plops off a species that's got this fully formed eye that can't evolve. That's a real mishmash of belief.

So, what's your theory, Public? It's easy to just snipe at other's ideas, but how do you think we got the incredible variety of species we have on this planet?

Well first off, the difference between MY theory and the 'life out of inanimate matter' people is, I don't claim I have proof of my belief, whereas the latter group does. I don't think my beliefs should be taught in school, whereas the latter group does.
And speaking of mish mashes, I notice that YOU are one of those that will use what's in the Bible to make a point, like you believe it, but when it comes to this topic, all of a sudden the Bible is irrelevant.
As for what I believe, I'm not sure I'm comfortable expressing my beliefs to someone that will use the Bible as a reference to make a point when it suits them, but then tell me the events in the Bible are mythical. You can't have it both ways.
Funny how you claim in the other thread that you used his argument against him but when it's done to you, you ignore and deflect by asking me what my personal beliefs are. Did you even bother checking out ANYTHING from Dr. Yockey? He goes well beyond the issues in the origin of life, to include issues with the current vein of evolutionary belief. Don't be afraid to check him out. He's an evolutionist. He's not going to tell you evolution didn't happen.
What's amusing is, Creationists and Evolutionists aren't that different from each other. Both groups have many people that get defensive AND offensive when you question their beliefs. Some of the shit I was called by SOME evolutionists on this forum in a different thread will speak to that.
The other similarity between the two groups is, evolutionary theory has reached the point of becoming religious dogma. If you don't believe in it, you're an uneducated idiot that is still stuck in the Middle Ages. Not unlike many in the other group that will tell you yer an un-enlightened fool and will burn in hell. Neither of which is really going to convince the other to change their point of view.

Oh, ok I'll tell you what I believe. In Creation, as well as evolution, animals came before man. Since God created the world in 6 steps, man being the last step, anything that happened before mankind appeared was Creation still taking place. As for the discovery of new species of plant and animal life, I'd hardly call that proof of evolution. Your glib comment about a giant hand reaching down from the sky to place new species isn't a whole lot different than the belief that nature just suddenly decided that (place epoch here) is the perfect time to spontaneously evolve brand spanking new life forms. Natural selection don't work that way.
What's even funnier though is, people that "pooh-pooh" the Creation story in the Bible because it's: A)a religious document and they don't believe in it, or B) it's too old and too convoluted through translations to be accurate. But is it really when it comes to the story of Creation? The 6 steps that are laid out in the Book of Genesis have been pretty much confirmed by science. Once the original formation of the firmament took place, each following step in the Creation of Earth could NOT have taken place without the preceding step happening. I'd say that's pretty fucking accurate for a religious, ancient and oft poorly translated book.

[BartSimpson]

poquas poquas:

An historical document is a document that states facts about a place, people, or an event.

And the Bible does, indeed, do this.

But is it completely factual? No, it is not and I've never said it was.

My local newspaper in much the same way is a document that states facts about people, places, and events.

But are they completely factual?

[PublicAnimalNo9]

[quote="Dayseed"]
Your above statement is pitiable nonsense. The data supporting evolution is abundant, clear and available for anybody to look at if they simply care to go to a museum. Dr Richard Lenski et al's experiment on the long-term evolution of E. Coli is pretty much the death knell for your nonsense. Oh, and it DOES include a two-stage introduction of new information to the genome allowing for the movement of citrate across the bacterial membrane thus "evolving" the bacterium in a brand new direction.

I read those experiments a while back. What you forget to mention is, the scientists removed the protein chain that enabled the E.Coli to digest it's normal food source. What the E.Coli did was utilize already existing information to "create" the ability to digest a different food source. They didn't generate new information, they devolved and used OLD existing information.
Curiously, when the protein chain that allowed digestion of this new food source was removed, the E.Coli simply died because they could not "evolve" non-existent information to cope with the new changes.
Now, unless you're referring to a totally different experiment or he has newly discovered this "evolution" in the last 5 years, well like I said to you earlier, anytime you have a reputable link to info that's less than 5 years old, I'll be happy to check it out. I'm not some close minded shmuck as you are coming across as. Simply repeating in a more condescending tone, what you said in a previous post is hardly going to convince me yer right I asked you simply to provide links because I can't find anything current, so take yer veal and shove it where you usually have your head.

[poquas]

BartSimpson BartSimpson:

poquas poquas:

An historical document is a document that states facts about a place, people, or an event.

And the Bible does, indeed, do this.

But is it completely factual? No, it is not and I've never said it was.

My local newspaper in much the same way is a document that states facts about people, places, and events.

But are they completely factual?

Are you really comparing the factual content of a newspaper to the bible?


That’s just sad.

[BartSimpson]

poquas poquas:

Are you really comparing the factual content of a newspaper to the bible?

That’s just sad.

I agree.

[poquas]

Wow! A breakthrough!

Oh wait...... You meant the Enquirer?

In that case you'd be right I guess. It would be the same as the bible.

[Dayseed]

PublicAnimalNo9 PublicAnimalNo9:

I read those experiments a while back. What you forget to mention is, the scientists removed the protein chain that enabled the E.Coli to digest it's normal food source.

Um, they didn't "remove a protein chain" (PS, all proteins are chains of amino acids. It sounds like you're unknowingly being redundant) that enabled it to eat it's normal food source. Which is glucose. Which they fed it in the agar. So, I don't think you read it properly.

$1:

What the E.Coli did was utilize already existing information to "create" the ability to digest a different food source. They didn't generate new information, they devolved and used OLD existing information.

You're flat out wrong. What Lenski et al did was to retain a sample of each generation. Around generation 30,000, one strain of bacteria mutated to be able to allow citrate to cross the membrane wall (PS, that isn't "digesting it"). They back tracked across they bacterial generations to find out that it was a two stage mutation, the first having occurred back around generation 20,000. And it wasn't an adaptation at all (exaption is the word you're looking for), but new information in the genome. The new genome was longer than the old one.

Sorry, but you're just wrong and there are slides of genomes out there to prove it to you.

$1:

Curiously, when the protein chain that allowed digestion of this new food source was removed, the E.Coli simply died because they could not "evolve" non-existent information to cope with the new changes.

Um, no particular strain of E. Coli died in Lenski et al's experiment. All 12 continued along jolly well fine. Except for the citrate strain; they was livin' it up.

$1:

Now, unless you're referring to a totally different experiment or he has newly discovered this "evolution" in the last 5 years, well like I said to you earlier, anytime you have a reputable link to info that's less than 5 years old, I'll be happy to check it out.

This experiment occurred in 2007. Or at least had significant publishing in 2007.

$1:

I'm not some close minded shmuck as you are coming across as. Simply repeating in a more condescending tone, what you said in a previous post is hardly going to convince me yer right I asked you simply to provide links because I can't find anything current, so take yer veal and shove it where you usually have your head.

Actually, you do strike me as a close-minded schmuck. However, I'll give you the benefit of the doubt and refer you to:

http://myxo.css.msu.edu/lenski/pdf/2004 ... Lenski.pdf

This is a publishing which occurred in 2004, before the 2007 citrate mutation.

[BartSimpson]

poquas poquas:

Wow! A breakthrough!

Oh wait...... You meant the Enquirer?

In that case you'd be right I guess. It would be the same as the bible.

Funny, the Enquirer sadly gets some things right the "real" newspapers get wrong.

OJ Simpson, for instance. It was the Enquirer that caught him wearing the pair of shoes that were identified at the murder scene - a discovery that came too late to put OJ in jail, but it has cost him over $30 million dollars.

And your 'breakthrough' is two-fold if you'll kindly acknowledge that I am not one of those people who thinks that everything in the Bible is literally true.

Thanks.

[BartSimpson]

Dayseed Dayseed:

Um, no particular strain of E. Coli died in Lenski et al's experiment. All 12 continued along jolly well fine. Except for the citrate strain; they was livin' it up.

Well, that explains the party in my lower colon last month after an outing to a Mexican restaurant.

[poquas]

BartSimpson BartSimpson:

And your 'breakthrough' is two-fold if you'll kindly acknowledge that I am not one of those people who thinks that everything in the Bible is literally true.

Thanks.

I don't know that. You'd have to retract the "historical" statement for me to think otherwise.

You're welcome

[PublicAnimalNo9]

Dayseed Dayseed:

This experiment occurred in 2007. Or at least had significant publishing in 2007.

http://myxo.css.msu.edu/lenski/pdf/2004 ... Lenski.pdf

This is a publishing which occurred in 2004, before the 2007 citrate mutation.

Well thank you. Was that so hard?
Yer EXACTLY the kind of person I've referred to in this thread, get yer fuckin' knickers all in a bunch cuz I don't believe what you do, whether it's a secular or religious belief. In my initial response to you, I simply asked politely if you would mind posting the link for that study. It sure didn't require you to repeat yourself(talk about redundant )and throw in some dumb-assed comment about the veal and tipping the waitress. If I didn't wanna see the study, I wouldn't have asked for a fuckin' link.

[andyt]

PublicAnimalNo9 PublicAnimalNo9:

Well first off, the difference between MY theory and the 'life out of inanimate matter' people is, I don't claim I have proof of my belief, whereas the latter group does. You're wrong here - theories about the beginning of life are acknowledged to be tenuous. You're confusing beginning of life with evolutionary theory, which can only apply to living organisms. I don't think my beliefs should be taught in school, whereas the latter group does. Evolution should definitely be taught in science classes - it's solidly established science. If we can't teach evolution, we might as well not teach any science at all.
And speaking of mish mashes, I notice that YOU are one of those that will use what's in the Bible to make a point, like you believe it, but when it comes to this topic, all of a sudden the Bible is irrelevant. Actually, the points I make are to hold up the contradictions of others who say they believe in the bible but then don't practice it. I see the bible as an important repository of human wisdom about how to live a good life, in an ethical sense. But as for science, not so much. The bible certainly isn't irrelevant, but for discussing evolution, yep, it pretty well is.
As for what I believe, I'm not sure I'm comfortable expressing my beliefs to someone that will use the Bible as a reference to make a point when it suits them, but then tell me the events in the Bible are mythical. You can't have it both ways.
Funny how you claim in the other thread that you used his argument against him but when it's done to you, you ignore and deflect by asking me what my personal beliefs are. I wasn't really asking about your religious beliefs - to my mind at least. I was asking what your theory about how the profusion of life we see came to be is. I guess for you that is a religious belief, but I think you're making a mistake there to see it as such. Did you even bother checking out ANYTHING from Dr. Yockey? He goes well beyond the issues in the origin of life, to include issues with the current vein of evolutionary belief. Don't be afraid to check him out. He's an evolutionist. He's not going to tell you evolution didn't happen. Nope I was just responding to the quote you gave.
What's amusing is, Creationists and Evolutionists aren't that different from each other. Both groups have many people that get defensive AND offensive when you question their beliefs. Some of the shit I was called by SOME evolutionists on this forum in a different thread will speak to that.
The other similarity between the two groups is, evolutionary theory has reached the point of becoming religious dogma. If you don't believe in it, you're an uneducated idiot that is still stuck in the Middle Ages. Not unlike many in the other group that will tell you yer an un-enlightened fool and will burn in hell. Neither of which is really going to convince the other to change their point of view. You are confusing two kinds of belief. Science says always question everything, but do it in a systematic way that follows the rules of the system. Science says you can never know anything 100% for certain, but you can do pretty well most of time following the accepted evidence. Science is always open to being proved wrong, and gives you the method by which to do it. Religious faith does none of these things, nor should it necessarily. But questions about the material world are better answered by science - when religion intrudes here, but demands blind faith it just makes a fool of itself. That is my belief.

Oh, ok I'll tell you what I believe. In Creation, as well as evolution, animals came before man. Since God created the world in 6 steps, man being the last step, anything that happened before mankind appeared was Creation still taking place. As for the discovery of new species of plant and animal life, I'd hardly call that proof of evolution. Your glib comment about a giant hand reaching down from the sky to place new species isn't a whole lot different than the belief that nature just suddenly decided that (place epoch here) is the perfect time to spontaneously evolve brand spanking new life forms. Natural selection don't work that way. Exactly. Nature is not making any decisions, the environment just shapes the available biomaterial to perform in the best possible way. That is why our bodies are such Rube Goldberg construction - Nature can't decide it made a mistake and start over, what is already present has to be shaped as best as possible to adapt to conditions. From our eyes to our brain wiring, to our skeleton, if somebody was starting from scratch, they could do a lot better job, but instead the existing template had to be modified. But if you believe in the creation of fully formed species, with no evolution of that species, then those species must appear somehow, Where they just materialize a la Star Trek, or the big hand comes down doesn't matter - the process is the same. And in that case God ain't so bright - as I said, humans have a lot that could be physically improved on - say the elimination of the blind spots in our retinas where the optic nerve has to pass thru.
What's even funnier though is, people that "pooh-pooh" the Creation story in the Bible because it's: A)a religious document and they don't believe in it, or B) it's too old and too convoluted through translations to be accurate. But is it really when it comes to the story of Creation? The 6 steps that are laid out in the Book of Genesis have been pretty much confirmed by science. Once the original formation of the firmament took place, each following step in the Creation of Earth could NOT have taken place without the preceding step happening. I'd say that's pretty fucking accurate for a religious, ancient and oft poorly translated book.

It depends how you read it. Many Christians insist it took exactly 6 days and happened 6000 years ago. Stockwell Day is convinced Adam ran around with the Dinosaurs. If you are willing to read the 2 creation stories in Genesis (quite different ones) as allegories, well then great, it allows you to claim that science has confirmed them. But that's because they are so vague you can pretty well claim anything about them. Science says there was a big bang, and that it knows the conditions of this big bang back to 1/44000000000000000000000000 of a second (I'm not really sure how many 0's go here) seconds. I Science has an answer to almost the beginning, just can't quite get to that very first nanosecond. So really, for God to have a role in a scientific understanding of the universe, it's going to have to be a very brief one. And, current quantum theory actually allows for the creation of primordial matter out of nothing. Don't ask me to explain it, as I don't pretend to understand it. I'm just willing to take their word for it. But quantum theory also has room for the creation of matter to arise from mind, from consciousness: http://henry.pha.jhu.edu/clearer.light.pdf Personally, I think that's where your God might be hiding in all this. I just doubt that he's a guy in the sky.

[Dayseed]

PublicAnimalNo9 PublicAnimalNo9:

Well thank you. Was that so hard?
Yer EXACTLY the kind of person I've referred to in this thread, get yer fuckin' knickers all in a bunch cuz I don't believe what you do, whether it's a secular or religious belief. In my initial response to you, I simply asked politely if you would mind posting the link for that study. It sure didn't require you to repeat yourself(talk about redundant )and throw in some dumb-assed comment about the veal and tipping the waitress. If I didn't wanna see the study, I wouldn't have asked for a fuckin' link.

Calm down asshole. For somebody who is a complete preacher about people being civil to him, you're a right hypocrite about not doing it yourself. Doesn't your Christ teach you to turn the other cheek?

Damn, that's two failures among all of your evolutionary missteps.

In other words, practise what you preach about being civil.