Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.1 6/24/83; site cadovax.UUCP Path: utzoo!linus!philabs!prls!amdimage!amdcad!amd!pesnta!pertec!scgvaxd!trwrb!trwrba!cadovax!keithd From: keithd@cadovax.UUCP (Keith Doyle) Newsgroups: net.origins Subject: Re: Response to flames Message-ID: <603@cadovax.UUCP> Date: Thu, 9-May-85 20:46:22 EDT Article-I.D.: cadovax.603 Posted: Thu May 9 20:46:22 1985 Date-Received: Tue, 14-May-85 06:42:29 EDT References: <253@cmu-cs-edu1.ARPA> <303@scgvaxd.UUCP> <1518@hao.UUCP>, <310@scgvaxd.UUCP> Organization: Contel Cado, Torrance, CA Lines: 109 [...................] > All supposed evidence for evolution is subjective. All data is > interpreted with the biased assumption of evolution behind it. Not true. > Then of course there is your circular reasoning. Like for example, > using the fossils to date the strata and using the geologic column > to date the fossils and using the assumption of uniformitarianism to > support the geologic column. a. The geologic column was estimated to be extremely old somewhat BEFORE Darwin by geologists that were operating under the 'creationist' frame of reference of that time. And, I might add, BEFORE radio-carbon dating. When later dating was developed, it's use supported and refined this old-age data, and radio-carbon dating as a technique has been cross checked by several other means (astronomical for one). b. Uniformitarianism holds that only presently observable natural forces have operated in the past, as they do today, although their rates can vary. Evan at the most rapid rates know to exist, natural forces cannot account for geological features such as continental drift or sedimentation except on a time scale of many millions of years. >Dan: > Please! You don't think the Big Bang ranks as superstition? We are > the product of an explosion? Your Big Bang theory isn't worth the > powder to blow it up. And its been blown full of holes. Perhaps. Either way it has nothing to do with evolution. >Closed systems can produce smaller parts (Earth) with higher order than the >rest of the environment. This is not a problem. >Dan: > Truly, an oversimplification! This is an example of that brand of > science known as the science of evolution! > > The first Law of T. states that nothing is being created or destroyed. > Therefore, the universe did not create itself. There is nothing in the > present structure of natural law that could possibly account for its > own origin. Just as there is nothing in the present structure of 'creationist' ravings that could possibly account for a creators own origin. > The second Law requires the universe to have had a beginning. The first > Law precludes its having begun itself. Ok, so maybe it DID begin by 'magic'. Evolution is what it did after that. > There are systems which do manifest an increasing degree of comlexity. > These are open systems and draw on external sources of energy. However, > merely having an open system and energy available from the sun does > not automatically generate higher order in that system. All real systems > are open systems and are open in one way or another to the sun's energy. > But most systems normally proceed to lower degrees of order in accord > with the law of entropy. I see no reason to assume this, or that MOST systems means ALL systems. > No system shows an increasing order unless it also possesses a specific > program to direct its growth and a complex mechanism to convert the > suns energy into specific work. Examples of such directive programs > are DNA in living systems and plans and specifications for > construction of artificial systems. Mechanisms for storing and > converting energy would be photosynthesis in plants, metabolism in > animals, and machinery in artificial construction. Simple organic molecules have been seen to form from elementary constituents (ammonia, methane, etc.), and assemble themselves into self-replicating nucleic acids which mutate and are altered in frequency by natural selection, all in the laboratory under conditions resembling the prebiotic earth. Note that all 'specific work' has to mean is replication. > This driving mechanism is absent in the case of supposed evolution. > Saying that the sun's energy is adequate to sustain evolution without > saying HOW is like saying that there is enough energy in a waterfall > to fly an airplane. Even if true, it is irrelevant until a mechanism > for converting such energy into a useful medium is accomplished. There are lots of potential 'how's. Evolutionary theorists are postulating new ones every day. That still dosen't change the fact that however life got started, it evolved, is still evolving, and took millions of years to get to where we are now. > Unfortunately, you will never give any scientific evidence for > evolution because there is none. Not true. There is considerable scientific evidence for evolution. >> What is the difference >> between God creating Adam, and a reptile giving birth to a bird? > >Nothing, since neither happened. >Dan: > Thats not what the Punctuationists say. You better had read up on > the new evolutionary trend. Hopeful monsters is where its at, man! Go research your Punctuated Equilibrium a bit more. P.E. does not claim (or imply) that any animals immediate parent animal was that of another species. Note that when P.E. theorists say 'quickly' they still mean umpteen generations, not overnight. 'Quickly' is meant relatively to how long a stasis tends to last (might take 5-10,000 years to drift to a new species 'quickly', then remain stable for a couple million years). Keith Doyle # {ucbvax,ihnp4,decvax}!trwrb!cadovax!keithd