| Topic: |
Religions > Atheism |
| User: |
"" |
| Date: |
20 Sep 2006 07:12:58 PM |
| Object: |
Creationism , Evolution BOTH WRONG |
5>
Creationism and Evolution BOTH WRONG
The debates about the issue of creationism vs.
evolution keep popping up, often in local public school
board meetings. Some Christians want to force public
schools to teach creationism, even though their children
can already learn it in Sunday school, church, and
parochial schools, as well as in their homes. I wonder
how they would like being forced to teach EVOLUTION in
their Sunday school, church, and parochial schools.
Creationism and evolution are actually both partly
right, BUT BOTH MOSTLY WRONG ! There is a 3RD
ALTERNATIVE that is being systematically ignored and
suppressed: SEEDING BY SPACE ALIENS ! The TRUE ORIGIN
for humans is the six-planet solar system that we call
Vega, which is now the main headquarters for the REAL
Galactic Federation that will soon be formally greeting
us with a First Contact mass UFO landing. (See the web
site http://www.paoweb.com/updates.htm .)
Another most important fact of life that is being
systematically ignored and suppressed by both the
Christian churches and the public schools is that people
PHYSICALLY REINCARNATE as many times as they need to.
Several kinds of supporting evidence for it can be found
in books at public libraries and book stores. It was
the Nicene Council of the early Catholic Church that
REMOVED REincarnation from the Christian teachings. The
churches want us all to believe that we have only one
chance to make it, so that they can have more control
over their members and extract more money out of them.
Robert E. McElwaine
PAO Member
Eckankar Initiate
B.S., Physics and Astronomy, UW-EC
http://members.aol.com/rem547 PLUS
http://members.aol.com/rem460
Preserve BOTH on CD-R and PRINT-OUTS
P.S.: PASS IT ON !
"EVERYTHING you know is WRONG."
"The Truth IS STRANGER than fiction."
"The Truth is ALWAYS the FIRST CASUALTY OF WAR."
"OFFICIAL LIES are ALWAYS the BIGGEST LIES OF ALL."
"The more things change, the more they STAY THE SAME."
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| User: "Al Klein" |
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| Title: Re: Creationism , Evolution BOTH WRONG |
06 Nov 2006 01:27:21 PM |
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On 6 Nov 2006 09:32:57 -0800, "JoelKatz" <davids@webmaster.com> wrote:
Al Klein wrote:
There's a difference between a single specimen being neither alive nor
not alive and there being disagreement on whether that specimen is
alive or not.
It is the most extreme craziness to categorize the status of a virus as
"definitely alive or definitely dead, we just don't know which yet".
Since you've just demonstrated that you don't have the slightest
knowledge of the subject (I must admit that you've been faking it
quite well up to now), there's no reason for me to waste time with
you.
What information do we lack that would allow us to figure out which
category it must definitely be in?
None, but the question just points more solidly to the fact that you
have no understanding of the issue. It's not a matter of information.
--
rukbat at optonline dot net
"If this were a dictatorship, it'd be a heck of a lot easier, just so
long as I'm the dictator."
- G W Bush (Washington, D.C., Dec. 19, 2000)
(random sig, produced by SigChanger)
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| User: "JoelKatz" |
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| Title: Re: Creationism , Evolution BOTH WRONG |
06 Nov 2006 07:49:36 PM |
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Al Klein wrote:
On 6 Nov 2006 09:32:57 -0800, "JoelKatz" <davids@webmaster.com> wrote:
Al Klein wrote:
There's a difference between a single specimen being neither alive nor
not alive and there being disagreement on whether that specimen is
alive or not.
It is the most extreme craziness to categorize the status of a virus as
"definitely alive or definitely dead, we just don't know which yet".
Since you've just demonstrated that you don't have the slightest
knowledge of the subject (I must admit that you've been faking it
quite well up to now), there's no reason for me to waste time with
you.
Ah, declare victory and run away.
What information do we lack that would allow us to figure out which
category it must definitely be in?
None, but the question just points more solidly to the fact that you
have no understanding of the issue. It's not a matter of information.
My point was precisely that it's not a matter of information. We know
everything there is to know about viruses (that bears on this subject)
and we still cannot say "yes, a virus is definitely alive" or "no, a
viruse is definitely not alive".
That's because viruses display some attributes that we think only
living things show. Yet viruses are missing some attributes we think
all living things must have.
This shows that our concept of "living" is simply not precise. It can
say that a rock is dead, and it can say that a plant is alive. But it
cannot say whether a virus is alive or dead.
The point is, our concept of "living" has fuzzy boundaries. And
understanding how life began is understanding a course through those
boundaries.
Despite the fact that you feel otherwise, *every* modern theory of
abiogenesis proceeds in this manner.
DS
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| User: "Christopher A. Lee" |
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| Title: Re: Creationism , Evolution BOTH WRONG |
06 Nov 2006 01:45:49 PM |
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On Mon, 06 Nov 2006 14:27:21 -0500, Al Klein <rukbat@pern.invalid>
wrote:
On 6 Nov 2006 09:32:57 -0800, "JoelKatz" <davids@webmaster.com> wrote:
Al Klein wrote:
There's a difference between a single specimen being neither alive nor
not alive and there being disagreement on whether that specimen is
alive or not.
It is the most extreme craziness to categorize the status of a virus as
"definitely alive or definitely dead, we just don't know which yet".
Since you've just demonstrated that you don't have the slightest
knowledge of the subject (I must admit that you've been faking it
quite well up to now), there's no reason for me to waste time with
you.
What information do we lack that would allow us to figure out which
category it must definitely be in?
None, but the question just points more solidly to the fact that you
have no understanding of the issue. It's not a matter of information.
It's the discontinuous mind at work. Dawkins this in
http://www.simonyi.ox.ac.uk/dawkins/WorldOfDawkins-archive/Dawkins/Work/Articles/1993gaps_in_the_mind.shtml
The article is all about speciation and great apes, but the concept
applies in a lot of other areas as well, anywhere there is a
continuous spectrum somewhere along which we have defined arbitrary
points.
"The discontinuous mind is ubiquitous. It is especially influential
when it afflicts lawyers and the religious (not only are all judges
lawyers; a high proportion of politicians are too, and all
politicians have to woo the religious vote). Recently, after giving a
public lecture, I was cross-examined by a lawyer in the audience. He
brought the full weight of his legal acumen to bear on a nice point
of evolution. If species A evolves into a later species B, he
reasoned closely, there must come a point when a mother belongs to
the old species A and her child belongs to the new species B. Members
of different species cannot interbreed with one another. I put it to
you, he went on, that a child could hardly be so different from its
parents that it could not interbreed with their kind. So, he wound up
triumphantly, isn't this a fatal flaw in the theory of evolution?
"But it is we that choose to divide animals up into discontinuous
species. On the evolutionary view of life there must have been
intermediates, even though, conveniently for our naming rituals, they
are usually extinct: usually, but not always. The lawyer would be
surprised and, I hope, intrigued by so-called 'ring species'. The
best-known case is herring gull versus lesser black-backed gull. In
Britain these are clearly distinct species, quite different in
colour. Anybody can tell them apart. But if you follow the population
of herring gulls westward round the North Pole to North America, then
via Alaska across Siberia and back to Europe again, you will notice a
curious fact. The 'herring gulls' gradually become less and less like
herring gulls and more and more like lesser black-backed gulls until
it turns out that our European lesser black-backed gulls actually are
the other end of a ring that started out as herring gulls. At every
stage around the ring, the birds are sufficiently similar to their
neighbours to interbreed with them. Until, that is, the ends of the
continuum are reached, in Europe. At this point the herring gull and
the lesser black-backed gull never interbreed, although they are
linked by a continuous series of interbreeding colleagues all the way
round the world. The only thing that is special about ring species
like these gulls is that the intermediates are still alive."
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| User: "Al Klein" |
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| Title: Re: Creationism , Evolution BOTH WRONG |
06 Nov 2006 07:43:15 PM |
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On Mon, 06 Nov 2006 14:45:49 -0500, Christopher A. Lee
<calee@optonline.net> wrote:
The best-known case is herring gull versus lesser black-backed gull. In
Britain these are clearly distinct species, quite different in
colour. Anybody can tell them apart. But if you follow the population
of herring gulls westward round the North Pole to North America, then
via Alaska across Siberia and back to Europe again, you will notice a
curious fact. The 'herring gulls' gradually become less and less like
herring gulls and more and more like lesser black-backed gulls until
it turns out that our European lesser black-backed gulls actually are
the other end of a ring that started out as herring gulls. At every
stage around the ring, the birds are sufficiently similar to their
neighbours to interbreed with them. Until, that is, the ends of the
continuum are reached, in Europe. At this point the herring gull and
the lesser black-backed gull never interbreed, although they are
linked by a continuous series of interbreeding colleagues all the way
round the world. The only thing that is special about ring species
like these gulls is that the intermediates are still alive."
Good analogy.
--
rukbat at optonline dot net
"Given that you exist and that you are aware of your situation and
surroundings, you will find yourself in a place which has conditions
exactly suitable to your being there. If the environment was
hostile or incompatible in some important way then you would not be
there in the first place. Therefore the suitability and seeming
perfection of your universe cannot be taken as evidence of anything
more than your existence in it."
- Edward Warren, "The naturalistic fallacy"
(random sig, produced by SigChanger)
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| User: "JoelKatz" |
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| Title: Re: Creationism , Evolution BOTH WRONG |
27 Oct 2006 07:01:10 PM |
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Al Klein wrote:
I already explained what I meant and used protein folding as an
example. A protein folded a particular way can cause another unfolded
protein to fold in that same way.
But proteins don't reproduce.
Right, but the folds in them can. Molecules don't reproduce either, yet
humans can even though they're made of molecules. That's because the
attributes of a human allow that human to re-arrange existing molecules
into the form of that human. This is precisely analogous to
'contagious' protein folding, such as what causes BSE. Fire is another
example of a non-living thing that can 'reproduce' even though it is
not living.
All you need for an evolutionary process is contagious mutations and
differential propogation. With just those two things, you can get the
appearance of design and increasing functional complexity.
We can already create non-living systems that show these things, for
example, evolutionary algorithms implemented in a computer. The
question is whether such things could arise without an intelligence to
put them together in the first place. (The computer itself, obviously,
cannot evolve from non-living things on its own.)
The mutations are at the genetic level due to garbling and other
errors in the copying of genetic material, and passed on to the next
generation - if they survive to do that. There has to be life already
for this to happen.
Do you have some evidence to support your assertion that duplication
with error is not possible in non-living systems? That strikes me as an
exceptional claim requiring exceptional evidence.
Non-living things don't reproduce at all - with or without errors.
Fire does. Protein folds do. It's entirely within our capability to
create non-living things that do reproduce (though not of any kind that
would be likely to have evolved on their own).
I think it's a fair question whether life or reproduction arose first.
Life may have been preceded by non-living things that could reproduce.
If you had self-replicating non-living molecules, that experienced both
random mutations (either due to duplication error or radiation or
chemical affects) and the mutations could effect the rate of
replication, would that not be an example of evolution?
If they needed some form of input food, energy, etc.) and gave off a
waste product, they'd be alive. Demonstrate a non-living,
self-replicating thing.
Fire. Protein folds. I realize these are not very much like what I'm
proposing. Can you demonstrate a living thing that cannot
self-replicate? Is it absolutely essential that both life and
self-replication arose at the same instant?
You are saying that evolution could not possibly explain the origin of
life.
Evolution - by definition - starts after life exists, so it can't
explain the origin of life - by definition.
No, it starts after self-replication, diffential propogation, and
mutation exist. It does not require life.
This requires you to show that there is no possible way that
non-living things could have experienced random mutations and
differential survival. That's a pretty high hurdle to get over.
No, it only requires showing that you don't understand what
'evolution' and 'alive' mean. Non-life experiencing random mutations
during self-reproduction is a self-contradiction, since something that
can mutably self-reproduce would be alive.
That would make the protein that causes BSE alive. I find that somewhat
hard to swallow.
That would make robots that could replicate themselves (with the
occasional error) alive. I find that quite hard to swallow.
DS
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| User: "Al Klein" |
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| Title: Re: Creationism , Evolution BOTH WRONG |
28 Oct 2006 10:18:52 AM |
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On 27 Oct 2006 17:01:10 -0700, "JoelKatz" <davids@webmaster.com>
wrote:
Al Klein wrote:
I already explained what I meant and used protein folding as an
example. A protein folded a particular way can cause another unfolded
protein to fold in that same way.
But proteins don't reproduce.
Right, but the folds in them can.
That's not biological reproduction, so it has nothing to do with
biological evolution.
Molecules don't reproduce either, yet
humans can even though they're made of molecules.
Money doesn't place bets, but humans can place bets with money. What
does playing with words have to do with anything?
That's because the
attributes of a human allow that human to re-arrange existing molecules
into the form of that human. This is precisely analogous to
'contagious' protein folding, such as what causes BSE. Fire is another
example of a non-living thing that can 'reproduce' even though it is
not living.
But neither one is biological reproduction, so neither one has
anything to do with biological evolution.
All you need for an evolutionary process is contagious mutations and
differential propogation.
And something alive doing it.
With just those two things, you can get the
appearance of design and increasing functional complexity.
I can get the appearance of a human being with a camera and a printer,
but what I get is NOT a human being, it's the appearance of one.
You keep redefining words in order to prove that you can stuff a
redefined process into one of them, but biological evolution requires
life already existing - it's part of the definition - so biological
evolution of non-living things is a self-contradiction. It's change
in living things in non-living things - pure word salad.
--
rukbat at optonline dot net
"Properly read, the Bible is the most potent force for atheism ever conceived."
- Isaac Asimov
(random sig, produced by SigChanger)
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| User: "JoelKatz" |
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| Title: Re: Creationism , Evolution BOTH WRONG |
29 Oct 2006 03:15:51 PM |
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Al Klein wrote:
You keep redefining words in order to prove that you can stuff a
redefined process into one of them, but biological evolution requires
life already existing - it's part of the definition - so biological
evolution of non-living things is a self-contradiction. It's change
in living things in non-living things - pure word salad.
First, you have no reason to change my references to "evolution" to
"biological evolution". Second, you have no rational basis to argue
that "biological reproduction" does not include a contagious protein
fold such as that which causes BSE. (If a biological entity creates a
copy of itself from some raw material, this is biological reproduction.
If fire were a protein, it would experience biological reproduction.)
Your giant smoke-screen of proof by definition serves only to hide the
fact that evolutionary processes may well in fact explain how the first
living things arose from non-living thing. Non-living things can
experience evolution in the sense of the development of functional
complexity through random mutation and differentiral propogation. I
think it's an example of the most blatant stupidity to say that this
does not qualify as "biological evolution" if the things that are
evolving are biological.
DS
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| User: "Al Klein" |
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| Title: Re: Creationism , Evolution BOTH WRONG |
29 Oct 2006 06:48:52 PM |
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On 29 Oct 2006 13:15:51 -0800, "JoelKatz" <davids@webmaster.com>
wrote:
Al Klein wrote:
You keep redefining words in order to prove that you can stuff a
redefined process into one of them, but biological evolution requires
life already existing - it's part of the definition - so biological
evolution of non-living things is a self-contradiction. It's change
in living things in non-living things - pure word salad.
First, you have no reason to change my references to "evolution" to
"biological evolution".
Creationism addresses biological evolution, not change in anything in
general. Since the topic is "Creationism , Evolution BOTH WRONG",
it's about biological evolution, or it's meaningless. "Chemistry,
Library Science both wrong about origins of color"?
Second, you have no rational basis to argue
that "biological reproduction" does not include a contagious protein
fold such as that which causes BSE. (If a biological entity creates a
copy of itself from some raw material, this is biological reproduction.
If fire were a protein, it would experience biological reproduction.)
And if bubblegum were a biological entity we might find bands of
intelligent bubblegum monsters roaming the jungle.
Biological evolution doesn't address crystal "reproduction" and it
doesn't consider protein folding as being evolution - it starts with
living forms that possess genes, so let's stick to those.
--
rukbat at optonline dot net
"The United States of America is not in any sense founded on the Christian Religion"
- Treaty of Tripoli, 1797, ratified by Congress
(random sig, produced by SigChanger)
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| User: "JoelKatz" |
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| Title: Re: Creationism , Evolution BOTH WRONG |
01 Nov 2006 09:18:46 PM |
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Al Klein wrote:
Biological evolution doesn't address crystal "reproduction" and it
doesn't consider protein folding as being evolution - it starts with
living forms that possess genes, so let's stick to those.
This is false for two reasons.
First, a gene is defined as a linear sequence of nucleotides. It is
hard to imagine any process other than evolutionary ones that could
have had as an end result a functional linear sequence of nulceotides.
That is, genes themselves evolved as an efficient way to store
inheritable information. As far as I know, there is no evidence to
suggest that genes are the most primitive way to hold inheritable
biological information and some evidence to suggest that they are not.
Second, the qualification "living forms" is, as you have admitted
elsewhere, arbitrary. Some forms may be arguably living and arguably
non-living. The argument over whether such forms are living has to do
with things like whether they excrete and whether they are
self-sufficient.
They may also arguably demonstrate evolution or not demonstrate
evolution. That argument would be over whether they experience random
changes that can be passed on to duplicates of themselves and whether
those change can effect their success at replication.
Although there are some common issues, such as reproduction, there is
no a priori reason to think that the answer to both of these question
is always the same. This is especially true in cases where the answer
to the first question is "maybe".
For example, viruses indisputably experience evolutionary processes.
Their DNA is replicated with random errors, and those errors result in
differential propogation of inheritable traits selecting for those that
provide the greatest chance for replication.
However, whether viruses are alive is arguable. The fact that they
experience biological evolution does *not* end the living/dead debate.
Modern theories of abiogenesis show both a gradual transition from
non-living to living and a gradual switch from non-evolutionary
processes to evoluationary processes.
DS
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| User: "Rusty Sites" |
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| Title: Re: Creationism , Evolution BOTH WRONG |
01 Nov 2006 09:29:35 PM |
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JoelKatz wrote:
Al Klein wrote:
Biological evolution doesn't address crystal "reproduction" and it
doesn't consider protein folding as being evolution - it starts with
living forms that possess genes, so let's stick to those.
Modern theories of abiogenesis show both a gradual transition from
non-living to living and a gradual switch from non-evolutionary
processes to evoluationary processes.
How did they gradually switch from a non evolutionary process to an
evolutionary process without evolving?
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| User: "JoelKatz" |
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| Title: Re: Creationism , Evolution BOTH WRONG |
01 Nov 2006 10:34:37 PM |
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Rusty Sites wrote:
JoelKatz wrote:
Modern theories of abiogenesis show both a gradual transition from
non-living to living and a gradual switch from non-evolutionary
processes to evoluationary processes.
How did they gradually switch from a non evolutionary process to an
evolutionary process without evolving?
Through a large number of non-evolutionary processes. Read any modern
theory of abiogenesis. These include random collisions, reactions
prompted by naturally-occuring inorganic catalysts, and so on. The
precise path is not clear, but at some point these non-evolutionary
processes created sufficient complexity that processes with
evolutionary components became possible.
We don't yet know exactly what happened and there are competing
theories of abiogenesis that are very, very different. But they all
start out with purely non-evolutionary processes and, continue into
somewhat-evolutionary processes, and end with genetic biological
evolution.
The search for where to "draw the line" between abiogenesis and
evolution is nonsenical. There is no line. The transitions were all
gradual. The first organic things capable of evolution (differential
propogation of random changes selecting for those changes that enhance
propogation) were likely not definitively alive. (As viruses today are
capable of evolving but not definitively alive.)
DS
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| User: "Al Klein" |
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| Title: Re: Creationism , Evolution BOTH WRONG |
02 Nov 2006 09:09:30 AM |
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On 1 Nov 2006 19:18:46 -0800, "JoelKatz" <davids@webmaster.com> wrote:
Al Klein wrote:
Biological evolution doesn't address crystal "reproduction" and it
doesn't consider protein folding as being evolution - it starts with
living forms that possess genes, so let's stick to those.
This is false for two reasons.
First, a gene is defined as a linear sequence of nucleotides. It is
hard to imagine any process other than evolutionary ones that could
have had as an end result a functional linear sequence of nulceotides.
If it involved non-living processes it wouldn't be biological
evolution.
That is, genes themselves evolved as an efficient way to store
inheritable information.
From biological forms, not from non-biological forms.
As far as I know, there is no evidence to
suggest that genes are the most primitive way to hold inheritable
biological information and some evidence to suggest that they are not.
There's evidence that there are more primitive means. But they were
biological, not non-living.
Second, the qualification "living forms" is, as you have admitted
elsewhere, arbitrary. Some forms may be arguably living and arguably
non-living. The argument over whether such forms are living has to do
with things like whether they excrete and whether they are
self-sufficient.
They may also arguably demonstrate evolution or not demonstrate
evolution. That argument would be over whether they experience random
changes that can be passed on to duplicates of themselves and whether
those change can effect their success at replication.
Although there are some common issues, such as reproduction, there is
no a priori reason to think that the answer to both of these question
is always the same. This is especially true in cases where the answer
to the first question is "maybe".
For example, viruses indisputably experience evolutionary processes.
Their DNA
If it has DNA it's not a virus.
However, whether viruses are alive is arguable. The fact that they
experience biological evolution does *not* end the living/dead debate.
Since they don't have DNA, their DNA can't experience evolution, can
it?
Modern theories of abiogenesis show both a gradual transition from
non-living to living and a gradual switch from non-evolutionary
processes to evoluationary processes.
Which has nothing to do with calling processes in non-living things
"biological evolution". Clay doesn't biologically evolve.
--
rukbat at optonline dot net
"I see only with deep regret that God punishes so many of His children for their
numerous stupidities, for which only He Himself can be held responsible; in my opinion,
only His nonexistence could excuse Him."
-A. Einstein (Letter to Edgar Meyer, Jan. 2, 1915)
(random sig, produced by SigChanger)
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| User: "JoelKatz" |
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| Title: Re: Creationism , Evolution BOTH WRONG |
03 Nov 2006 12:16:27 AM |
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Al Klein wrote:
If it involved non-living processes it wouldn't be biological
evolution.
What if it involved processes that are arguably living and arguably
non-living? Since we have agreed that there is no one instant of
transition, what happens in that intermediate stage? Can there be
biological evolution in that stage?
If you say, "no, there is no biological evolution in the intermediate
stage", then you are just denying the existence of an intermediate
stage by insisting there must be some instant at which biological
evolution began.
Do you insist there must be some one definable instant at which
biological evolution began?
If not, and we agree there is a gradual transition from non-living to
living and a fuzzy stage where there were processes that were arguably
biological evolution but arguably not so, are you now arguing those two
stages could not have overlapped?
If you agree that the transition from non-living to living was gradual
and involved intermediate forms that are arugably alive but not
definitively so, and you agree that the beginnings of evolution were
similarly gradual, how can you maintain that evolutionary processes
don't help explain the transition from non-living things to living
things?
It seems to me like you are stubbornly sticking to an obvious
absurdity.
DS
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| User: "Al Klein" |
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| Title: Re: Creationism , Evolution BOTH WRONG |
03 Nov 2006 11:26:50 AM |
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On 2 Nov 2006 22:16:27 -0800, "JoelKatz" <davids@webmaster.com> wrote:
Al Klein wrote:
If it involved non-living processes it wouldn't be biological
evolution.
What if it involved processes that are arguably living and arguably
non-living?
At the same time? A thing is either living or non-living - the terms
are mutually exclusive.
Since we have agreed that there is no one instant of
transition, what happens in that intermediate stage?
There is none. A single entity is either alive or it isn't. At which
point it becomes alive is another topic entirely, and one that science
doesn't bother with, since we have no specimen at that point (and
can't, since a single specimen is either alive or it isn't.)
If you say, "no, there is no biological evolution in the intermediate
stage", then you are just denying the existence of an intermediate
stage by insisting there must be some instant at which biological
evolution began.
Biological evolution began when life began. You're conflating that
universally unique instant with when a specific specimen becomes
alive, which science doesn't address.
Do you insist there must be some one definable instant at which
biological evolution began?
Of course. But science doesn't address the definable instant at which
a particular specimen became alive. The two aren't the same thing at
all.
If you agree that the transition from non-living to living was gradual
and involved intermediate forms that are arugably alive but not
definitively so
Science doesn't address the situation.
and you agree that the beginnings of evolution were similarly gradual
They weren't - evolution began at the instant that life began. That's
due to the definition of 'evolution', and not anything else.
how can you maintain that evolutionary processes
don't help explain the transition from non-living things to living
things?
Because the definition of 'biological evolution' requires life, so
'evolution' doesn't explain what happened before evolution occurred,
any more than part of 'today' describes what happened yesterday.
It seems to me like you are stubbornly sticking to an obvious
absurdity.
You're conflating 3 totally different things and insisting that I
agree that all are true or all are false - and that's not the case.
A particular specimen gradually edges toward life. At some stage we'd
call it non-living. At some later stage we'd call it living. We
don't watch it develop and say, "there - it just now became living".
It's a step function - it's either living or non-living.
Biological evolution began at a SINGLE UNIVERSALLY UNIQUE instant
(there's only one such instant in the entire history of the universe)
- the instant at which life began. We don't define that moment in
terms of exactly what happened to what specimen to nudge it over from
non-life to life.
--
rukbat at optonline dot net
"We should do unto others as we would want them to do unto us. If I were an unborn
fetus I would want others to use force to protect me, therefore using force against
abortionists is *justifiable homocide*."
- "Pro-Life" doctor killer and corpse Paul Hill
(random sig, produced by SigChanger)
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| User: "JoelKatz" |
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| Title: Re: Creationism , Evolution BOTH WRONG |
04 Nov 2006 07:04:07 PM |
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Al Klein wrote:
On 2 Nov 2006 22:16:27 -0800, "JoelKatz" <davids@webmaster.com> wrote:
Al Klein wrote:
If it involved non-living processes it wouldn't be biological
evolution.
What if it involved processes that are arguably living and arguably
non-living?
At the same time? A thing is either living or non-living - the terms
are mutually exclusive.
The terms "living" and "non-living" are mutually exclusive. But the
terms "arguably living" and "arguably non-living" are overlapping.
When we talk about the transition from non-living things to living
things, abiogenesis, we are not talking about rocks turning into
humans. We are talking about the transition from a bit before "just
barely arguably living" to just after "just barely arguably
non-living".
You are taking the rules about things that are definitively
categorizable and applying them to the one situation in which they
don't apply -- those things that are not definitively categorizable.
Since we have agreed that there is no one instant of
transition, what happens in that intermediate stage?
There is none. A single entity is either alive or it isn't. At which
point it becomes alive is another topic entirely, and one that science
doesn't bother with, since we have no specimen at that point (and
can't, since a single specimen is either alive or it isn't.)
So is a virus alive or not?
If you say, "no, there is no biological evolution in the intermediate
stage", then you are just denying the existence of an intermediate
stage by insisting there must be some instant at which biological
evolution began.
Biological evolution began when life began. You're conflating that
universally unique instant with when a specific specimen becomes
alive, which science doesn't address.
So now you *are* back to insisting that life began at some precise,
definable instant? This is in contrast to every modern theory of
abiogensis, which universally deny that any such instant occurs. They
all document a gradual transition from "definitely not alive" to
"definitely alive."
Do you insist there must be some one definable instant at which
biological evolution began?
Of course. But science doesn't address the definable instant at which
a particular specimen became alive. The two aren't the same thing at
all.
Again, this is in contrast to every modern theory of abiogenesis and
evolution which all document a gradual transition from "definitely not
evolution" to "definitely evolution".
If we knew which theory of abiogenesis was the correct one, I could
pick some of the intermediate points, explain them to you, and
challenge you to explain whether they are alive or not or experiencing
evolution or not. Unfortunately, I can't do that.
However, your claim is extraordinary. It's possible that it's correct,
but unbelievably unlikely. Can you present a plausible theory of
abiogenesis and the origin of evolution in which there is such a
precise instant? If so, that would be a remarkable achievment.
If you agree that the transition from non-living to living was gradual
and involved intermediate forms that are arugably alive but not
definitively so
Science doesn't address the situation.
That's the most ludicrous absurdity you've tried yet. Of course science
addresses the early beginnings of both life and evolution and the way
in which both of those phenomena arose.
and you agree that the beginnings of evolution were similarly gradual
They weren't - evolution began at the instant that life began. That's
due to the definition of 'evolution', and not anything else.
But there was no "instant life began". Every modern theory of
abiogenesis denies that there is such an instant. Unless you can
present a plausible theory of abiogenesis that contains one, that
remains an extraordinary claim presented with no evidence at all.
I agree that it's theoretically possible. However, I find it almost
inconceivable.
how can you maintain that evolutionary processes
don't help explain the transition from non-living things to living
things?
Because the definition of 'biological evolution' requires life, so
'evolution' doesn't explain what happened before evolution occurred,
any more than part of 'today' describes what happened yesterday.
Of course to be definitively biological evolution may require life. But
we are talking about things that are sort-of alive, on the boundary
between non-living and living at the origins of life. You cannot say
that such things could or could not definitely experience evolution
because you cannot say if they are definitively alive.
It seems to me like you are stubbornly sticking to an obvious
absurdity.
You're conflating 3 totally different things and insisting that I
agree that all are true or all are false - and that's not the case.
A particular specimen gradually edges toward life. At some stage we'd
call it non-living. At some later stage we'd call it living. We
don't watch it develop and say, "there - it just now became living".
It's a step function - it's either living or non-living.
I don't get it. Are you saying there is one specific instant of
transition? Or are you saying there are intermediate stages where
neither category applies? If there's some third possibility, what is
it?
Biological evolution began at a SINGLE UNIVERSALLY UNIQUE instant
(there's only one such instant in the entire history of the universe)
- the instant at which life began. We don't define that moment in
terms of exactly what happened to what specimen to nudge it over from
non-life to life.
That's an extraordinary claim that contradicts every modern theory of
abiogenesis. If you can't even present a theory that explains how such
a unique instant could occur (and I don't think you can) or argue what
things might have been like at such an instant, it remains an
extraordinary claim with no evidence whatsoever to support it.
Every modern theory of abiogenesis proposes that the transitions
occured gradually and passed through numerous phases in which things
are arguably alive but arguably not.
DS
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| User: "Al Klein" |
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| Title: Re: Creationism , Evolution BOTH WRONG |
04 Nov 2006 10:56:34 PM |
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On 4 Nov 2006 17:04:07 -0800, "JoelKatz" <davids@webmaster.com> wrote:
Al Klein wrote:
On 2 Nov 2006 22:16:27 -0800, "JoelKatz" <davids@webmaster.com> wrote:
Al Klein wrote:
If it involved non-living processes it wouldn't be biological
evolution.
What if it involved processes that are arguably living and arguably
non-living?
At the same time? A thing is either living or non-living - the terms
are mutually exclusive.
The terms "living" and "non-living" are mutually exclusive. But the
terms "arguably living" and "arguably non-living" are overlapping.
And totally without scientific meaning.
When we talk about the transition from non-living things to living
things
Science doesn't.
abiogenesis
That's not abiogenesis - science doesn't address the transitional
state, since there probably isn't any.
we are not talking about rocks turning into
humans. We are talking about the transition from a bit before "just
barely arguably living" to just after "just barely arguably
non-living".
Which science doesn't address, since there's no specimen in that
state.
You are taking the rules about things that are definitively
categorizable and applying them to the one situation in which they
don't apply
And one that science doesn't address.
Since we have agreed that there is no one instant of
transition, what happens in that intermediate stage?
There is none. A single entity is either alive or it isn't. At which
point it becomes alive is another topic entirely, and one that science
doesn't bother with, since we have no specimen at that point (and
can't, since a single specimen is either alive or it isn't.)
So is a virus alive or not?
We haven't arrived at a consensus yet. That doesn't mean that a virus
is in an intermediate state - it means that we haven't decided how to
classify it yet. But it's either one or the other.
Biological evolution began when life began. You're conflating that
universally unique instant with when a specific specimen becomes
alive, which science doesn't address.
So now you *are* back to insisting that life began at some precise,
definable instant?
No, science doesn't address this because there's no specimen at that
state.
This is in contrast to every modern theory of
abiogensis, which universally deny that any such instant occurs.
There's a specimen that's not alive and there's one that is alive.
There's no specimen that's in the process of becoming alive, because a
single specimen doesn't change status.
They all document a gradual transition from "definitely not alive" to
"definitely alive."
There's a difference between deciding whether a single specimen is
life or not, and deciding the instant at which something BECOMES life.
Stop insisting that the two be the same - they're not.
Do you insist there must be some one definable instant at which
biological evolution began?
Of course. But science doesn't address the definable instant at which
a particular specimen became alive. The two aren't the same thing at
all.
Again, this is in contrast to every modern theory of abiogenesis and
evolution which all document a gradual transition from "definitely not
evolution" to "definitely evolution".
No it's not. For any given specimen, it's either definitely life or
definitely not life. That has nothing to do with some theoretical
construct of yours that's in some intermediate state.
If we knew which theory of abiogenesis was the correct one, I could
pick some of the intermediate points, explain them to you, and
challenge you to explain whether they are alive or not or experiencing
evolution or not.
A single specimen doesn't evolve - species evolve.
However, your claim is extraordinary. It's possible that it's correct,
but unbelievably unlikely. Can you present a plausible theory of
abiogenesis and the origin of evolution in which there is such a
precise instant?
Science doesn't address the instant a evolution isn't at all concerned
with how life began. But at one point a particular specimen would
have been judged not life and at another point some other specimen
would have been judged life. If the first was directly ancestral to
the second, that's your "instant".
If you agree that the transition from non-living to living was gradual
and involved intermediate forms that are arugably alive but not
definitively so
Science doesn't address the situation.
That's the most ludicrous absurdity you've tried yet. Of course science
addresses the early beginnings of both life and evolution and the way
in which both of those phenomena arose.
But it doesn't address the instant at which non-life becomes life,
because single specimens don't evolve, only species do. Stop
confusing the two.
and you agree that the beginnings of evolution were similarly gradual
They weren't - evolution began at the instant that life began. That's
due to the definition of 'evolution', and not anything else.
But there was no "instant life began".
So there was no start of evolution. So? Evidently your assumption is
invalid. There's a difference between "there was a point at which
this happened" and "science defines the point at which this happened".
Every modern theory of
abiogenesis denies that there is such an instant.
No, it merely ignores the instant, because it doesn't define it. No
one denies that 3, 0 or "divide by" exist, but math doesn't define
3/0. One isn't the other.
Unless you can
present a plausible theory of abiogenesis that contains one, that
remains an extraordinary claim presented with no evidence at all.
If you understood what you were asking, you'd understand that the
question itself is undefined.
I agree that it's theoretically possible.
You can't agree - you don't understand what I'm saying.
However, I find it almost inconceivable.
You find it totally inconceivable, because you can't conceive that
you're conflating two different things, then demanding that I explain
them as if they're the same thing.
how can you maintain that evolutionary processes
don't help explain the transition from non-living things to living
things?
Because the definition of 'biological evolution' requires life, so
'evolution' doesn't explain what happened before evolution occurred,
any more than part of 'today' describes what happened yesterday.
Of course to be definitively biological evolution may require life. But
we are talking about things that are sort-of alive
A single specimen is either life or not life - there's no
"sort-of-life". Don't confuse individuals with concepts.
on the boundary between non-living and living at the origins of life.
No such thing. Present the specimen that's "on the boundary between
non-living and living". Or even define it. One specimen is either
alive or it's not alive. Individuals don't evolve.
You cannot say that such things could or could not definitely experience evolution
because you cannot say if they are definitively alive.
If they're not life they can't undergo "life-evolution" (biological
evolution) - BY DEFINITION. Non-life CAN NOT BE life. And if it's
not life it's not undergoing biological evolution, because it has no
alleles to change. And, again, individuals don't evolve, species do.
It seems to me like you are stubbornly sticking to an obvious
absurdity.
You're conflating 3 totally different things and insisting that I
agree that all are true or all are false - and that's not the case.
A particular specimen gradually edges toward life. At some stage we'd
call it non-living. At some later stage we'd call it living. We
don't watch it develop and say, "there - it just now became living".
It's a step function - it's either living or non-living.
I don't get it.
I know you don't.
Are you saying there is one specific instant of transition?
There must be - life is a step function. An individual specimen is
either alive or not alive. But science doesn't define the transition
any more than mathematics defines 3/0. That doesn't mean that 3, 0 or
"divide by" aren't defined - which is what you're demanding, that
either both sets are defined or both sets are undefined. Sorry, one
set ("is this particular specimen life or not") is defined while the
other set ("exactly when did this 'species' become life") is not
defined. It might be, once we can create life in the laboratory.
Or are you saying there are intermediate stages where
neither category applies?
No. A single specimen is in one category or the other. You're still
confusing species and individual. Individuals don't evolve.
Biological evolution began at a SINGLE UNIVERSALLY UNIQUE instant
(there's only one such instant in the entire history of the universe)
- the instant at which life began. We don't define that moment in
terms of exactly what happened to what specimen to nudge it over from
non-life to life.
That's an extraordinary claim that contradicts every modern theory of
abiogenesis.
So far all we have are hypotheses, not theories.
If you can't even present a theory that explains how such
a unique instant could occur (and I don't think you can) or argue what
things might have been like at such an instant, it remains an
extraordinary claim with no evidence whatsoever to support it.
Only insofar as you insist that either 3, 0, "divide by" and 3/0 are
defined or they're undefined. The answer is that the question isn't
valid. You have to ask a valid question to get an answer.
You're asking if an individual can be in an intermediate state for a
species. An individual isn't a species, so it can't be in ANY
species-specific state. If there's no air in your left-front tire, is
your car flat? Or is one tire flat? You're asking me about the
flatness of the car. Cars don't go flat, tires do. Individuals don't
evolve, species do.
Every modern theory of abiogenesis
Hypotheses aren't theories.
proposes that the transitions
occured gradually and passed through numerous phases
True.
in which things are arguably alive but arguably not.
Not true.
A SPECIES passes through phases, an INDIVIDUAL is alive or not alive.
You're insisting on treating the two as if they're the same - they're
not.
A SINGLE SPECIMEN is either life or not life. At which point it
became life is undefined, because individuals DON'T BECOME - anything.
--
rukbat at optonline dot net
"I've heard the call. I believe God wants me to run for president."
- George W. Bush, quoted in George Magazine, September, 2000
"God gave the savior to the German people. We have faith,
deep and unshakeable faith, that he was sent to us by
God to save Germany."
- Hermann Goering, speaking of Hitler
(random sig, produced by SigChanger)
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| User: "JoelKatz" |
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| Title: Re: Creationism , Evolution BOTH WRONG |
05 Nov 2006 08:11:31 PM |
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Al Klein wrote:
So is a virus alive or not?
We haven't arrived at a consensus yet. That doesn't mean that a virus
is in an intermediate state - it means that we haven't decided how to
classify it yet. But it's either one or the other.
I have no response to this level of idiocy.
Feel free to believe (on the basis of nothing at all) that a virus must
"really be alive" or "really not be alive". Perhaps if we all bought
really good dictionaries, we could figure out which one it is.
A virus is arguably alive and argably not alive. A rock is not alive. A
person is. There is, however, a fuzzy boundary between the two
categories. You can deny it all you like, but it is an unavoidable
fact.
Theories of abiogenesis do in fact hypothesize the path up to that
fuzzy boundary and through it.
DS
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| User: "Al Klein" |
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| Title: Re: Creationism , Evolution BOTH WRONG |
05 Nov 2006 09:17:15 PM |
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On 5 Nov 2006 18:11:31 -0800, "JoelKatz" <davids@webmaster.com> wrote:
Al Klein wrote:
So is a virus alive or not?
We haven't arrived at a consensus yet. That doesn't mean that a virus
is in an intermediate state - it means that we haven't decided how to
classify it yet. But it's either one or the other.
I have no response to this level of idiocy.
Feel free to believe (on the basis of nothing at all) that a virus must
"really be alive" or "really not be alive".
It would be idiocy - but for the fact that words do have meaning.
A virus is arguably alive and argably not alive.
Not because it's in an intermediate state, but because we haven't
arrived at a consensus yet. No biologist claims that it's both alive
and not alive - some claim it's alive and some claim it isn't.
Theories of abiogenesis
Of which there are none.
do in fact hypothesize
An hypothesis hypothesizes, a theory doesn't. Try to learn the
meanings of the words you misuse.
--
rukbat at optonline dot net
"They laughed at Newton, they laughed at Einstein, but they also laughed at
Bozo the Clown."
- Carl Sagan
(random sig, produced by SigChanger)
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| User: "JoelKatz" |
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| Title: Re: Creationism , Evolution BOTH WRONG |
06 Nov 2006 01:44:55 PM |
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Al Klein wrote:
A virus is arguably alive and argably not alive.
Not because it's in an intermediate state, but because we haven't
arrived at a consensus yet. No biologist claims that it's both alive
and not alive - some claim it's alive and some claim it isn't.
This is absolute nonsense. If something is either definitely alive or
definitely not alive, why is there no consensus? What is missing?
In fact, the majority of biologists do not believe that the virus is
alive or dead. There is a consensus view, and it's whether or not a
virus is alive or not is simply a question of how you define "alive".
What is missing is a precise enough definition of "alive". The problem
is that the root concept the word "alive" is trying to get at is fuzzy.
We know rocks are not alive. We know humans are. Whether or not viruses
are alive depends upon precisely what actual facts you are trying to
get at.
Every theory of the origin of life tries to define these boundaries.
Understanding the origin of life itself means understanding what
happens at these fuzzy boundaries with things that are arguably alive
and arguably not so.
They show some of the attributes that we think are unique to living
things, but not all the attributes we think are required of living
things.
And that's a fact.
DS
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| User: "JoelKatz" |
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| Title: Re: Creationism , Evolution BOTH WRONG |
01 Nov 2006 08:49:51 PM |
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Al Klein wrote:
Creationism addresses biological evolution, not change in anything in
general. Since the topic is "Creationism , Evolution BOTH WRONG",
it's about biological evolution, or it's meaningless. "Chemistry,
Library Science both wrong about origins of color"?
Actually, creationism adresses abiogenesis as much as evolution. If
abiogenesis includes evolutionary processes that are not what you call
biological evolution, then creationsm addresses those too.
Second, you have no rational basis to argue
that "biological reproduction" does not include a contagious protein
fold such as that which causes BSE. (If a biological entity creates a
copy of itself from some raw material, this is biological reproduction.
If fire were a protein, it would experience biological reproduction.)
And if bubblegum were a biological entity we might find bands of
intelligent bubblegum monsters roaming the jungle.
Biological evolution doesn't address crystal "reproduction" and it
doesn't consider protein folding as being evolution - it starts with
living forms that possess genes, so let's stick to those.
"Biological evolution" is simply about biological entities that can
evolve. That we happen to see that on this planet in the form of genes
doesn't mean that a process that didn't involve genes would not be
biological evolution.
DS
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| User: "Al Klein" |
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| Title: Re: Creationism , Evolution BOTH WRONG |
02 Nov 2006 09:04:52 AM |
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On 1 Nov 2006 18:49:51 -0800, "JoelKatz" <davids@webmaster.com> wrote:
Al Klein wrote:
Creationism addresses biological evolution, not change in anything in
general. Since the topic is "Creationism , Evolution BOTH WRONG",
it's about biological evolution, or it's meaningless. "Chemistry,
Library Science both wrong about origins of color"?
Actually, creationism adresses abiogenesis as much as evolution. If
abiogenesis includes evolutionary processes that are not what you call
biological evolution, then creationsm addresses those too.
Creationism only accepts special creation, which abiogenesis rejects.
"Biological evolution" is simply about biological entities that can
evolve. That we happen to see that on this planet in the form of genes
doesn't mean that a process that didn't involve genes would not be
biological evolution.
Which doesn't mean that protein folding is biological evolution.
--
rukbat at optonline dot net
"Nothing in biology makes sense without evolution."
- Theodosuis Dobzhansky
(random sig, produced by SigChanger)
This signature was made by SigChanger.
You can find SigChanger at: http://www.phranc.nl/
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| User: "Al Klein" |
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| Title: Re: Creationism , Evolution BOTH WRONG |
26 Oct 2006 04:00:28 PM |
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On 26 Oct 2006 04:23:27 -0700, "JoelKatz" <davids@webmaster.com>
wrote:
You are welcome to use your own definitions of words, but if you want
other people to understand you, you should use the ones everyone else
uses.
Evolution is a scientific term - it means what the scientists who use
it every day use it to mean. If you want to use a different meaning,
feel free, but don't expect educated people to understand you.
If you look back at the beginning of this thread, it was 100%
clear beyond any question that the term "evolution" was MISused to refer
to an explanation for why life forms are complex and show the
appearance of design.
there - I've corrected your error.
So evolution may well explain the origin of life.
Since evolution doesn't even begin to address the question, it can't
provide the answer. (You're talking about the kind of "evolution"
practiced by scientists - the uneducated who insist that it's just a
theory will never explain anything.)
I think it's possible that evolution explains the origin of life.
It doesn't. It describes the change and divergence in life.
I presented an argument why something might be so.
You presented an argument that had nothing to do with evolution
"explaining" something it has nothing to do with.
Why can't non-living things have evolved into living things?
Because non-living things have no alleles and evolution is a change in
allele frequency in a BREEDING population, something non-living things
don't do..
Or, to put it another way, if you draw the line between life and non-life and also
the line between things that can evolve and things that cannot evolve,
why must the two lines fall in precisely the same place?
Because evolution is DEFINED AS dealing with living things.
IMO, it is most logical that evolution predated life and that life evolved.
A study concerned with life can't deal with the period before life.
That's like the study of flight including horse-drawn wagons.
As a fairly silly hypothetical, suppose I created robots that had both
random mutations and differential survival. They would not be
considered living things, however. Is it not possible that in a few
million years that might either become alive or become capable of
creating living things out of purely non-living things (by intelligent
molecular rearrangement, perhaps). It is totally plausible, IMO, that
living things could have evolved from non-living things.
No it's not. An Asimovian robot isn't biologically alive, because
it's not biological at all.
By evolution, I mean simply random mutations that are contagious in
some way combined with differential survival leading to increased
complexity.
By evolution I mean things produced by the use of money, so
self-replication can't be evolution.
But, if we're using the same meaning that those in the field use,
evolution deals with alleles and that definition of yours is okay as
long as it deals with creatures that have them.
--
rukbat at optonline dot net
"Damn. Looks like all of usenet agrees that you don't have the logical
faculties to prove the statement 'dogshit is not peanut butter' if we
gave you a jar of each and a box of crackers" - John Hattan to Tichy
(random sig, produced by SigChanger)
This signature was made by SigChanger.
You can find SigChanger at: http://www.phranc.nl/
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| User: "JoelKatz" |
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| Title: Re: Creationism , Evolution BOTH WRONG |
04 Nov 2006 07:08:33 PM |
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Al Klein wrote:
As a fairly silly hypothetical, suppose I created robots that had both
random mutations and differential survival. They would not be
considered living things, however. Is it not possible that in a few
million years that might either become alive or become capable of
creating living things out of purely non-living things (by intelligent
molecular rearrangement, perhaps). It is totally plausible, IMO, that
living things could have evolved from non-living things.
No it's not. An Asimovian robot isn't biologically alive, because
it's not biological at all.
Funny how you add your own bits to my hypothethical, show that the bits
you added are absurd, and use that to reject the hypothetical.
Can you at least pretend to be honest?
Note that I never said the robots themselves would be alive (except as
part of an 'or' clause). The other part of that 'or' was that they
would assemble living things by a process like molecular rearrangement.
Are you saying it's impossible for a robot to create a living thing?
DS
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| User: "Al Klein" |
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| Title: Re: Creationism , Evolution BOTH WRONG |
04 Nov 2006 10:58:04 PM |
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On 4 Nov 2006 17:08:33 -0800, "JoelKatz" <davids@webmaster.com> wrote:
Al Klein wrote:
As a fairly silly hypothetical, suppose I created robots that had both
random mutations and differential survival. They would not be
considered living things, however. Is it not possible that in a few
million years that might either become alive or become capable of
creating living things out of purely non-living things (by intelligent
molecular rearrangement, perhaps). It is totally plausible, IMO, that
living things could have evolved from non-living things.
No it's not. An Asimovian robot isn't biologically alive, because
it's not biological at all.
Funny how you add your own bits to my hypothethical, show that the bits
you added are absurd, and use that to reject the hypothetical.
Can you at least pretend to be honest?
Note that I never said the robots themselves would be alive (except as
part of an 'or' clause). The other part of that 'or' was that they
would assemble living things by a process like molecular rearrangement.
And calling it evolution - which requires that it be alive, which it
isn't.
Are you saying it's impossible for a robot to create a living thing?
Of course not, but it's not evolution, it's manufacture.
--
rukbat at optonline dot net
"If we really know Truth, we do not fear hearing falsehoods or half-truths; if we are not sure of the truth - we shudder and try to shout down every utterance." - A. J. Mims
(random sig, produced by SigChanger)
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| User: "JoelKatz" |
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| Title: Re: Creationism , Evolution BOTH WRONG |
07 Nov 2006 06:51:19 PM |
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Al Klein wrote:
And calling it evolution - which requires that it be alive, which it
isn't.
I thought we had agreed that algorithms could evolve? Or are you back
to insisting that I must be talking about biological evolution in an
example involving robots?
Are you saying it's impossible for a robot to create a living thing?
Of course not, but it's not evolution, it's manufacture.
It is evolution if the living thing is made in the same way that
algorithms evolve. Algorithms and software can evolve. All that is
required is random changes and differential propogation leading to
increased complexity.
My point is simply that living things could have evolved from
non-living things. If a collection of robots used an evolutionary
algorithm that ultimately resulted in assembling a living thing, that
would be a living thing that had been created entirely from non-living
things by an evolutionary process.
Admittedly, it's a pretty silly example. But it serves to prove that it
is possible for living things to evolve from non-living things.
Now, if you replace the robots by primitive biological entities,
capable of an evolutionary process that is not quite evolution as we
know it, and you have the steps right before things that are
definitively alive in many modern theories of abiogenesis.
DS
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| User: "JoelKatz" |
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| Title: Re: Creationism , Evolution BOTH WRONG |
07 Nov 2006 08:09:00 PM |
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JoelKatz wrote:
Of course not, but it's not evolution, it's manufacture.
This actually deserves a more detailed response.
First of all, individuals never evolve. They are all "manufactured".
Once the sperm and egg that ultimately formed me combined, evolution
took a back seat to manufacture.
Whether it's evolution or not has not one thing to do with how a
particular individual arose. It has to do with the entire process that
lead up to not just that individual but the thing that manufactured
that individual.
Suppose humans built robots, and then all life died off, and the robots
used evolutionary processes to develop to the point where they
assembled a life form. This would be a transition from a state of
affairs with no life to a state of affairs with life. The process would
be evolutionary -- just as much so as the way humans evolved. Some
parts of it would not be biological evolution. (Note that the use of
deduction and analysis does not negate the evolution. Humans use
deduction and analysis just like the robots do. They also evolve, just
as the robots do.)
This is not really all that different from most modern theories of
abiogenesis. Except instead of robots, they propose non-living things
that gradually developed the capacity to assemble living things. The
thing is, many of these latter steps are evolutionary, generally to an
increasing extent.
For example, one theory of abiogenesis proposes particles that randomly
combined and split. Over time, combinations that resisted splitting
were favored simply because they didn't split, increasing their average
lifespan and thus their relative frequency. Is this an evolution sort
of? Sort of.
Evolution has fuzzy boundaries just as life does, and the fuzzy
boundaries of evolution are intertwined with the fuzzy boundaries of
life. Evolution, as we now see it, and life as we now see it, developed
concurrently.
It is a complete and utter fallacy to argue that life arrived, fully
alive, with no evolution. And then evolution arrived, added on to the
living things. For one thing, there is no known non-evolutionary
process that could have lead to fully living things (except creationism
or robots from another planet).
DS
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| User: "JoelKatz" |
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| Title: Re: Creationism , Evolution BOTH WRONG |
03 Nov 2006 12:10:17 AM |
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Al Klein wrote:
Why can't non-living things have evolved into living things?
Because non-living things have no alleles and evolution is a change in
allele frequency in a BREEDING population, something non-living things
don't do..
Then please explain to NynexST that their voice recognition algorithm
is alive. That algorithm was created by an evolutionary process.
Evolution, by itself, means simply differential propogation of random
changes.
There is no point where evolution begins. There is no point where life
begins. The origin of evolution and the origin of life overlap in a
series of complex and not-very-well understood transitions. This is
consistent with every modern theory of abiogenesis and if there is an
alternative, I have no idea what it is.
This is such a simple and obvious point that I find your refusal to
acknowledge it perplexing.
The most generic definition of evolution is simply a gradual process
wherein something changes into a form that is better in some way. Every
theory of abiogenesis includes steps from nearly the very beginning
that are evolutionary in this sense.
The most specific definition of evolution is the appearance of design
and functional complexity caused by random genetic changes and
differential propogation.
If you look at any modern theory of abiogenesis you will see that
almost all of the steps are evolutionary in the most generic sense. The
steps get closer and closer to being evolutionary in the most specific
sense. Nowhere in that process is there a definitive on/off switch. The
change is completely gradual.
You continue to assert that there must exist some point at which things
go from non-living to living and processes that are evolutionary in the
most complex sense start. But that is just simply completely not true.
*All* of the changes that take place are gradual.
The origin of evolution and the origin of life are intertwined in a
complex series of states and transitions involving processes and
organisms that are sort-of alive and sort-of evolutionary.
DS
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| User: "Al Klein" |
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| Title: Re: Creationism , Evolution BOTH WRONG |
03 Nov 2006 11:13:40 AM |
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On 2 Nov 2006 22:10:17 -0800, "JoelKatz" <davids@webmaster.com> wrote:
Al Klein wrote:
Why can't non-living things have evolved into living things?
Because non-living things have no alleles and evolution is a change in
allele frequency in a BREEDING population, something non-living things
don't do..
Then please explain to NynexST that their voice recognition algorithm
is alive. That algorithm was created by an evolutionary process.
Evolution, by itself, means simply differential propogation of random
changes.
Read the topic - Creationism deals with BIOLOGICAL evolution of LIVING
things.
--
rukbat at optonline dot net
"Shake off all the fears of servile prejudices, under which weak minds
are servilely crouched. Fix reason firmly in her seat, and call on her
tribunal for every fact, every opinion. Question with boldness even the
existence of a God; because, if there be one, he must more approve of
the homage of reason than that of blindfolded fear."
- Thomas Jefferson (1743 - 1826)
(random sig, produced by SigChanger)
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| User: "JoelKatz" |
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| Title: Re: Creationism , Evolution BOTH WRONG |
07 Nov 2006 07:01:24 PM |
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Al Klein wrote:
On 2 Nov 2006 22:10:17 -0800, "JoelKatz" <davids@webmaster.com> wrote:
Al Klein wrote:
Why can't non-living things have evolved into living things?
Because non-living things have no alleles and evolution is a change in
allele frequency in a BREEDING population, something non-living things
don't do..
Then please explain to NynexST that their voice recognition algorithm
is alive. That algorithm was created by an evolutionary process.
Evolution, by itself, means simply differential propogation of random
changes.
Read the topic - Creationism deals with BIOLOGICAL evolution of LIVING
things.
You can't have it both ways. You can't talk specifically about
non-living things and then say you're talking about living things.
Further, creationism doesn't deal with evolution at all. Creationism
deals with the origin of livings things as well as their increasing
complexity. If you, by definition, exclude anything involving
non-living things from evolution, then creationism has a greater scope
than evolution. You can't point to limits on evolution and then argue
they apply to creationism.
Creationism definitely deals with the transition from non-living things
to living things. If creationism were a validated scientific theory
(and you could somehow fix the self-contradictions in it), it could
replace both evolution and abiogenesis. Abiogenesis would be replaced
with a creator willing the first living thing into place (ignoring
somehow the contradiction that the creator would have to be alive to
will anything). Evolution would be replaced with a creator willing
progressively more complex beings (ignoring somehow the contradiction
that the creator could not be complex).
Let's review how we got here again since you seem to keep forgetting.
I'm responding to the argument that evolution cannot help in any way to
explain the origin of the first living things. Obviously, if you mean
modern biological evolution involving the frequency of genes, that's
true. Things that are not definitely alive do not have genes.
Nevertheless the processes surrounding the formation of the first
things that were definitively alive are evolutionary processes in every
modern theory of abiogenesis. (Though not genetic biological
evolution.)
If those evolutionary processes were responsible for the first
biological living things, it is nonsensical to say that they are not
properly part of biological evolution. However, because we don't know
what those steps look like and only have several sets of hypothesis, it
is not yet appropriate to add them to a formal description of
biological evolution.
Hopefully, at some future point, we will have a much greater
understanding of the steps surrounding the transition from the most
complex definitively non-living thing to the least complex definitively
living thing. Many of those steps will be evolutionary in a sense
greater than the sense in which algorithms evolve but perhaps a bit
less than the way genetic evolution takes place.
I'm honestly baffled that this is controversial. What is the
alternative?
DS
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| User: "The_Sage" |
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| Title: Re: Creationism , Evolution BOTH WRONG |
12 Nov 2006 10:24:18 AM |
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Reply to article by: "JoelKatz" <davids@webmaster.com>
Date written: 7 Nov 2006 17:01:24 -0800
MsgID:<1162947684.647811.104680@i42g2000cwa.googlegroups.com>
Why can't non-living things have evolved into living things?
Because non-living things have no alleles and evolution is a change in
allele frequency in a BREEDING population, something non-living things
don't do..
Then please explain to NynexST that their voice recognition algorithm
is alive. That algorithm was created by an evolutionary process.
Evolution, by itself, means simply differential propogation of random
changes.
Read the topic - Creationism deals | | | | | |
