Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/18/84; site utastro.UUCP Path: utzoo!linus!decvax!tektronix!zehntel!dual!mordor!ut-sally!utastro!bill From: bill@utastro.UUCP (William H. Jefferys) Newsgroups: net.origins Subject: Re: Glarch Message-ID: <28@utastro.UUCP> Date: Sat, 20-Apr-85 19:15:36 EST Article-I.D.: utastro.28 Posted: Sat Apr 20 19:15:36 1985 Date-Received: Fri, 26-Apr-85 22:43:41 EST References: <946@uwmacc.UUCP> Distribution: net Organization: U. Texas, Astronomy, Austin, TX Lines: 162 Although I have promised to stay out of this controversy in general, I have to respond to Paul Dubois' latest comments. [On Cuffey's bibliography of papers supporting the existence of transitional forms] > > It is > simply a fact that any given paper is very likely to be subject to > disagreement. So 100 papers is simply 100 papers which are going to be > fought over. (I realize that this is an overly general statement > which, to be compelling, should be demonstrated by showing controversy > in regard to the papers in question. I think you get my meaning, > though.) > OK, then, why don't you demonstrate your point by documenting the controversy you claim is there? Let's see if it is really relevant to the question of the existence of transitional forms, or if (as is most of the controversy that Creationists quote) it is actually about entirely different issues. [on Archaeopteryx] > That it had both reptilian and birdlike characteristics is obvious and > has always been known and agreed on. Its status as a transitional form > is what has always been debated. [Much left out] > > Again, there could be > > no clearer proof that Archaeopteryx was indeed a transitional form. > > Yep. It had both reptilian and avian characteristics. > Well, it appears that Paul agrees that Archaeopteryx was transitional. Since that was my point, can we go on to something else? > >>-------------- > Not so long ago, continual upward progress USED to be a big theme of > evolutionists and stasis WAS inconsistent with that. (Obviously this > proves nothing about the current state of affairs - and creationists > ought to realize this fact, if they don't already.) > A wrong argument is wrong no matter who makes it. > >>---------------- > >>Hitching [1982] comments: > >> > >>(i) No series of horse fossils is complete anywhere in the world. To > >>move up in a complete series requires that one bounce from continent to > >>continent. Even if one accepts this, the number of fossils and the > >>relative ordering is subject to a good deal of dispute. > > > Yet two pages later in his book, Hitching shows a chart ("one of many > > conflicting versions of horse ancestry") which shows the entire > > main line of the development of the horse, from Eohippus to Equus, > > as taking place in North America. > > And then (in the same diagram) Equus goes to Eurasia, turns into the > modern horse and comes back to North (and South) America. Proving my > point. Come on, Bill. Did you think I wouldn't look it up? > Come on, Paul, don't be obtuse. The claim made by Hitching is that one has to bounce from continent to continent to get a complete horse series. That is contradicted by his own figure, which shows the entire main line of the evolution of the horse, up to Equus itself, in North America. Equus (modern horse *is* Equus) then established itself on the Eurasian continent, presumably via the land bridge that periodically connected it to the North American Continent. Subsequently the Indians wiped out the horse (along with most large mammals) in the Americas, and it was brought back to North America by the Spaniards. The latter fact is documented in the historical record, and the fact of the extinction of large mammals by native Americans is well documented in the recent paleontological record. I stand by my statement. > > There are occasional side shoots, > > but they are not on the main line. To my knowledge, this is in > > agreement with current understanding. So Hitching's own book contradicts > > the idea that one has to "bounce from continent to continent". And so > > what if there is controversy about the exact ordering? Controversy is > > quite normal in good science. > > You're the one that talked about the "facts" of the ordering, Bill. > Are there facts, after all? Or just controversy? > I am not aware of any evidence that the entire development of the horse, to Equus, did not take place in North America. Are you? That is the only claim I made. > > Since when does evolution predict that evolution takes place in a > > continuous, monotonic progression? > > Does it or not? There's been a lot of evolutionary writing *on the > horse* that paints exactly that picture. > A wrong argument is wrong no matter who makes it. > > That's true. Living fossils don't contradict evolution because nothing > does. Not an increase in complexity. Not stasis. Not a decrease in > complexity. Evolution thus reduces to description void of explanatory > value. > ...[and] > > Since when does evolution predict a > > continuous, monotonic progression? > > Since never, I guess. It "predicts" everything, and therefore, > nothing. > Baloney. You have used this bogus argument twice in this article, and many times in the other articles you posted recently. You make an assertion that evolution ought to predict something that it doesn't. Perhaps it was also said by evolutionists, but that's irrelevant if the assertion is wrong. When I point out that evolution in fact makes *no* such assertions, you claim that this shows that evolution can predict anything, therefore predicts nothing. This is absolute hogwash. For the record, this is called "demolishing a straw man". Evolution makes many very specific predictions which can, and have, been tested. That the distance between protein sequences should be correlated closely with the degree to which two species are related, to give only a single example. Creationism makes no such predictions since by its very hypotheses, the Creator, being all-powerful, can do anything He pleases. There are numerous observations which could in principle disprove evolution. There are none that could in principle disprove creationism. That is why evolution is a science and creationism is not. But no one claims that evolution theory can "predict" the future evolution of a species given its past evolution, as you imply it should. If some evolutionists claim that it can, well they are wrong. It is impossible to make such predictions since evolution is driven largely by stochastic processes and unique events (such as meteorite impacts resulting in great extinctions). > > Actually, it is surprising that Creationists are as fond > > of Hitching's book as they seem to be. It is clear that Hitching > > does not dispute the fact of evolution. I think that it is partly > > because when Hitching points out difficulties with *Darwinism*, > > Creationists imagine that Hitching is actually attacking *evolution*. > > > Nothing could be further from the truth. Hitching says, on p. 4: > > ... > > And so on. Creationists must not have read this book very carefully > > if they believe that it gives any support to their cause. > > I know he's an evolutionist. I know he doesn't think much of > creationism. > > I've read it carefully - twice. But while it is obviously not a > creationist book (just as Macbeth's book isn't), it contains material > helpful to some of the points which I wished to make - so I used it. > So what? Is evolutionary material reserved for the exclusive use of > evolutionists? > No, but to quote from Hitching's book as if he were arguing against evolution, when he is not, strikes me as being, at the very least, disingenuous. -- "Men never do evil so cheerfully and so completely as when they do so from religious conviction." -- Blaise Pascal Bill Jefferys 8-% Astronomy Dept, University of Texas, Austin TX 78712 (USnail) {allegra,ihnp4}!{ut-sally,noao}!utastro!bill (uucp) bill%utastro.UTEXAS@ut-sally.ARPA (ARPANET)