So creationists...how do you explain away an arsenic-based life form? (Christian, believe)
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So that's how you prove a theory. You jump up and down and scream, evolution is a fact, and eventually wear all your opponents down. Your methods are also used in politics. No matter how true or untrue, if you say it enough times, it's becomes fact.
So you're a politician in addition to being an expert in scientific method. Kudos to you.
Either way, neither of them is provable through current means.
Nothing is "proven" in science. However, with what is observed, there is no reason to conclude otherwise. You could say that one opinion is well founded on observational methods and testing, the other opinion is a philosophical conclusion which is not testable but faith based. Funny thing, both opinions can be held because they are not addressing the same issue. One is just addressing what happened, on the other hand "Goddidit" is just a satement of who.
I guess that's why it's known as the LAW of gravity, and not the THEORY of gravity.
Not really. Actually our explanation of gravity has not been "proven." However, it does work quite well on large scales. I know it can get confusing when discussing scientific terms and principles when you use these specific terms in the vernacular, completely misunderstanding it, resulting in coming to wrong conclusions ^^. They are used differently in science. The Theory of Gravity - Einstein's General Theory Relativity is the overarching explanation. The laws which are part of and fully support the Theory are mearly observations that are so regular and predictable that they can be written as mathematical equations. So it is nonsensical to think that the "Law" replaced the Theory. In science, these terms are not some rungs on a ladder of certainty. The Theory of Gravity is not "proven" it just keeps getting confirmed and works very well, until you get to the Quantum level.
Read my tag line. It highlights the cognitive disconnect of the usage of Theory vs theory.
First article:
"In scientific investigations, it is permitted to invent any hypothesis and, if it explains various large and independent classes of facts, it rises to the rank of a well-grounded theory. (Charles Darwin)" Okay, I can concede that evolution is a "well-grounded" theory.
Second article:
The word fact is not even used.
Third article:
Again nothing about facts, just theories. Stupid stuff like if animal has gills like a fish and the head of a crocodile, it must have evolved. Whatever!
Still awaiting for the proof that evolution is fact. Jumping up and down and screaming "Evolution is fact" doesn't count. Nor does hugging the phrase because you love the idea and you have become roomies and you never want to let it go.
Debating a creationist is like talking to a pole-you explain the facts to them, but it just hits them then bounces right off. Here's the creationist argument for anything based in science:
'I have absolutely no clue whatsoever of what x claim is or how it works, therefore it is wrong since learning is such a herculean task that I would fall into oblivion.'
Creationists don't believe in evolution because understanding it requires learning something other than what their 2000 year old collection of desert scribblings tells them to believe. It's the same reason they don't have an explanation for arsenic-based life. All they're able to do is go off onto tangents of blatant lies and misconceptions. It must have been explained hundreds of times what a theory in science is, yet they continue to rattle off their rubish nonsense that evolution is 'just a theory,' etc. It reminds me of whenever Hillary Clinton was interviewed during the presidential elections. She never answered any questions that were asked, she just went off onto numerous tangents. MC also already made a thread about what a theory in science means and explained exactly what it is yet that seemed to have been completely ignored. No surprise though. The creationist motto is to ramble off nonsense then ignore everything(which is everything in reality) that contradicts the iron age fluff that they purport as being true. The basic answer that has been given in response to the OP is that they have no explanation for arsenic based lifeforms. All they have to do now is realize that they are unable to account for them.
In a way Catholics are creationists....It's true that the church accepts evolution, but who do you think they say created first life, then set evolution in motion....Yup, you got it, God dun it.
Well, take it from someone that attended Catholic school. Evolution was taught to me as being fact. Now, I don't buy it no more than I buy god-dunnit. When it comes to humans, I honestly think ET dunnit.
Evolution breaks down at the beginning. They say the odds of all the things happening at the same to just spontaneously create a self-replicating life is much much worse than winning the powerball lotto.
Quote:
Originally Posted by rifleman
They? You've been watching Men in Black again? "We're the they, the them... we're The Men in Black!" Hmmm; an Appeal to Undesignated Authority. You've perhaps been attending the same night school that Campbell34 has, he with his "science now agrees" line.
Just FYI: none of us here believes the unsupportable statistics of any Creationist Website. They, like Al Gore the pseudo-scientist, just make it all up. Just wanted you to know; inquiring minds, right?
I am not saying it didn't happen, but remember it's a theory, not fact.
Quote:
Originally Posted by rifle
Well, how do I say this politely now?
WRONG. It's a well-documented, DNA-mapped, fossil and physiologically proven fact, called a Theory in science. You don't get to use the New Christian Science dictionary for definitions that have been long outdistanced by the onward encroachment of nasty facts, derived from vigorous science. Sorry.
BTW look up Drs. Craig Venter and Richard Lenski, and then check up on the British successes with self-assembling amino acids out of simple basic chemicals that would have been found in a salty, warm, electrically charged ocean about 3.5 to 4 billion years or so ago. That certainly provides a lot of time for a few simple chance stable reactions to occur given the total volume of seawater and molecules available, right?
Besides, what if God didn't create the first life but created the universe and it's laws and then set everything in motion. And then life just found a way. That could be true, too.
You're right, but then I'd ask: why bother if it can happen all on it's own? And why hasn't He ever shown his ruggedly handsome face? To anyone?
Quote:
Originally Posted by sanspeur
You just blew it..Typical creationist dodge.....Micro and macro evolution are the same thing the only difference is time...macro evolution is merely the accumulation of mico evolutionary events over a period of time.
[quote-rifle]And as well, sans, as you well know, we don't have to define a new species as having outwardly obvious physical differences any more. Simple unique DNA-based, biochemical differences, not visible to 17th, 18th, 19th or even early 20th century observers, can and do define a "species" now. So micro-adaptation is in fact, ongoing Evolution.
Given that there are inevitable measurable changes even over one generation, Evolution is an obvious, documented, visible state of constant change. It's as simple as that. We're not talking abiogenesis here, which is the usual ploy of desperate Evolution denialists.
You also do not seem to understand what the word theory means in the realm of science...Evolution is proven many times over.[/quote]
And yet they never tire of using that tired old (incorrect) line. "It's only a theory!" Blah blah blah. That must have been drummed in at Sunday School, eh?
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Originally Posted by Violett
I, for one, welcome our new Arsenic Overlords.
Funniest line of this thread! Thanks! BTW, this bacterium is just as likely to have evolved here on Earth, but it essentially proves the ability of molecules to successfully adapt to existing conditions. After all, there must have been a surplus of arsenic in mono lake, it being an old volcano, and probably the bearer of unusual chemistry options.
Quote:
Originally Posted by juj
Yes, light colored moths become dark colored moths. (micro) So evolution is fact, huh? Please explain the exact historical path of a single cell bacteria into a Tazmanian Devil. Please support the biologicial changes with hard evidence.
Quote:
Originally Posted by rifleman
Why do you ask for such an unlikely lineage? The process is quite obvious, and proven in the lab and well documented. Hard evidence is now easily at hand if you choose to look it up. (I'm betting you'd rather not really learn about this stuff though, right? After all, what would that do to your critically important life viewpoint? Right?)
As well, it's not our job to provide you with a Grade 10 biology education. nonetheless, it's called "accumulated advantages" and includes "evolutionary vectors", and other very logical stuff. , Evolution's the obvious consequence and outcome of the unique ability of DNA to mutate, record it's mutations and try them out on the next generation. Simplicity through to complexity.
Now that we can and will map the genome of literally every organism on this planet, you'll be forced to see how one "species" (a defined but human-defined point in the otherwise constant development of a lineage) evolves through mutation into a different, perhaps more specialized, or perhaps less, organism. No sleight of hand required.
BTW, your lack of technical education in this area is now clear. How can you rationally hope to debate with any sort of honesty if you don't know your topic at all?
Here's another one: How does a organic soup of a few compounds become that first relicating life form? Please, you must have verifiable evidence or evolution is just theory. Were you there? Was anyone there? I guess the world will never know for sure.
Quote:
Originally Posted by rifleteacher
Yep, we do in fact. Those danged Brits and Craig Venter again, but that's your reading assignment, not mine. I did my 25 years as a grad student, researcher and teacher. Your turn. Beside, whatever I might say here, you'd probably just deny it anyhow, even if it were The God's Truth.
Theory in any realm means it is unproven.
(WRONG. See explanation above.)
It is conjecture, a hypothesis.
(Nope. first an hypothesis is vigorously confirmed and re-confirmed, and only then does it become a Theory. You'll rarely find a true scientist saying anything is officially designated as a FACT. Vis: The Theory of Gravity. The Theory of Light Propagation, of molecular interaction, of, well, anything. Stop with this old tiresome Creationist silliness and evasive ploy. )
There is absolutely no evidence that a single cell microbe evolved into a fish or a sea invertebrate.
(Oh well. sigh. You're wrong, but why would you accept that.)
The theory of evolution provides one means of explaining the transition assuming there was a transition, but in no way provides hard evidence that it actually happened. So evolution IS theory.
And I haven't told you I was a creationist, I am merely reminding you that your arrogance of what actually happened is unearned.
(Let's see now... Millions of honest scientists all working at various aspects of the origins of this earth, geologically, astronomically, biologically, sub-atomically, etc. All simultaneously wrong and assumptively arrogant, huh? But then you come along and conflate abiogenesis with adaptive Evolution? And we're the arrogant, incorrect ones? Hmmm. Why am I not so convinced of your qualifications?)
Unless you can time travel at be there and witness the point of change, you will never know for sure. Hence, the world will never know for sure.
Simply not how it has to work. We can and do determine past events through modern evidence, as well as through simple conjecture which is then proven pout by field or lab observations. Q: will a supersaturated sugar solution form crystals on a string, like the ones we found yesterday in the back of the lab, which formed when no-one was around? So... was that God then?
Let's try out our crystal formation hypothesis shall we? And when we do, and we can establish the conditions in the original situation, we conclude there's a high probability that, yep, that's exactly how it happened. further more exacting tests conclude with the exact same results. We can, of course, go to far more sophisticated levels than this in our modern scientific investigations.
We didn't have to be there, son. Some things are just obvious, and certainly more believable than some hand-waving Godly supernatural thingy. We certainly weren't there for that either. And hows about all the mandated timelines and impossible events, from Noah's Ark to a 6 day Creation, to the easily disproven, desperate and quite recent ID silliness?
Science marches on, discoveries are made, and yet the bible remains an ever more outdated and certainly non-scientific book. It's always your choice to believe in that sort of thing, of course...
Wouldn't it be fun to have Creationists in a class and be able to flunk them for not paying attention, giving ridiculous answers on essay tests, etc.? You could even write stuff in the margins of their tests, make them stay after school, etc. And ultimately flunk them for not studying, doing well on tests, turning in assignments that made any sense or understanding the subject. Too bad that can't be done in life.
I guess that's why it's known as the LAW of gravity, and not the THEORY of gravity.
Sorry, it is the theory of gravity. Here is how it works....The rules within a theory are called "laws" and the inverse square law of the Newtonian theory of gravitation does describe gravity extremely well.
In the language of science, the word "law" describes an analytic statement. It gives us a formula that tells us what things will do. For example, Newton's Law of Universal Gravitation tells us that "Every point mass attracts every single point mass by a force pointing along the line intersecting both points. The force is directly proportional to the product of the two masses and inversely proportional to the square of the distance between the point masses."
But gravity as a whole is a scientific theory and a theory can have several laws.
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Another Desperate Attempt to mis-quote Facts...
