Why do people reject evolution?

[Quaxar]

snip for length

Your Paper is somewhat interesting however, I believe there is a majorly overlooked flaw in their method. It would have been more fruitful to check if any of the genes on either side were expressed on the anti-sense strand. If the ends were to join up 5>3 prime & vice versa than one sense strand will become an anti-sense strand (it was confusing but I had to draw a diagram to see it). This would present a risk where after replication about half of this new fused chromosome would be rendered useless or worse, produce random junk RNA sequences or even translate random peptide sequences that could aggregate in the cell, especially with no epigenetic regulation. I wonder if they checked inverted expression with replicated robertsonian chromosomes in the individuals that do survive & how far they can go. Either way translocation doesn't appear to be an effective method for scrambling individual genes all around the genome or on the same chromosome, atleast not with positive results anyway. Given our up to date knowledge its very likely due to transposons or microsatelites which are also tandem repeats but the fact that my human genetics textbook just makes a mere reference of the fusion theory leaves to believe that geneticists are just going to settle on that & not bother with further experimentation. I hope im wrong about that.

In my defense there are genuine YEC scientists (of which I will be soon enough) who do present both the evidence & both interpretations of it. Its always the quacks who get the most attention. I will however applaud you on your effort to prove your point in an academic & professional manner (as opposed to substanceless sarcastic mockery), thats always refreshing. And further more, I hope you did well on your exams. Better than mine did atleast.

No, there are no "genuine YEC scientists" because the young earth stance fundamentally contradicts established sciences in so many ways that there is simply no reasonable ground for it. It's essentially not different from calling yourself a flat-earth scientist.
What I find is that a lot of that research is focused on challenging very specific little tit-bits, then inserting the supernatural into the gap. And that's just silly.
Sarcastic mockery is kind of pointless if you want to have a discussion rather than a trench war is my view, but I know many people of both sides like to pretend like they don't even need to prove anything because it's so obviously right. And my exam went very well, thanks a lot. That is to say I passed, anyway.

Off to the genetics then. I'm in luck, it's part of my next exam so I can pretend like I prepare.
I realize a study as old as me wasn't the best but I kind of liked it because it was more detailed than second-hand articles like <url=http://www.genome.gov/13514624>this one. For some reason a lot of search results is various creationists' reactions to it, that kind of makes it hard to find real articles.
Of course translocation isn't effective for positive effects but that isn't to say that it has to be negative. I'm sure it has been said before but anyway, translocation occurs not that rarely. Although I have to say I just read part of one study examining negative genetic mutations and it went so far over my head that I didn't even see it pass.

I just remembered another even better argument from genetics if you like: Viral DNA encoded in the primate genome.
http://ars.els-cdn.com/content/image/1-s2.0-S088875430600245X-gr4.jpg
This is for example the backtrace of a line of HERV-P viruses through primate DNA, where everytime a new strand is added we are able to find it in all species further down the evolutionary tree. Evidence consistent with the already priorly established family tree.

Now to spare you the search, there is a retroviral strain called <url=http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2005/03/050328174826.htm>PtERV1 only occuring in African great apes and Old World monkeys but not humans and Asian apes although like the graph above illustrates there is common ancestry among those but there's theories to explain those discrepancies; for example there's a study of a specific <url=http://www.sciencemag.org/content/316/5832/1756>antiretroviral immune protein that has shown to be able to block that virus in a low enough dose.
Not that there's no competing view but such is science.

And I'll be damned, you're right, I just spent ten minutes with my genetics book (Russel et al., iGenetics) but no mention I could spot of human chromosome 2 anywhere in the genome or mutations sections as an example. Out of interest, what book do you use?

 

[darkstarangel]

snip for length

Your Paper is somewhat interesting however, I believe there is a majorly overlooked flaw in their method. It would have been more fruitful to check if any of the genes on either side were expressed on the anti-sense strand. If the ends were to join up 5>3 prime & vice versa than one sense strand will become an anti-sense strand (it was confusing but I had to draw a diagram to see it). This would present a risk where after replication about half of this new fused chromosome would be rendered useless or worse, produce random junk RNA sequences or even translate random peptide sequences that could aggregate in the cell, especially with no epigenetic regulation. I wonder if they checked inverted expression with replicated robertsonian chromosomes in the individuals that do survive & how far they can go. Either way translocation doesn't appear to be an effective method for scrambling individual genes all around the genome or on the same chromosome, atleast not with positive results anyway. Given our up to date knowledge its very likely due to transposons or microsatelites which are also tandem repeats but the fact that my human genetics textbook just makes a mere reference of the fusion theory leaves to believe that geneticists are just going to settle on that & not bother with further experimentation. I hope im wrong about that.

In my defense there are genuine YEC scientists (of which I will be soon enough) who do present both the evidence & both interpretations of it. Its always the quacks who get the most attention. I will however applaud you on your effort to prove your point in an academic & professional manner (as opposed to substanceless sarcastic mockery), thats always refreshing. And further more, I hope you did well on your exams. Better than mine did atleast.

No, there are no "genuine YEC scientists" because the young earth stance fundamentally contradicts established sciences in so many ways that there is simply no reasonable ground for it. It's essentially not different from calling yourself a flat-earth scientist.
What I find is that a lot of that research is focused on challenging very specific little tit-bits, then inserting the supernatural into the gap. And that's just silly.
Sarcastic mockery is kind of pointless if you want to have a discussion rather than a trench war is my view, but I know many people of both sides like to pretend like they don't even need to prove anything because it's so obviously right. And my exam went very well, thanks a lot. That is to say I passed, anyway.

Off to the genetics then. I'm in luck, it's part of my next exam so I can pretend like I prepare.
I realize a study as old as me wasn't the best but I kind of liked it because it was more detailed than second-hand articles like <url=http://www.genome.gov/13514624>this one. For some reason a lot of search results is various creationists' reactions to it, that kind of makes it hard to find real articles.
Of course translocation isn't effective for positive effects but that isn't to say that it has to be negative. I'm sure it has been said before but anyway, translocation occurs not that rarely. Although I have to say I just read part of one study examining negative genetic mutations and it went so far over my head that I didn't even see it pass.

I just remembered another even better argument from genetics if you like: Viral DNA encoded in the primate genome.
http://ars.els-cdn.com/content/image/1-s2.0-S088875430600245X-gr4.jpg
This is for example the backtrace of a line of HERV-P viruses through primate DNA, where everytime a new strand is added we are able to find it in all species further down the evolutionary tree. Evidence consistent with the already priorly established family tree.

Now to spare you the search, there is a retroviral strain called <url=http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2005/03/050328174826.htm>PtERV1 only occuring in African great apes and Old World monkeys but not humans and Asian apes although like the graph above illustrates there is common ancestry among those but there's theories to explain those discrepancies; for example there's a study of a specific <url=http://www.sciencemag.org/content/316/5832/1756>antiretroviral immune protein that has shown to be able to block that virus in a low enough dose.
Not that there's no competing view but such is science.

And I'll be damned, you're right, I just spent ten minutes with my genetics book (Russel et al., iGenetics) but no mention I could spot of human chromosome 2 anywhere in the genome or mutations sections as an example. Out of interest, what book do you use?

OK, as for the YEC position, we acknowledge the supernatural as part of the equation. Naturally not everyone accepts this but then again not everyone is willing to give it a chance. As for a young earth there is plenty of evidence in support of it you just need to look for it. There is also no crime in challenging "established" science. We seem to forget that a lot of the historical figures in sciences history challenged (& eventually changed) what was then established science. It seems to be a trend these days that nobody is allowed to challenge anything any more. But anyway im losing sleep so ill stick to genetics & stay on topic.

Your article on ptERVs is interesting but as it stated, the DNA contains regulatory elements. These sound like transposons to me. There's still not much known about them but they're used a lot by B lymphocytes when producing all the different combinations of antibodies. I think the same process is used for globins too. To me I find it disappointing that these are just written off as viral DNA, as if there is some unwritten rule stating that DNA must be static. No one ever seems to look at it the other way round & suggest that this mechanism is a natural part of the chromosomes function & that viruses originated from it. After all, where else could have viruses come from?

The other article on Chromosomes 2 & 4 didn't seem too confident in its assertions but at least it was honest. The older article had more meat to it. Although one other problem I forgot to mention last time was that the repeats weren't ordered in codons, instead the bases were position to show TTAGGG repeats & what was suggested to be its variances. I cant remember if that's what they're methods targeted but to me it seemed a bit misleading without showing the full linear code undivided. Either way that's neither here nor there I just wanted to get that off my chest because it only occured to me after I hit the post button.

In any case I dont have a problem if people want to interpret the data to support an evolutionary origin I just think they should wait until we figure how all of it works first rather than imposing assumptions prematurely & cluttering the database with outdated articles. That's my position anyway. Im glad your exams are going well. I missed one of mine because I wrote the wrong time down & im so pissed the uni wouldn't let me do it again. I still passed though its only second year organic chemistry but I missed my chance of getting what would probably have been my highest mark so far. If you have no problems like that then all I can say is you're doing very well. My textbook by the way is Human Molecular Genetics 4th edition by Strachan & Read. Iv read it more out general interest than for study since I bought it so im debating with myself whether it was worth all that money or not.

 

[Quaxar]

another snip

OK, as for the YEC position, we acknowledge the supernatural as part of the equation. Naturally not everyone accepts this but then again not everyone is willing to give it a chance. As for a young earth there is plenty of evidence in support of it you just need to look for it. There is also no crime in challenging "established" science. We seem to forget that a lot of the historical figures in sciences history challenged (& eventually changed) what was then established science. It seems to be a trend these days that nobody is allowed to challenge anything any more. But anyway im losing sleep so ill stick to genetics & stay on topic.

[...]

In any case I dont have a problem if people want to interpret the data to support an evolutionary origin I just think they should wait until we figure how all of it works first rather than imposing assumptions prematurely & cluttering the database with outdated articles. That's my position anyway. Im glad your exams are going well. I missed one of mine because I wrote the wrong time down & im so pissed the uni wouldn't let me do it again. I still passed though its only second year organic chemistry but I missed my chance of getting what would probably have been my highest mark so far. If you have no problems like that then all I can say is you're doing very well. My textbook by the way is Human Molecular Genetics 4th edition by Strachan & Read. Iv read it more out general interest than for study since I bought it so im debating with myself whether it was worth all that money or not.

Nothing wrong with challenging theories but there are boundaries in which you can do it. Young-earth creation necessarily assumes that the last hundred years of geology, geophysics, biology and astronomy are wrong, not to mention other fields' reasearch where appropriate. Of course there is a chance that there is something behind it, but if you have to go against and ignore decades of multi-field reasearch to make your theories work it is highly questionable.

Some theories completely turned over a scientific field, that isn't to say that every theory that did so was ultimately right. Spontaneous generation was superceded by Lamarck's inheritance of acquired characteristics, the four element theory was replaced by phlogiston theory, yet none of those turned out to be the ultimate solution.
Yes, Copernicus changed astronomy with his heliocentric model but geocentrism had long been majorly flawed and relied heavily on planets moving around invisible centres (epicycles) to properly explain their orbits and the aether theory was dependent on assumptions that could be explained much easier and more reliable by relativity but the new theories still explain the same phenomena, they just do it in a better way. As such, any new theory that tries to surpass evolution still has to account for millions of fossils, DNA and physiological similarities.
To say "god did it" and everything that contradicts your belief is just "temptation" is simply a nonsensical assumption if you want your theory to be taken seriously because ultimately if you implant a supernatural being to fill your theory's holes what's to stop you from doing it with anything?

Some examples: almost all carbohydrates that are physiologically used in the entire tree of life are D-enantiomers while with amino acids it's the same with L. And if humans are the pinnacle of creation, why design all mammals so that their bodies can't synthesize double bonds after C9 and still make fatty acids like linolenic acid with two double bonds after C9 needed for survival? Why in the whole of creation can DNA only be transcribed from 5' to 3', thus making transcription more complicated than necessary for one strand? Why do quasi hairless humans possess a pilomotor reflex (goosebumps)? Or why is a giraffe's inferior laryngeal nerve starting at the brain, then going all the way down through the neck to the heart just to turn and go back up to the larynx?
Can Creationism explain these phenomenons with something that is not "god's ways are mysterious and his reasoning is beyond our grasp"? Because evolution can.
If you stop looking to fill the gaps and instead put "???" what's the point of doing the research, and this is why the supernatural has no place in science.
Quite frankly, a majority things you get from Creationists is cherrypicking specific examples that haven't been fully researched and explained yet and saying "nobody knows how evolution could lead to this, therefor creation", while another part, like non-doctor Kent Hovind, flat out lie about facts and evidence or at least distort them for ridiculing purposes. These aren't challenges of a theory based on contrary evidence, it's the wish that evolution is wrong because you don't like its implications and then setting out with the absolute goal of fulfilling that wish, ignoring clear contrary evidence and interpreting everything else in a way that suits your goal.
Not to mention that you are still putting all your stakes on your personal religion's creation myth being true compared to a myriad of others. EDIT: I have touched on that subject in <url=http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/18.394799-Why-do-people-reject-evolution?page=25#16275879>a later post. I'm curious what makes you so sure that the universe was created by Yhwh and not Viracocha or Brahman? They all have their books, some are even older or more in accordance with science than the Old Testament and I'm sure all of these religions at one point considered their own creation version true.

Interpreting data is vital, either way. Whether you use it to support a religious or secular stance, both are assumptions based on a body of evidence. Saying we shouldn't rush an interpretation would in the end ruin your side as well, because you too chose to interpret the currently available evidence a way that is most fitting to your belief.

I'd like to see a bit of your evidence for creation, and that's sans any sarcasm because I just had a look and the only things I found that weren't blatant misinterpretations and misinformations of theories (the "why are there still monkeys?" kind) were badly sourced articles. Like only sourcing from earlier articles in the same magazine bad. Or <url=http://www.answersingenesis.org/articles/cm/v19/n3/clock-in-the-rock>something I could't find a single thing on that was not an exact copy of the text there, not a single properly published source (even in a bad magazine) and I have to say I start to doubt that the alleged "Dolores Testerman" even exists at all.

And because a TED talk is always relevant:
<youtube=7OMLSs8t1ng>
Not directly related to creationism but I think we can pass it off as near enough. Just play along, I'm sure there are some anti-vaccine people around.

Missing an exam sucks but good you made it anyway.
I've heard of your book but since my professor said iGenetics was practically all you'd ever need up to MSc I just went along.

I think I'll tackle the genetics in a second post, it's starting to get a bit long and confusing otherwise. Also, I would like to further my research before replying but need to take a break first.

 

[Sindaine]

Usually? because they're semi-literate Jesus-freaks.

 

[Quaxar]

Sorry this took me so long. Busy day before Christmas.

Your article on ptERVs is interesting but as it stated, the DNA contains regulatory elements. These sound like transposons to me. There's still not much known about them but they're used a lot by B lymphocytes when producing all the different combinations of antibodies. I think the same process is used for globins too. To me I find it disappointing that these are just written off as viral DNA, as if there is some unwritten rule stating that DNA must be static. No one ever seems to look at it the other way round & suggest that this mechanism is a natural part of the chromosomes function & that viruses originated from it. After all, where else could have viruses come from?

The other article on Chromosomes 2 & 4 didn't seem too confident in its assertions but at least it was honest. The older article had more meat to it. Although one other problem I forgot to mention last time was that the repeats weren't ordered in codons, instead the bases were position to show TTAGGG repeats & what was suggested to be its variances. I cant remember if that's what they're methods targeted but to me it seemed a bit misleading without showing the full linear code undivided. Either way that's neither here nor there I just wanted to get that off my chest because it only occured to me after I hit the post button.

Well, for once we know that it is retroviral DNA because it exhibits mirrored long terminal repeats (<url=http://www.biology-online.org/dictionary/Long-terminal_repeats>LTRs) at each end that are typical features of retroviruses such as HIV.
You're confusing me a bit, DNA is by no means static, hasn't that been the topic of our last few posts? No one assumes that viruses come from mammalian DNA because they are far older than even any land animal. That isn't to say any virus has always existed in its current form since they too are subject to evolutionary selection but their respective families (e.g. Retroviridae, Togaviridae, etc.) themselves are of pre-human age.

As for "where else could they have come from" we do have <url=http://www.nature.com/scitable/topicpage/the-origins-of-viruses-14398218>several conclusive theories about that.
1. genetic elements gaining the power to move between cells, similar to existing retrotransposons
2. adoption of a parasitic lifestyle in response to a loss of genetic material from an autonomous or symbiotic life, similar to current intracellular parastite-bacteria
3. viruses existing even before other cells, employing self-replicating and catalyzing RNA (<url=http://www.newscientist.com/blogs/shortsharpscience/2011/04/rna-enzyme-makes-another-rna-e.html>totally conceivable), then switching over to today's viral method for a more efficient replication
For further research also play <url=http://skunksoup.com/2011/10/free-online-games/strategy/simulation/multitasking-management/disease/pandemic-2-disease-mutation>Pandemic 2. Not part of my point, just a fun game.

I don't know why I kept looking through pages of google results of creation arguments and such for good sources when the answer was right there all along. That's what you get for not just using the nature.com internal search...
Anyway, apparently <url=http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v434/n7034/full/nature03466.html>this is the go-to study of chromosome 2 concerning fusion site and centromere/telomere remnants. Though it's at parts so technical it makes my head spin.

 

[Mr.PlanetEater]

People reject Evolution because people have the capacity for free thought and choice, meaning you're always going to have someone who will choose to agree and someone who will choose to disagree; and there isn't a damn thing you can do about it.

I'm in the pro-Evolution camp by the way.

 

[texanarob]

Similarly, I believe your faith in evolution is merely an attempt to rationalise creation and therefore to excuse your lifestyle without judgement from a creator. However, I argue this case with shared logic and i would appreciate if you didn't pass me off as some uneducated stubborn fundamentalist nut. You have offended me sir.

First off before you accuse me of "Faith" or "not having done the research" im a biologist who is going to uni to study biomedical science. I spent a few weeks working in a genetics lab.

So youre assuming i believe in what i do because im a bad person and dont want to feel bad about being a bad person... erm no? You cant just think EVERYONE who is an atheist is totally immoral. Especially when proportionally fewer atheists go to jail than christians in America in proportion to their size as a group. For your information im very moral. And require no vengeful hand hanging over me to be so. Im surprised i saw "Atheists just fear judgement!" from someone as honest sounding as you. Im offended sir much like you were at such an obviously offensive fallacy.

Creationism is bad science. It has a major single source which is "infallible" which is a MAJOR no in science. You NEVER use only one source. You NEVER declare the source infallible as a given. No good theory is built using such crude assumptions.

It also works in the reverse order compared to how the scientific method should work. You have a conclusion from the infallible source. And then you seek to prove it with evidence. This is nonsense since whats the point of gathering evidence if the conclusion is already "infallible". Why research anything at all? Its right and confirming it is silly. The scientific method demands you draw NO conclusions until after you gather evidence. You then dont prove anything with evidence. You use the evidence to draw a conclusion. If that conclusion is then well evidenced and used in science (which it most certainly is) others may use more evidence to show that the conclusion MUST be false.

The argument of creationism IS an argument. However it has as much validity as ANY religions creation story and times. Its evidence is poor and a pathetic challenge to the theory of evolution. You incorrectly stated that people assume a creator didnt create anything as a starting point. This is nonsense. There is no starting point other than observation. There are no "givens". There is only gathering what is seen. If the scientists assumed god had no part is irrelevant. They gathered what they saw and drew a conclusion from said evidence. At now part did the "assumption" you accused them of come into play. The evidence showed X and they drew X as the conclusion.

Creationism isnt a valid or useful theory. It explains little and offers no understanding of the world around us. Its not worth the time to challenge since it brings nothing interesting to the table other than chipping away furiously at a much larger well established idea with small nit picks. If the formation of life is a 1000 piece puzzle evolution has filled about 800 pieces in establishing its most certainly the way life formed. By pointing out there are holes it doesnt change the fact the other 800 pieces all fit into place so far. This is why the "missing link" bull is totally absurd. You dont need to show every organism evolving every stage. Just quite a few. At a few stages. Even ONE fossil showing adaption totally throws creationism out of the window so we are basically done here. Unless the creation theory thinks that every single minor adaption is actually a separate species created by god, except 99.9999999% of them were killed in the flood leaving only the ones we have today?

Dont project or assume anything from someone youve never met. Thats arrogant to the extreme. Dont assume im immoral. Dont assume i defend and get angry at these pointless challenges because im insecure about my world view. Dont assume you know me that intimately sir because you definitely do not. It offends me because biology is my passion and my lifes work and i love it with every ounce of my being. If biology is a wonderfully stocked feast the the creation theory is a stumbling drunk who stumbles over to tell you his vomit is as valid as your lovingly cooked turkey as a creation. It offends me. Its poor science and i will grant respect to those who accept they are rejecting logic and understanding for faith and assumptions. Dont try and prop up irrational faith with science. Just accept its a totally faith based position thats against all evidence and be happy that you made that choice. I could flip it around and say youre insecure if you feel the need to justify creationism with science. It says in the bible after all, what more proof do we need? Why would any creation scientist want any proof at all since the one true source says so? Why do you want creationism to seem "logical" and "reasonable" when it doesnt need to be. All it needs is biblical verification.

Apologies, my internet went down and I appear to have been misunderstood. I know this is an old post, but I come across as an arrogant, judgemental git, so I'm gonna correct it.

I was not actually saying that I believed you to believe in evolution to avoid dealing with your own morality. The first word of the quote is 'similarly'. I meant to compare two stereotypes believed by the uninformed on the opposing sides in this debate.

I can't find the initial quote, but you said something along the lines of me ignoring science because I can only follow blind faith in an ancient book, an equally offensive and dismissive point to many Christians believing all atheists/evolutionists to be immoral fools.

I repeat, The above post does not reflect my view, but is merely a badly worded retaliation to an anger inducing insult at the early hours of the morning.

'Im surprised i saw "Atheists just fear judgement!" from someone as honest sounding as you. Im offended sir much like you were at such an obviously offensive fallacy.'
Your surprise hopefully means you will understand my correction. I didn't mean to offend you, and appreciate the implication that I appear 'honest' through a keyboard.

Good luck with your biomedical science. Having been through university myself (aerospace engineering) I hope you get the opportunity to have this debate with someone in person much more thoroughly than an internet forum allows.

I also feel I can't end this post without comment on the original issue. Creationism may take the Bible as a source, and many who look into it believe that source to be infallible. However, there are many scientists out there who look into creationism using all the sources available. When all the evidence fits a previously held belief, but cannot prove it true, I see no reason to abandon that belief. Bad science? Maybe. But evolution uses a similar concept.

As far as creationism not being a useful theory, especially concerning the world around us, that depends on the outlook on the world. To claim creation would further scientific breakthroughs is outside my knowledge, but I imagine such a claim would be false. However, if we hypothetically accept creation to be true, the effects on human life would be huge. The mindset would be significantly different once a creator is involved, and any theory that could potentially result in fewer souls lost has a massive use for those of us who believe.

 

[disgruntledgamer]

In my defense there are genuine YEC scientists (of which I will be soon enough) who do present both the evidence & both interpretations of it. Its always the quacks who get the most attention. I will however applaud you on your effort to prove your point in an academic & professional manner (as opposed to substanceless sarcastic mockery), thats always refreshing. And further more, I hope you did well on your exams. Better than mine did atleast.

No there isn't, YEC scientist is an oxymoron, If you're a YEC you are not a scientist period. If you think the world is around 6,000 years old you are going against every branch of scientific thinking, even dendrochronology (tree ring dating) says the world is at least 11,000 years old.

People who are YEC scientist are not scientist they're people who provide disinformation to the general masses who don't know enough to see that they are bluntly misinterpreting and flat out lying to defend their holy book.

 

[Quaxar]

Since I just stumbled into this thread again...

As far as creationism not being a useful theory, especially concerning the world around us, that depends on the outlook on the world. To claim creation would further scientific breakthroughs is outside my knowledge, but I imagine such a claim would be false. However, if we hypothetically accept creation to be true, the effects on human life would be huge. The mindset would be significantly different once a creator is involved, and any theory that could potentially result in fewer souls lost has a massive use for those of us who believe.

I'm sure Biscuit will have a good response to that post, I just wanna mention the last paragraph.

Accepting creation to be true? What creation are we talking about?
Genesis?
Viracocha, the Incan creator god that rose from lake Titicaca and brought light into the dark world by creating sun, moon and stars and made life out of stones?
Tawa, sun spirit of the Hopi, creator of the nine worlds?
The Siberian goddess Buga, who set fire to the infinite primordial ocean until land was exposed and formed man out of iron, water, earth and fire?
The Hindu creation text of Rig Veda, wherein the cosmos was first birthed from the golden womb of Brahman and is since then in a repetitive cycle of creation and annihilation?
The Mesopotamian Enûma Eli? in which the god Marduk rips apart Tiamat, the chaos, and out of her body fashions the sky and the earth and slays her husband-son Kingu to out of his blood create man as workers for the gods?
The Nordic Völuspá where the sons of Burr lifted the earth out of the sea and the Æsir established sun, moon and stars, then later, Odin, Hoenir and Lodur made two trees into a man and a woman and gave them life and reason?
The Finnish Kalevala, wherein Ilmatar, daughter of the Sky, swam in the endless ocean until she encountered a beautiful bird that she let land and lay seven eggs on her knee, which she accidentally broke -thus formed land from the lower eggshell part, sky from the top, moon and stars from the egg white and the sun from the yolk- and later gave virgin birth to the first human?
Various similar Polynesian creation myths about the children of mother earth and father sky splitting them apart to create the world, then later fashioning man out of red earth and spit or similar compounds?

Most of those creation myths impart a vastly different mindset, even at the same time it ranged from the Greeks' utter indifference of time after death where everyone would spend eternity the same way and all you would get with you on your way was two silver coins on the eyes (or sometimes just one in the mouth) to pay the ferryman Charon for your passage over the river Styx (or sometimes the river Archeron) to the Egyptians' almost insane obsession with death and the afterlife where this realm was only seen as a short transition and a considerable amount of your wealth was dedicated to grave furnishing since you could take everything buried with you over to the afterlife (including live servants) and preparation of your body, with strict rules about organ preservation - vital organs like the liver where to be taken out for optimal protection while silly organs like the brain where just thrown away until only the heart would remain in the body because you needed that with you to be weighed against the feather of truth at the end of your lengthy journey through the underworld.
Not even going to mention the Lovecraftian gore horror that was the Aztec afterlife.

I'm sure it has been said multiple times in this thread alone but there is no compelling reason apart from upbringing in a social environment that imprinted its values on you and/or personal preference of one religion over the other because you prefer its ideas and concepts to settle for one religion and its creation myth over any other.
Are you saying that Yhwh creating the world from nothing is more likely than a clumsy Ilmatar breaking seven eggs a bird was trying to hatch on her knee which then formed the universe or Tawa fashioning nine worlds out of endless space? How could you even judge that? The oldest is right? Then the Old Testament is beat by the Enûma Eli? and Rigveda by a few centuries so hail Marduk and Kalì. By the amount of followers? 1st century AD the Roman pantheon was immensely widespread in the Roman Empire and even the Mithras cult had more followers than Christianity, does that mean at that time the Roman gods were legit and at one point the Christian religion suddenly turned into the one true religion? By how its teachings stand up to modern morality? Then Buddha pretty much shared Jesus' prechings but without the added bonus of confirming the Old Testament's barbaric rules as still valid. Scientific validity? I'm sorry, but Hinduism's creation story is actually much better in terms of comparing the story to what we know from cosmological research than Genesis.

Because every one of those creation myths is necessarily objectively as likely as the next one since all of them employ gods, omnipotent or not, whose actions and reasons are beyond human grasp but all imply vastly different concepts of afterlives and rules of religious practices you basically have to chose one over all the others and hope that you picked right and your chances of that are astronomically low. Thus atheism is simply the acknowledging of those chances and going the full way of one more religion than you.

Captcha: heated debate... indeed

 

[darkstarangel]

Sorry this took me so long. Busy day before Christmas.

Not to worry. My laptop crapped itself & my net time has been severely limited, hence the late reply.

Im not going to cover every little bit of detail because its lengthy & I got a lot of Zero punctuations to catch up on.

Ok. The article you posted covered a lot of detail about Chromosome 2 but still didn't seem sure of itself, as can be expected. It also didn't mention anything about a fusion inverting the sense/anti-sense strands from the joing of the ends of each arm.

AS for the creationists sources, there are actually some good articles & even videos out there written by experts in their field who actually think about their professions & identify flaws & such rather than just going with the flow & just accepting everything they're told. The trouble is there are a lot of amerteurs & just plain nut jobs puting their stuff out there aswell (it makes my job harder I can assure you). The problem with this is all of it gets generalised under the same title, particularly by search engines, & researching is pretty much luck of draw. The same goes for book stores too. Iv spent a good seven years sifting through dodgy material just to find the good stuff. Research in this area is more performed by private institutes since creation/ID have become terms of stigma by the media & evolutionary community. That isn't to say there aren't creationist scientists working among them either, they just dont feel the need to advertise it everywhere they go. Hopefully this will change in the near future since so much attention on this matter increases.

As for your examples. From a creationist perspective it makes sense to have all organisms compatible with the same nutrients, even if in some cases minor adjustments are needed. Linoleic acid doesn't need to be synthesised since its aquired from diet. DNA is read in one direction due to the geometrical structure of the molecule. Id say its more of a compromise in having two strands synthesised simultaneously rather than seperately. I suppose an advantage to this would be to avoid any hairpin loops forming from a supercoiling single strand. Erector Pili muscles contract for insulation, possibly as a result of the blood flow being shunted away from the surface. And the giraffes inferior laryngeal nerve can yield several explanations other than an evolutionary one; it could be a minor deformity or a consequense of foetal development. Or it might have a purpose. All mammals have an extended inferior laryngeal nerve which could mean that perhaps its intended to have a delayed signal, possibly a feedback mechanism of sorts. If there is a purpose in this than we're never going to discover it by just writing it off a 'evolution did it' & then ignoring it. The field of genetics has been delayed for about 30 years because non-protein coding DNA was written off as evolutionary junk. And countless people have died or become sick because glands & organs that were deemed vestigial by evolutionary thinking were either removed or zapped with x-rays with roentgenium.

You see, God is mysterious but theres no sin in discovering those mysteries. And I dont believe that the supernatural should be excluded from science but I do however believe the supernatural should itself be thouroughly investigated. Many will disagree with this last statement but I believe its better to experiment & examine something, even if it seems rediculous, rather than dismiss with skepticism. But as far as science goes I believe we should be investigating what already exists then apply theories on its origins afterwards. Thats the only thing I had agains a lot of creation sources, they were aimed more at believers who were seeking answers rather than made public friendly. And I know exactly what you mean by citing its own articles. It is perfectly acceptable in literature to cite secondary sources but I believe that if they want to prove a point they should site the original article. Again, hopefully that will change in future.

Iv probably written more than you care to read. But still, I hope you had a good Christmas.

 

[Quaxar]

Sorry this took me so long. Busy day before Christmas.

Not to worry. My laptop crapped itself & my net time has been severely limited, hence the late reply.

Im not going to cover every little bit of detail because its lengthy & I got a lot of Zero punctuations to catch up on.

Iv probably written more than you care to read. But still, I hope you had a good Christmas.

I was wondering about you disappearing all of a sudden.
Christmas is always good, hope yours was too.

And don't worry, I don't mind walls of text at all in a good discussion. I just hope me writing even more back is what you expected. Otherwise... surprise!
Ok. The article you posted covered a lot of detail about Chromosome 2 but still didn't seem sure of itself, as can be expected. It also didn't mention anything about a fusion inverting the sense/anti-sense strands from the joing of the ends of each arm.
Well, I can't really go more into it detail on chromosome 2, I'm not that versed with genetics yet.

As for your examples. From a creationist perspective it makes sense to have all organisms compatible with the same nutrients, even if in some cases minor adjustments are needed. Linoleic acid doesn't need to be synthesised since its aquired from diet. DNA is read in one direction due to the geometrical structure of the molecule. Id say its more of a compromise in having two strands synthesised simultaneously rather than seperately. I suppose an advantage to this would be to avoid any hairpin loops forming from a supercoiling single strand. Erector Pili muscles contract for insulation, possibly as a result of the blood flow being shunted away from the surface. And the giraffes inferior laryngeal nerve can yield several explanations other than an evolutionary one; it could be a minor deformity or a consequense of foetal development. Or it might have a purpose. All mammals have an extended inferior laryngeal nerve which could mean that perhaps its intended to have a delayed signal, possibly a feedback mechanism of sorts. If there is a purpose in this than we're never going to discover it by just writing it off a 'evolution did it' & then ignoring it. The field of genetics has been delayed for about 30 years because non-protein coding DNA was written off as evolutionary junk. And countless people have died or become sick because glands & organs that were deemed vestigial by evolutionary thinking were either removed or zapped with x-rays with roentgenium.
Alright, I suppose a standardized enantiomer could make sense, I give you that.

Linoleic acid and other EFAs are taken up through food, yes. But there can be deficiencies and if they are essential for synthesizing components that affect cellular, neurological and inflammatory functions and for cell signalling and DNA transcription one would assume that any all-knowing creator building the chosen species would just put the means to make it ourselves right into the metabolism. It's not even hard to do, a lot of non-mammalian animals don't have issues with it.

The fact that DNA can only be read from 5' to 3' is because our transcriptase only works this way so one strand is read in a simple linear sequence while the other one simultaneously has to transcribe a few codons at a time in reverse direction. However, I don't see why this way should be preferable over simply having something that can transcribe in both directions. Or a second transcriptase for the 3'5' strand.
Similarly, during translation there are two release factors, RF1 and RF 2. RF1 only detects stop-codons UAA and UAG while RF2 is on the look-out for UAA. Now, first there's three stop-codons that also need two different RFs to act with. Is that the most logical solution you could think of?

Arrector Pili muscles insulate diddly squat, if you pardon my Flanders. I haven't been able to find concrete studies on efficiency rates but that's probably because they're laughably small. A normal human being doesn't have the hair density needed to have any proper insulation from trapped air nor an advantage of scaring off predators with it, yet those are the uses of it throughout the mammalian world and coldness & fear are the two situations where goosebumps are the most common occurences. Now, an evolutionary route from hairy primate ancestory such as Australopitheci that would infact have had use for a pilomotor reflex for both warmth and intimidation gives a pretty logical story of origin while Creationism is pretty much left to come up with any explanation besides "because God".
Sure, we've found a use for things like the vestigial cecum that is now the appendix but at least that's a proper organ, a little muscle sitting on a hair's base doesn't exactly provide the most versatile of functions.

The recurrent laryngeal nerve in fish is the most direct route from brain to the gills, during the evolutionary lengthening of the neck and lowering of the heart the laryngeal nerve was now trapped under the aorta ascendens and had to lengthen (because lengthening of a nerve is easier than lengthening the biggest bloodvessel) since it couldn't just pass through the aorta. Might there have been some kind of mutation at one point that through sheer luck would have had the nerve free from the loop? Possible, but since there is no direct advantage to it there was no specific selection for it and it vanished again.
All mammals have this setting, yes. Evolution has a flawless explanation for that occurence as I've just explained. If it was a "minor deformity" it wouldn't be present in the exact same setting or in logical varieties of forms throughout the animal kingdom. Foetal development is no excuse for a design flaw if talking about an all-powerful, all-knowing, perfect being that could eliminate a flaw like that with ease.
I don't see what signals the laryngeal nerve should even delay, I'd prefer it if my cough reflex happened as efficient as possible, same for voice control or breathing. Besides, depending on what delay time you want you could use different kinds of nerve cells, make them thicker or more insulated, put more behind each other as a delay or just spring for hormones if you've got the time. Signal delaying through a ridiculous axon length that runs through a rather vulnerable part of the body twice and if damaged in any time that isn't the last decades basically kills you through loss of voice and an unprotected airway is, at best, a very odd design choice.

"Evolution did it" and research into it aren't mutually exclusive. Appendices were cut because there was no known use for it and eliminating a possible inflammation centre is more important than something without a use, but why do you think did we discover that it had a part in the immune system? Not because we ignored it since discovery. Besides, standards in medicine change all the time depending on latest findings but they take time to apply. I think for more than a decade now atropine has been used by pretty much every physician at a CPR for ventricular fibrillation, a few years ago long-term studies suggested that it really had no use either way and has slowly been faded out, yet I still know one or two doctors who use it. You go with what worked best so far, it takes time to perform studies and it takes even more time to convince everyone to change. I don't see how that is anyone's fault.

You see, God is mysterious but theres no sin in discovering those mysteries. And I dont believe that the supernatural should be excluded from science but I do however believe the supernatural should itself be thouroughly investigated. Many will disagree with this last statement but I believe its better to experiment & examine something, even if it seems rediculous, rather than dismiss with skepticism. But as far as science goes I believe we should be investigating what already exists then apply theories on its origins afterwards. Thats the only thing I had agains a lot of creation sources, they were aimed more at believers who were seeking answers rather than made public friendly. And I know exactly what you mean by citing its own articles. It is perfectly acceptable in literature to cite secondary sources but I believe that if they want to prove a point they should site the original article. Again, hopefully that will change in future.
I don't disagree with investigating the supernatural, what I meant was using supernatural explanations such as "god made it this way just because he wanted to" or "magicians control the tide" as sufficient explanation to rely your hypothesis on, which is exactly what Creationism does. Or, to stay closer to actual claims, "fossils are temptations planted by the devil".
Continuing there, you arbitrarily pick one religion and the explanations that come with it, then set out to find something that supports these explanations. And it doesn't even matter that time and time again your biblical sources have been shown to be wrong about the simplest things (rabbits don't chew their cud, insects have six legs not four, bats aren't birds but mammals, hell even the trumpets of Jericho are silly since Jericho never had any walls) Creationists still pretend like the book is infallible. If the bible is the "eternal word of god" (because it itself says so) then surely the fact that not even the omniscient creator knows his simplest stuff has to be alarming. Science changes theories based on new evidence, the bible on the other hand is, based on its own premise, eternally wrong about stuff.
And if it's wrong about simple facts of nature, why could it not also be completely wrong about other things?

And as I have stated before (because I'm honestly curious if there is any argument FOR it), how is it any more likely that everything was created as-is in seven days than that it originates from the goddess of chaos, Eurynome, dancing on the waves of the endless surrounding ocean to separate land from sea and fill it with creatures like nymphs and titans?

EDIT: A second thought I might be able to slip in here: if day 3 saw creation of plants and day 6 creation of animals... what's up with mushrooms?

 

[texanarob]

In my defense there are genuine YEC scientists (of which I will be soon enough) who do present both the evidence & both interpretations of it. Its always the quacks who get the most attention. I will however applaud you on your effort to prove your point in an academic & professional manner (as opposed to substanceless sarcastic mockery), thats always refreshing. And further more, I hope you did well on your exams. Better than mine did atleast.

No there isn't, YEC scientist is an oxymoron, If you're a YEC you are not a scientist period. If you think the world is around 6,000 years old you are going against every branch of scientific thinking, even dendrochronology (tree ring dating) says the world is at least 11,000 years old.

People who are YEC scientist are not scientist they're people who provide disinformation to the general masses who don't know enough to see that they are bluntly misinterpreting and flat out lying to defend their holy book.

http://www.answersingenesis.org/articles/nab2/how-old-is-the-earth?utm_source=aigsocial02072013howold&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=facebooktwittergooglelinkedin

The earth is demonstrably young using all scientific theories, other than radiometric dating. Radiometric dating (such as carbon dating) has never been demonstrated to be accurate, and always seems to over estimate the known ages of specimens. This is due to it's uniformitarian assumptions, where temperature, pressure and concentrations of chemicals are assumed to have been constant for extreme periods of time.

 

[BrassButtons]

The earth is demonstrably young using all scientific theories, other than radiometric dating. Radiometric dating (such as carbon dating) has never been demonstrated to be accurate, and always seems to over estimate the known ages of specimens. This is due to it's uniformitarian assumptions, where temperature, pressure and concentrations of chemicals are assumed to have been constant for extreme periods of time.

Explain how angular nonconformities are consistent with a young earth. Since those are what initially disproved the young earth model (because that was once a valid scientific model) it's a good place to start. If you can't then the earth is old, regardless of whether or not our dating methods are correct (they are, by the way, but I won't pretend to know enough to argue the subject).

Edit: As to your last sentence, geologists don't take it for granted that those elements remain constant (you might want to brush up on what uniformitarianism actually means, because I don't think you understand it) and they have ways of checking which kinds of changes occurred when in order to account for them.

 

[Dinwatr]

The earth is demonstrably young using all scientific theories, other than radiometric dating.

Please explain why it was widely accepted--even by the religious zealots of the time--that the world was old a few centuries before the development of radiometric techinques.

Also, please briefly state how you know so much about radiometric dating. I'd like to know where to start showing you how wrong you are. For my part, I've taken several university classes (graduate level) on the topic and have used several radiometric dating methods on multiple industrial projects. I've done this professionally.

Radiometric dating (such as carbon dating) has never been demonstrated to be accurate,

This can only be called a lie. Radiometric dating relies upon the same principles as radioactive tracers in medicine--every time a doctor uses a radioactive tracer it amounts to a test of these principles. Also, radiometric dating has been, to a surprising extent corroborated by non-radiometric methods, such as varves, corals, bivalves, and tree rings. Then there are the natural reactors. I believe there are three of them on Earth, and they serve as good tests for this sort of thing.

and always seems to over estimate the known ages of specimens.

Please, please tell us the study you're citing as evidence of this. I have my suspicions, but I want you to put this noose around your neck yourself.

This is due to it's uniformitarian assumptions, where temperature, pressure and concentrations of chemicals are assumed to have been constant for extreme periods of time.

Again, this is a lie. Radiometric dating is actually fairly complicated, and done properly it's a means to test that theory. I was once given a list of radiometric dates, and their corresponding atmoic families and minerals sampled. From that (and a healthy dose of igenous stratigraphy) I was able to deduce multiple episodes of volcanic activity, including intrusions, actual volcanism (meaning the magma broke through the surface), and contact metamorphism (if you didn't see that coming, you didn't deserve to be in the class, but being able to pinpoint the max temperature was nice).

The concept you are so blithely ignoring here is closing temperature. Each mineral and each radioactive sequence has a particular temperature above which the atoms can more or less freely move out of the crystal structure. Given that radioactive decay usually alters the chemical nature of the crystal, the daughter isotopes tend to leave rather readily. Below that temperature, the atoms remain locked in as defects in the crystal structure (a common enough thing--crystals with defects are more stable over time than those without). This temperature can be surprisingly low--some of the more complex silicates have extremely low closing temperatures, as their structure provides what amount to pipelines out of the crystal, and uranium includes a radon phase, which is a gas. The closing temperature is frequently below the point where a mineral will metamporphose at all, and almost always well below the melting point.

You're also ignoring the fact that temperature and pressure have essentially no impact on radioactive decay rates. You simply can't squeeze the atoms together tight enough with crustal temperatures and pressures to impact the nucleous of the atoms. Concentrations can influence things, but that's where good old-fashioned stratigraphy comes in--NO ONE does radiometric dating without first doing a stratigraphic analysis.

 

[Quaxar]

The earth is demonstrably young using all scientific theories, other than radiometric dating.

All scientific theories except anything from biology, geology, astronomy, physics, ...

Also, citing Answers in Genesis is like using a neo-nazi website as a source about the holocaust. You can do it if their source bias make you feel good, but you can't expect anyone to take it seriously.
Personally, even opening this site makes me sick. Let me illustrate that with the last paragraph from your article's conclusions:
The age of the earth ultimately comes down to a matter of trust - it's a worldview issue. Will you trust what an all-knowing God says on the subject or will you trust imperfect man's assumptions and imaginations about the past that regularly are changing?
So even they say it isn't about facts, it's about either believing everything a book tells you to be absolute truth (despite obvious fallacies being right in there) or being a moron for having your own opinion that is based on best currently available evidence.

I am willing to listen to proper reasoned claims of a young earth. But please, let's keep some niveau.

 

[evilneko]

Full disclosure: There's no way I'm reading 25 pages of this thread.


People disbelieve in evolution for three reasons:

1. Because when you get right down to it, evolution is pretty irrelevant to most of our daily lives. If you needed to believe in evolution to complete a shift in the spandex mines, everyone would believe in evolution.

2. Because disbelief in evolution is a tribal marker. When someone expresses that they don't believe in evolution, they're not really saying, "I've examined all the evidence and I don't find evolution to be an adequate description of how life on Earth came to be diverse," even if those are the literal words they're saying. The real message intended, regardless of the words being used, is, "please notice how devout and faithful in my religion I am." I have noticed people will generally go to enormous leaps to identify and "protect" their tribe, even when their tribe isn't under attack[footnote]See the visceral hatred for Anita Sarkeesian[/footnote].

3. Because science education in the US is often pretty poor. Science is often thought of as this grand collection of ideas that must be right because they are SCIENCE!, and not a process used to arrive at those ideas. And people on both sides of the "debate" are guilty. Every time someone argues that science is capital-T Truth and not merely the best, most objective model that humans can come up with at the moment, they fuel the "debate". They create the impression that you don't have to follow the scientific method in order to understand the world, you just have to believe the things other scientists tell you. They turn it into a matter of opinion, of belief. The same thing happens every time someone tries to appeal some trumped up appeal to evolutionary psychology to explain what they want to be true without bothering to do the experiment to collect evidence for their beliefs.

Holy shit Katatori-kun is back!

 

[Dinwatr]

Good point about AIG, Quaxar. I'd only add one point: Unless God is the one doing the typing, their argument is self-refuting. We're dealing with humans in both cases--but in one case you have humans saying "Here's the evidence. Feel free to check it yourself" and in the other we have humans saying "GOD WILLS IT! Who are YOU to question the Almighty? How DARE you question me--I mean, God?!"

 

[Mylo Cannard]

So there is no God? I see... Then there couldn't be right or wrong, no guilt, no shame, no consequences... And if that is true then it should be OK for you to sleep with or kill your mother... Or your brother, Or a chicken... or an ape... Who's to say that's wrong using your belief system of "There is No GOD"... Oh and remind us again of your "Scientific" explanation of the universe's creation.... Let's see, there was nothing, then for no reason or explanation everything that was to make up our universe just appeared out of nowhere and for no reason... like "Magic"! excuse me, like "The Big Bang"... Then there were hot gasses and plasma that eventually condensed and turned into human beings... Have I missed anything? And I'm the "Fool" for beleiving in God and his son Jesus? If you say so... As a Christian I know not to sleep with or murder my mother... Reason being it's clearly pointed out in the Bible... Now remind us again, which set of morales and principles do you adhere too and what was the source of that information that you use to conduct your life?

 

[Mylo Cannard]

Evolution... Of course... Can you point out to me exactly when monkeys turned into humans? You know, the DNA evidence? Or does it NOT exist? Also, Why didn't the rest of the apes "Evolve"? Or better yet remind us again how swamp gas turned into every living thing on the planet? Anything? "Well there was this swamp gas stuff, then one day it decided it wanted to be alive... So "Poof" there you go... Then the "Alive swamp gas" decided it wanted to see... Nevermind it had no idea what sight was it just wanted to see. So of course poof, it grew eyebsalls! That's some pretty amazing and talented swamp gas huh? Then it decided it wanted to walk on land so it turned itself into a crawly thing a majig... Then the thing a majig decided it was "Lonely" so it split itself into two thing a majigs... Wow that "evolution" is surely all powerful stuff...

 

[Quaxar]

Evolution... Of course... Can you point out to me exactly when monkeys turned into humans? You know, the DNA evidence? Or does it NOT exist? Also, Why didn't the rest of the apes "Evolve"? Or better yet remind us again how swamp gas turned into every living thing on the planet? Anything? "Well there was this swamp gas stuff, then one day it decided it wanted to be alive... So "Poof" there you go... Then the "Alive swamp gas" decided it wanted to see... Nevermind it had no idea what sight was it just wanted to see. So of course poof, it grew eyebsalls! That's some pretty amazing and talented swamp gas huh? Then it decided it wanted to walk on land so it turned itself into a crawly thing a majig... Then the thing a majig decided it was "Lonely" so it split itself into two thing a majigs... Wow that "evolution" is surely all powerful stuff...

Your first two posts on this site are two majorly uninformed and/or ignorant rants against established science clearly already debated multiple times in this very thread? Really?
I appreciate darkstarangel, at least he took the time to thoroughly inform himself before coming to a conclusion neither I nor mainstream science particularly agree with. You on the other hand sound like a Kent Hovind script, riddled with outrageous claims so far away from reality not even Hubble could find it.