David said…

I admit that sounds like something I might have written, but I don’t recall using the phrase “large print Bible” or “Is too long”. Shame you couldn’t actually note when it was written, as I did.

In the thread “Four teens group hugged after killing a former friend"…
David at July 27, 2003 05:08 PM wrote the following…

Buy a large print bible and actually read it before you decide that it contradicts itself or is too long. If you find a specific contradiction please let me know.

Though I still don’t get how Les’s lack of dating your comment is shameful…

Again you assert that Evolution hasn’t been seen and can’t be repeated in experimentation. Burdon of proof for your assertion is on you. I eagerly await your supporting argument.
-Les

I’m so confused as to where you get your ideas on who the burden of proof belongs to. Every scored debate I’ve ever seen: the burden belongs to those making a positive assertion.
-David

David, you may or may not have made these literal assertions, but in full context it is very difficult to interpret your posts in any other way.

All things considered, I do not accept that your position is “evolution and creationism are just theories” - if this were so, you would argue that evolution explains the known observations, like so, and creationism like that, see, and who am I to chose?

Instead, what you do is to consistently question evolution and defend creationism, therefore exposing a bias that is indicative of both a positive assertion (creationism is right) and a negative assertion (evolution is wrong). You have previously admitted to interpreting the same facts differently,

We are looking at the same facts, we are just coming away with different interpretations. I have all the same evidence you do.

which further erodes your positive claim of a balanced position. This comment also doesn’t help:

Personally, it’s the fossil evidence (or lack of it) that makes me truly question Darwin. But I know your answer will be “Give it time”. Which is what Darwin said over a hundred years ago. And tons of fossils have been exhumed since and NONE of them show the links between species. This is why it is still a theory, and not science.

You do make a positive claim, “NONE of them show the links between species.” Rather than us falsifying that claim, we’d rather you show us how none of the fossils ever found are a link between species.

Since the two assertions Les mentioned are central to your apparent stance on evolution, it is acceptable for him to call you on them.

There’s more for you to get back to here.

Of course, by now the thread of the argument has been muddled up thoroughly. Maybe the proper form to continue is an itemized list of points similar to a legal filing. While this is a lot more tedious, it helps to maintain focus.

Hang on Elwed, I’m about to muddy it a bit more.

Les, I believe you’ve gotten caught up in the minutia of a point that really isn’t critical to the topic. If I wrote required, I should not have, part of the process might have been better phrasing. But none of your argument reduces the complexity of the mechanism. In fact, your inclusion of mechanical stimulation (nervous response) further complicates it. But continue down this path if it makes you feel better, it certainly isn’t helping your argument.

So says you and we all know how much I value your opinion on such matters. At the moment you seem to be the only one who’s criticizing my argument. Note the key word of “criticizing” in that last sentence, which is not the same as “refuting.” I only mention this as you seem to get the two concepts confused.

As for gravity, if you’re thinking that “It’s the only one of the four fundamental forces of nature that scientists haven’t been able to quantise as of yet” creates a flaw the size of the ones in evolution, then I’m amazed. That’s quite a sense of proportion you have there. But hey, it’s your perspective, so how can I argue. You’re right, Les, Gravity is practically unquantified and no one can be certain it will work or not, a new discovery could be made tomorrow and no one will believe in gravity. See, now, you made my milk come out my nose…

Thank you for another illustration of your ability to deflect facts you can’t refute with attempts at flippancy. It’s not a matter of whether or not gravity will work just as it’s not a matter of whether evolution will work. It’s entirely a matter of how much we understand how either one works. In comparison to what we know about how evolution works we know very little about how gravity works. Our lack of complete understanding of either phenomena does not, however, stop either of them from going about their business as usual. I could borrow a page from your book here and say something arrogant like “and you know this,” but I’m actually beginning to wonder if you might actually be as clueless as you present yourself as being.

Um so, it’s not random? And it’s not trial and error? So then, there is a designer behind it? OK, I’ll throw out all those old text books, and you lay the gospel down for me Les. Cause you are right, I’ve never heard that approach taken by an evolutionist before.

How clever of you to ignore the word “anthropomorphized” in formulating your response. You do know what anthropomorphized means, yes? Perhaps one of your Biology PhD friends can explain it to you. Seems you’re pretty good at taking things out of context yourself there, David.

Pay close attention now, Les: Irreducible Complexity. That’s what we are talking about, at least we were before you and Nunyabiz (I’m sure he exists in *someone’s* imagination) started in with the flames. How this pertains to the argument is that if a system only works when all of it’s parts are present and those parts depend on one another to function (as the hormonal/nervous/live birth combination) to produce a viable response, but none of those independent responses are useful otherwise, then how could they develop through evolution separately? And there is nothing in a non-guided evolution that would create it. I believe in my original argument, I stated that at the very least, it raises the bar on the odds of it happening by chance.

David, I think I’ve already established in another entry that I have a far better grasp of what’s in most of the comments you leave here than you do and I’m aware of what you guys were discussing. My initial response to you even addressed that discussion. You keep asserting that these systems you’re pointing to are irreducibly complex starting with your mention of the systems involved in lactation, but you’ve yet to provide anything to support that assertion. 

I live in one of the most backwoods places in the US. Even for rural PA, my area is particularly known as being backwoods. Yet, I have never seen a half man/ half ape running around. Or any dinosaurs. Let alone any of the millions the species that must have existed between a dog and a horse.

Why would you think that you should see such things unless you don’t have a friggin’ clue about Evolution? Allow me once more to rephrase my statement on the off-chance it might permeate your thick skull.  Your claim was: “Evolution insists that each trait that could improve the chance of survival become the norm. If some trait makes an organism more fecund, more viable, more prevalent, then that trait will win out, and all other organisms that do not have that trait will be pushed out. Otherwise, no “progress” would be made because the trait would just disappear back into the pool.”

Evolution does not insist on any such thing. An advantageous trait is no guarantee that organisms with that trait will “win out,” only that those organisms are more likely to win out. Nor does it guarantee the extinction of organisms without that advantage, though the risk of that possibility increases. Evolution is not “progress.” Populations simply adapt to their current surroundings. They do not necessarily become better in any absolute sense over time. A trait or strategy that is successful at one time may be unsuccessful at another and this has been proven experimentally. Your description of Evolution quoted above ignores the fact that the environment in which life evolves is always changing and is being changed by the life within it. Life doesn’t just change in order to adapt to its environment, it also modifies its environment to better suit it.

The Evolution you describe would result in one single species of any animal or plant as newer and better adapted organisms are produced forcing the extinction of any “inferior” organisms. Or, at best, would result in a single species of every type of animal and plant.

I’m not talking about breeding, we are (or at least were) discussing speciation.

Perhaps you’d care to explain how you separate the two concepts? They are, to use your current favorite word, interdependent. Or does your version of Evolution allow for change without a new organism being produced in the process?

I’m so confused as to where you get your ideas on who the burden of proof belongs to. Every scored debate I’ve ever seen: the burden belongs to those making a positive assertion. All along my only assertion has been that neither evolution or creation is proven, and both take faith to believe in. Several people assert that evolution is fact, I say OK show me the facts, and now it’s my burden to show the lack of facts? By that same logic a reduction in an increase in spending is a decrease in spending, even when we are still spending more. Right?

Last I checked, this isn’t a scored debate and in my experience the burden of proof falls on the person making the assertion, but I’m not a PhD either.

I was challenging your statement that if Evolution “explains how things currently work, then we’d see it happening at some point, or maybe be able to actually repeat the science by experiment. Since we can’t I guess you have to make a choice here as to whether you’d like to have your cake or eat it.” Your assertion being that we can’t see evolution happening or repeat the science by experiment. You offer up no scientific studies that attempted to verify Evolution which have failed. Seeing as Evolution is a scientific theory it’s not at all unlikely to assume there have been attempts to verify it and if those attempts have failed more often than not then you would have a strong basis for your assertion. What? You’re not going to pull out the can’t-prove-a-negative-myth on me, are you? I thought only us atheists were guilty of that.

Now you’re reframing your argument, another thing you like to accuse others of, as a comparison of what you consider equals: Neither Evolution or Creationism has been “proven” so they’re both matters of faith. As you like to point out all too often all knowledge is an issue of faith at some level so the issue should then become: Is the amount of faith required to accept Evolution the same as is required to accept Creationism? The implication of the reframed argument is that you feel the amount of faith needed for both is the same. Yet you don’t provide any basis for this assumption. At the very least you should be able to demonstrate that the Theory of Creationism is at least as useful at making predictions about organisms as the Theory of Evolution is or, as the case may be, that Evolution is as useless as Creationism is at making predictions. Of the two choices you’d probably have a slightly better chance with the latter over the former.

I realize I’ve raised a lot of points and you have a tendency to ignore various points raised at whim, so let’s break it on down again to a single point: You say your assertion “has been that neither evolution or creation is proven, and both take faith to believe in.” OK, prove this statement to be true.

I admit that sounds like something I might have written, but I don’t recall using the phrase “large print Bible” or “Is too long”. Shame you couldn’t actually note when it was written, as I did. I didn’t realize that telling people that they should actually try and read something before they critique it was an insult. It’s likely that it might save them a great deal of embarrassment. So sorry.

Of for crying out loud, David! Are you seriously that inept at computers you can’t figure out how to work a simple search query? It’s not like we’re even asking you to go to another website. But no, I won’t force you to use the big bad search engine option. I’ll just dig it up for you seeing as you love to ask everyone to else to do what you are not willing to do yourself. The entry was posted by you on July 27, 2003 at 05:08 PM. I was going to provide a link, but then I thought I’d take your approach and just couldn’t be bothered. The tone of the comment itself was, in my opinion, representative of your early displays of arrogance

elwedriddsche, There has been so much…errr, discussion, at this point that I’m afraid I’ve lost the threads of our argument a bit. If you would, please let me know what points specifically you’d like to see me respond to.

Oh this is sad. Not only can’t he work the search function, but apparently his scroll bars are broken on his browser and he can’t back up and look at old entries on the same fucking page. Next he’s going to want you to type up his response for him.

Lately I’ve read a number of columns and articles on “Religion getting a bad rap” or “Intolerance toward Christians. You know what? They are right, the Christian religion is being held with contempt by millions upon millions of people around the world, including other Christians. Here’s a list of questions you need to ask yourself.

Have you heard of Catholic priests and Christian ministers being accused of sexual abuse?

Do you see Christians on network news broadcasts picketing courthouses with signs reading “You’re going to Hell”?

Have you seen Christians delivering verbal abuse to Gays and Lesbians on network television?

Did you hear about the Christian mom who drowned her kids “because God told her to”?

Did you hear about the Christian church that gave an Easter Play to show that Easter was about Jesus not the Easter Bunny and whipped and beat the Easter bunny in front of children who cried because they couldn’t understand why?

Did you know some Christian organizations are using “free pizza” and other deceitful tactics to lure young people into places where they assault them with “Christian” music and preaching to earn that “free pizza”?

Did you know that millions of people and children that do not believe in God are being forced to use the term “under God” because Christians want it that way?

Do you know there are Christians who promote hate and intolerance for anything that doesn’t conform to their moral beliefs?

Do you wonder why people look down on Christianity?

Do you really think the intolerance toward Christians is unjustified?

If you answered yes to all of these questions (every one of them is true), then you cannot help but know why there is so much intolerance toward Christians.  These are the examples of Christian behavior that influence Christians to turn away from religion, why atheism is growing, why churches in the Europe hold only a tenth of the worshipers they used to.

And these are just the recent headlines. This kind of “Moral Majority” behavior isn’t new though.  Throughout the past 2000 years, Christians somewhere sometime have performed numerous non-Christian
Behavior over and over again. Entire civilizations have been wiped out by Christians, usually “in the name of God” when the underlying factor was simply greed for gold and territory. The Inquisition maimed and murdered countless thousands of innocent men women and children “in the name of God” simply because they didn’t believe the same way the Christian rulers (in Rome) wanted them to. In the New World at Salem Massachusetts and surrounding areas, hundreds suffered and died mostly because a Christian had a grudge against them and accused them of being witches. Hundreds of thousands of Africans were kidnapped and forced into slavery by Christians in the United States.

If you want to improve the respect and attitudes toward Christians, then I would recommend all Christians follow the teachings of Jesus and promote Love, honesty, tolerance, courtesy, friendship and set an example for non Christian to see and respect.  Actually, It might not hurt if Christians just shut up for a while. Stick to your Churches. Get your congregations straightened out first, then worry about the rest of the world.

I’m impressed. The only thing out of that I would nitpick would be the idea that atheism is growing because of the bad behavior of some Christians.

Most of the atheists I know got to that point after a lot of, if you’ll pardon the expression, soul searching and serious thought and the rest were never religious in the first place. I do know a lot of former Christians who have taken up a different religion in part because the bad behavior of other Christians, but I think it would take more than a few bad apples to make someone lose faith completely in anything. Or at least that’s been my experience.

Other than that I have to say that your comment was very refreshing.

Here’s some news about Hovind that some may find amusing…

Science Goddess,
I have read the article you referred me to in “Science”. As I guessed, it was not proof of evolution, but of breeding. In the first sentence of the second paragraph it reads “Teosinte and corn (Zea mays) don’t look much alike, but they are interfertile.” In the third sentence, same paragraph “In the 1920s, Beadle examined chromosomes in teosinte-corn hybrids and concluded that the two plants belonged to the same species...” The rest of the article was somewhat interesting, but hardly proof of anything but what I’ve said all along: we’ve been breeding plants and animals for thousands of years, but a poodle is still a dog. This is not evolution, this is merely breeding.

I earned myself a rap on the knuckles and humiliation in front of my 4th grade Catholic school classmates for asking Sister Jeannine to clarify that bit of Scripture for me, because there WERE no other people on Earth when Cain got kicked out of Eden.

I’m not sure where this came from, but I’d like a little proof on this matter. Cain and Able were merely the first children of Adam and Eve mentioned. There are thought to be many female children, and many grandchildren that are not mentioned (the wife of Cain is not mentioned accept for the fact that Cain lay with here). Possibly even some male children that are not mentioned. The story of Cain and Able is merely the first story of any people after the fall in the garden. Cain was NOT kicked out of Eden, he was removed from “the land” were his family was dwelling. Adam and Eve were thrown out of Eden after that little incident with the fruit and the snake. Where is the proof that there were not yet any other people besides the 4?

I now just want to address a couple of points so we can clarify where we are going. I am not trying to reframe my argument, I am trying to restate where I think we are so we can move forward. If I’m wrong, then please correct me.

From the beginning of the turn of this thread toward evolution, I have made clear my stance that I’m not an evolutionist or a 7 literal day creationist (Apr 8). Nunyabiz made the first positive assertion of either kind in favor of Evolution on April 5. I began by asking how he could automatically believe in it in light of the lack of evidence to support it, and the flaws in the basic theory. This clearly puts the burden of proof on him. In fact, my initial argument was not against evolution, but that it was not the only alternative to creationism. To be fair, I do believe in creation. However, it does not eliminate for me the possibility of directed evolution. So this argument is not critical to my faith or beliefs. It is critical to nunyabiz and those that followed after him who clearly stated that evolution was the only possibility and was undeniably factual. Again, this places burden of proof on them. And lastly, it was pointed out to me that since I made the assertion that there is not sufficient fossil record of transitional life forms, it was my burden to produce the lack of evidence. The same person (Les) that asserted this also asserted that this was NOT a formal debate, and the rules did not apply. Well, then, this must be a friendly debate, as such I would expect that since it is far easier to prove a positive than a negative, and since it’s so obvious that I am wrong, that there must be plenty of substantial proof of transitional forms. Therefore, in the interest of the friendly nature of the debate, it only makes sense that whoever has this evidence let me see it so that I may be corrected. My point is: you cannot have it both ways, either we go by the rules of formal debate, in which case the evolutionists made the first positive claim and are responsible for backing it up OR I made a negative claim in a friendly discussion and since I can easily be corrected by the abundance of such evidence, a friend should clue me in. Let me be clear, if someone was asserting factual 7 day creation, I’d be asking plenty of questions of them, it’s just that you folks all seem to swing the other way, as it were.

The next point I’d like to examine is irreducible complexity. Do we at least agree that there are things that are irreducibly complex, such as the mousetrap, and this is clear evidence of intelligent design, and contrary to the possibility of evolution? Not that because a mousetrap is irreducibly complex, there is no evolution, but because it is, IT could not have evolved and must have had a designer. Or are you all trying to debunk the whole concept?

I think this covers the open issues so far, if it does not, please feel free to let me know what other proofs you feel I should be providing.

Les,
Your post made me think of this “Lyric” (It’s actually spoken right before the song). Thought you might like it in light of that recent comment.

“The greatest single cause of atheism in the world today is Christians who acknowledge Jesus with their lips, then walk out the door and get on with their lifestyle. That is what our unbelieving world simply finds unbelievable.” From “What if I Stumble” On Jesus Freak by DC Talk

Do we at least agree that there are things that are irreducibly complex, such as the mousetrap, and this is clear evidence of intelligent design, and contrary to the possibility of evolution?
-David

No, we do not. You ask us to accept your conclusion as a premise.

In this context, irreducibly complex means the person or persons making this statement about something cannot conceive of an evolutionary path. I cannot mean more than just that, because:

1) That something cannot have evolved is a positive assertion that requires proof of a negative. Arguably, even as much as outlining a potential evolutionary path can be construed as a falsification.

2) Even if the assertion is true, it is a false dichotomy that something either evolves or is designed.

As far as I’m concerned, the very concept of irreducible complexity is a combination of several logical fallacies.

The same person (Les) that asserted this also asserted that this was NOT a formal debate, and the rules did not apply.

I didn’t say that at all. I said that the last I checked it wasn’t a scored debate. First you say scored, then you say formal. I’ve been to plenty of formal debates that weren’t scored in any way shape or form and at which the person making the assertion was required to back up the claim regardless of whether it was a positive or negative claim.

The truth is we’ve never established what the rules of debate here should be. I’ve been attempting to follow the approach I’m most familiar with and have tried to back up any claims made with supporting references. You, David, generally don’t. Instead, you tend to issue flat out denials without providing any basis for them. Though this does point out why you prefer to make negative claims over positive ones. In that way you feel you can avoid having to backup anything you say. You can just keep saying ‘no it doesn’t’ and leave it at that. Very clever. Even now in redefining this as a ‘friendly’ debate you again attempt to push the burden of backing up claims onto others by suggesting that “it is far easier to prove a positive than a negative” so you shouldn’t have to backup your claims if you’re perceived as being wrong. In effect, trying to apply the rule you believe is applicable to a formal debate to what you’re now calling a ‘friendly debate.’ When you’re not busy reframing you’re busy trying to set the rules to your advantage.

Finally, I’m in agreement with Elwed on the issue of irreducible complexity.

2) Even if the assertion is true, it is a false dichotomy that something either evolves or is designed.

I’ll get to the rest later, but for now, I’d like to know what you think the other possiblities are.

Nunyabiz made the first positive assertion of either kind in favor of Evolution on April 5. I began by asking how he could automatically believe in it in light of the lack of evidence to support it, and the flaws in the basic theory.

I don’t “automatically” believe in anything, YOU do. YOU automatically believe anything and everything as long as its in that book of Mythology you’re obsessed with.
Evolution has mountains of evidence to support it, you simply refuse to acknowledge it because of your Cognitive Dissonance.
There are no flaws in the basic theory, every single prediction has been found exactly where it was predicted to be.
Iv listed an enormous amount of empirical Falsifiable evidence that supports Evolution.
You on the other hand have listed zilch but pure crap.
You also have simply ignored ALL the contradictions I pointed out, course I don’t blame you because what can you say.
There isn’t any defense of almost 1000 blatant contradictions in the bible from cover to cover.
So in this case you choose your best defense which is no defense.

You would think IF Creationism even had the slightest bit of believability about it that at least ONE show once in awhile on something like the Discovery channel, Science Channel, shows like Paleoworld, etc. I mean lets face it there are hundreds of shows yearly for many many years and I have NEVER EVEN ONCE seen a single show that gave any credence AT ALL to Creationism, I mean not even a honorable mention EVER. Evolution is the one & the only theory ever mentioned.

Gee, think maybe mainstream science just might think Creationism is exactly what it is? PURE BULLSHIT. Ya think?

Maybe one of these days you will get a grip and face reality but its highly unlikely, you’re going to go through life believing in fairytales.
Yes I find that pitiful. You’re really no different than some strung out heroin addict looking for his next jones.
Your addiction is mythology and you mainline it everyday.

Side note:  I can’t conceive of a third alternative to the either/or binary of evolved/created.  Just because I can’t think of an alternative doesn’t mean that one doesn’t exist.  But I’m interested in hearing what it might be, as well.

there is not sufficient fossil record of transitional life forms

What qualifies as “sufficient?” If a creationist introduces me to ONE angel, then I have to seriously reassess my stance on supernatural entities.

If someone can show a creationist ONE transitional form, does that force a similar reassessment of the probability of speciation events, on their part?

Because it’s quite possible that the creationist might just as easily say “OK, -that’s- a clear example of speciation.  But just because -that- particular critter speciated doesn’t prove that the rest of them weren’t (-poof-) generated by divine force.

It’s also quite possible that a creationist could simply say “NO.  That’s not a -transitional- species because

1.  it’s too similar to the original-- it may not be able to breed with other dogs, but it still looks like a dog.

2.  it’s too different from the original.  Yes it has characteristics unique to two different species, but that doesn’t prove that it -links- them.  It’s a complete, independently created species in its own right.

We confront a similar problem with IC.  as in, it’s only evidence of design until someone manages to 1. trace a possible evolutionary pathway, or 2. find another, functioning version of the system, in a different species, that is missing one of the “required” parts of the supposedly IC system.  If either of these can be done, with any IC system, than that system can no longer, rationally, be considered irrefutable evidence of design.  But there’s the rub:

--irrefutable--

A proponent of IC could still -claim- “sure, it -looks- like it might have evolved, but you can’t -prove- that it wasn’t designed.  And I have fifteen more examples of IC-- until you trace each individual one, I maintain that design is the more rational answer.”

[scientist goes away, promptly spends the next sixty years tracing possible evolutionary explanations for the observed complexities.  Manages to address all fifteen.  Returns with the results.]

Creationist and IC proponent responds “OK, OK.  You’ve provided ONE example of speciation.  You’ve traced evolutionary pathways for the fifteen examples.  But that doesn’t -prove- that these other fifteen examples that I’ve come up with can be similarly explained.  Until you can reduce -every- -single- -example- that I come up with, you haven’t -proven- anything.  And even if you -do- provide a possible evolutionary explanation, that doesn’t -prove- that these systems weren’t designed. . .  it just provides an alternative possible explanation to design.

By these standards, we can’t prove the existence of gravity, either.  I mean, I could drop a ball, five hundred times, and someone could assert that it is -possible- that it might not, on the 501st time, you know. . .  fall.  That the ball only falls because of the Buddha’s willful suspension of the “lightness of Buddha spirit.” And that, someday, the Buddha will tire of suspending the “lightness,” and the ball will rocket away into the stratosphere.

I can never prove that that person’s position is “false.” They can always push the question/assertion out to ‘next example/time.’

It doesn’t seem that science can “prove” anything.  “Proof” is only available in Math, just as “Truth” is only available in Philosophy.  Hell, all science can do is provide explanations that are A: reasonable, and based on observed evidence and B: that -work-.

I might think it’s absurd for someone to believe that ball -really- might not fall to the ground, the next time that I release it, but I’m probably also not going to spend the rest of my life dropping the damn ball to “prove” that the “lightness of Buddha spirit” is a figment.

[If, however, the ball -does- rocket away into the stratosphere, I’m not going to immediately assume that they were “right” about the Buddha spirit.  I mean, it’s possible that it wasn’t Buddha at all, and that it was just God fucking with me.  I mean, Job was a decent sort, and look what God did to him!)

In this context, irreducibly complex means the person or persons making this statement about something cannot conceive of an evolutionary path

I’m not sure that I’m understanding IC correctly, if this is true.

My understanding is that an IC system (biological or mechanical) refers to the systems structure, and function, rather than it’s origins.

Kreb’s cycle, in humans, for example, can only take place if a series of chemicals and hormones interact in a very specific way.  Remove any one of those hormones, and the system completely crashes-- it doesn’t function poorly, and the independent pieces don’t keep “doing their thing” on their own.  The system completely crashes.  Proponents of design assert that this proves something [that the system is designed].

Proponents of evolution assert that IC systems evolve from systems that were not initially irreducible.

But the -nature- of the system under debate-- ie: its irreducibility-- does not change no matter how one attempts to explain its existence.

But it’s likely that I’m completely wrong about this.

elwed, WRT Hovind, you were one day ahead of the Miami Herald and other papers.

This is not his first encounter with the IRS. Here is the finding in a 1996 bankruptcy hearing, which found against him.

There are thought to be many female children, and many grandchildren that are not mentioned (the wife of Cain is not mentioned accept for the fact that Cain lay with here). Possibly even some male children that are not mentioned. The story of Cain and Able is merely the first story of any people after the fall in the garden. Cain was NOT kicked out of Eden, he was removed from “the land” were his family was dwelling. Adam and Eve were thrown out of Eden after that little incident with the fruit and the snake. Where is the proof that there were not yet any other people besides the 4?

Just gotta wonder about the Christian mind or what’s left of it.
So you have this so called “Infallible” book of which you are completely obsessed with but unfortunately its just chock full of inaccuracies, impossibilities, contradictions on virtually every single page. That’s gotta just fuck you up on a daily basis.
So that puts that wee little pee brain a spinning busily making up shit as you go along to keep explaining away all these fallacies.
So sure lets just throw in a bunch of female children and grandchildren that this infallible book never mentions nor even insinuates exist.
I mean really, why not?
That’s the beauty of believing in total mythology where all you need is faith not hard tangible Falsifiable evidence.
You can just dream shit up anytime you like.
Of course there is no “proof” don’t be silly, how can one have proof of anything that merely exist in the feeble minds of religious zealots whom have not socially or culturally progressed much past the stone age.

I got a simple question of which Im sure there will no simple answer forthcoming.

According to your infallible book of contradictory mythology was the so called Genesis Flood or Noah’s Flood in the year 2348BC?

Hovind:

“Hey!  Don’t light that!  Sorry man, but you can’t smoke in here, this is God’s car.”

ROFL.

There are thought to be many female children, and many grandchildren that are not mentioned (the wife of Cain is not mentioned accept for the fact that Cain lay with here [sic]).

WHO thinks that?  And why didn’t Sister Jeannine make an attempt to explain that to my ignorant 9 year old ass instead of hitting me and humiliating me for daring to voice my question?  You’d think those people put in charge of guiding children’s spiritual development would have an arsenal of things to whip out (like you do) in order to prop up their case for the need to believe the utterly preposterous things in the Bible.

More intriguing still:  Supposing there were all these “female children and grandchildren” you say it’s “thought” (by whom, I don’t know) exist—they would have to be first and second generation offspring of Adam and Eve, wouldn’t they?  So Cain was married to (i.e. fucking) some woman who, if not his sibling, would still be closely related enough to make it incest, right?  Does that mean God is ok with sister- or niece-fucking but not brother-killing?  We know he didn’t smite Lot or his daughters for it, so I guess he doesn’t mind a little fun family fornicating, the dirty old deity!

I will never understand how people can reconcile themselves with the utterly ridiculous things found in the Bible, and worse yet, defend them as absolute and literal fact. With the mental contortions and outright denial required to maintain such faith it’s no wonder some Christians crack under the strain and do things like bash their children’s heads in because they start hearing voices.

First I want to write that the reason for my quick question before was that I am probably more interested in where that discussion will lead than in this one. But to the stuff we have before us:

1) That something cannot have evolved is a positive assertion that requires proof of a negative. Arguably, even as much as outlining a potential evolutionary path can be construed as a falsification.

Logic can easily provide us proof of a negative. If we know that A requires B to exist, and we know that B requires A to exist, then we know they did not come not come into existence independently, as they require each other. The only way we can assume that this is not true is if we decide there must be a flaw in the idea that A requires B (or vice versa). That some other C provided for A what B supplies now. So what we have is not proof, but it becomes evidence. Ignoring that this can be, and ignoring that multiple instances of this exist by saying that in the singular case it is not definitive proof is burying your head in the sand. But it also requires us to come up with something that could be that C, not just in our one case, but in each case, if we want to continue to believe in undirected evolution. And lastly, I did not claim it was proof positive against evolution, I wrote that it raises the bar for such events to have occurred by chance. It was great odds against many of the things occurring which evolution rests on, the odds become greater still once one starts adding the requirement of these unknown and impossible to imagine (if one takes your argument) Cs that developed our existing A-B relationships. Worse still, many of those relationships are A-B-C-D-E relationships and we are looking for F,G,H,I and J.

And more to the point against your statement in art 2, I never claimed that one must believe in one or the other. It was my original argument that lack of belief in creationism does not mean automatic acceptance of evolution, and the converse is true. Irreducible complexity does not prove creation, it disproves evolution. I’ve never taken it as a dichotomy, that is your invention.

Les, I made 3 arguments against the burden for proof being mine. You made one attack on one argument, and your one attack does not hold water. But because it’s your site, I will attempt to clarify for you:
1) I did not make the first assertion, therefore the burden is not mine.
2) I’m not interested in proving Evolution or 7 literal day Creationism. I’ve stated repeatedly that I do not believe either can be proven. But if someone would like to try to convince me of evolution I have some questions, just like I would if you were trying to prove 7 literal day creationism.
3) If this is not a formal/scored debate, then in a friendly discussion, readily available evidence is generally supplied by those who have it, regardless of the burden.
Now I introduce a 4th argument: you’ve written (and others) thousands of words now saying the burden is mine. What, exactly is your goal? It appears that in the past little expense has been spared to belittle my positions, indeed you dedicated a whole thread to defaming me. So now, when I’ve made, by all your accounts at any rate, a huge blunder, no one can produce a shred of evidence to show what a complete moron I am? Wouldn’t it have been much easier for you to just show me the evidence of my stupidity rather than write volumes concerning how you don’t have to so you won’t?

You make many claims you do not back up in this very post:

1) I’ve been attempting to follow the approach I’m most familiar with and have tried to back up any claims made with supporting references. You, David, generally don’t. Instead, you tend to issue flat out denials without providing any basis for them.

I have consistently provided evidence whenever challenged. But since you’re making this assertion, I’d be happy to look over your evidence. Seems on the thread were you lost a nights sleep to prove this point, I rebutted each of your statements completely. You had taken almost every statement out of context, and also did not back up other outlandish statements made there.

2) Though this does point out why you prefer to make negative claims over positive ones. In that way you feel you can avoid having to backup anything you say. You can just keep saying ‘no it doesn’t’ and leave it at that.

I’ve never just said “no it doesn’t” that I can recall. But since you’ve now made the assertion, I’m sure that you will come up with at least 5 instances or concede the point publicly. In fact, I think you’d be hard pressed to show the ratio of negative to positive assertions I’ve made leans heavily toward the negative, but again, the burden of proof, according to what you just stated is yours.

3) Even now in redefining this as a ‘friendly’ debate you again attempt to push the burden of backing up claims onto others by suggesting that “it is far easier to prove a positive than a negative” so you shouldn’t have to backup your claims if you’re perceived as being wrong.

As shown above, this is part of one of 3 arguments. And it is not even the basis for that reason. I haven’t tried to redefine anything, you were the one saying it was not formal or scored. But again, you’ve made the assertion, prove it.

4) In effect, trying to apply the rule you believe is applicable to a formal debate to what you’re now calling a ‘friendly debate.’

I never set any rules of debate, I don’t recall reading any, so how could I be changing any? Again, you make a rather unfounded assertion.

5) When you’re not busy reframing you’re busy trying to set the rules to your advantage.

Seems you made this assertion in your thread attacking me, but failed to back it up there too. I clearly stated that I merely wished to resume the discussion and tried to summate where we were, inviting any to correct me. I’ve stayed with the same line of reasoning throughout this thread, and when I have shifted my arguments in other threads, I believe I’ve stated as much. But again, your assertion, you prove it.

Nowiser, any transitional form that PROVES speciation would be enough for me. But showing a species that’s similar to 2 others and could be a transitional form does not prove that it is a transitional form (as you stated). Like the IC argument, one case would give me pause, thousands of cases would certainly change my mind. I’m not sure where in-between enough would be enough. This is true of the ball example. When we are born, we probably didn’t believe in gravity, I’m certain of this when I see small babies, actually. But after noticing this effect over and over again, without even knowing what gravity is, we see it happen enough times that it just became a fact to us. But shouldn’t the examples be overwhelming? Shouldn’t all the hundreds of thousands of fossils we have show at least hundreds of such forms?

And I am giggling seriously over the final paragraph of the first post (Job and the ball). Because there are certainly times when I think God does just screw with me (or rather, allow Satan to) and I think of Job and say “Hey, this is not so bad by comparison, and I’m sure from some angle, pretty funny.”

In the second post: I agree with your interpretation of IC. I think you may have been confused by me trying to nail down what we are looking for in the same sentence I was defining IC. It is only my poor use of the language, and not your fault at all.

If we know that A requires B to exist, and we know that B requires A to exist, then we know they did not come not come into existence independently, as they require each other.

Wrong, David.  They could have come into existence independently, and then grown interdependent.  They could require each other in one environment but not in another.  They could require each other for one particular function but not for others.

Your “logic” consistently includes hidden assumptions, most of which seem to be based on your foregone conclusion.

OB said…

And why didn’t Sister Jeannine make an attempt to explain that to my ignorant 9 year old ass instead of hitting me and humiliating me for daring to voice my question? You’d think those people put in charge of guiding children’s spiritual development would have an arsenal of things to whip out (like you do) in order to prop up their case for the need to believe the utterly preposterous things in the Bible.

It seems to me that had she answered your question, it would have encouraged you to ask more question about biblical inconsistencies, which is not exactly what they want you doing.  Instead, she worked on shutting down your curiosity.

Instead, she worked on shutting down your curiosity.

She failed miserably.  What she succeeded in shutting down was a child’s natural tendency to believe the words of authority as truth, along with any positive feelings whatsoever toward the Church, Catholicism or a God that would allow such a vile, heartless cunt to guide the religious lives of innocent children.  Brides of Christ my ass.

1.

What GeekMom said.

2.

Irreducible complexity does not prove creation, it disproves evolution

Actually, it doesn’t.  It only proves that we don’t know -yet- how an IC system evolved.  There are plenty of IC systems to look at, and when we see similar systems, in other life forms, but which -lack- one of the “indespensable” components of the IC system that we have identified, -that- can be seen as an indication of evolution (and perhaps common ancestry, as well).

Krebs cycle is an example of this.  Which is why Behe (as far as I know) doesn’t address it.

A similar case can be made for macro-level IC systems.

Specific case for example #2.  How about those Archaeopteryx?  And don’t tell me you didn’t expect me to bust -him- out.  Nor is Archaeopteryx a “solitary” example.  Not anymore.  Recent fossil discoveries in China and Spain certainly bolster the case for A as a “transitional” species.

Specific case for example #1.  Speciation of salamanders and green warblers. 

href="http://www.actionbioscience.org/evolution/irwin.html”

OB,
I’m not sure your statements/questions aren’t rhetorical. But I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt and answer seriously.
1) I wouldn’t start to say I can understand what goes on in Catholicism. But they do have some views not generally held by protestants. I would think any protestant source you went to would tell you that not everybody that ever lived during the time period would be mentioned in the Bible. What history ever written does?
2) Yes, Cain and Able pretty much must have married their sisters. Not much choice in the matter, eh? There was no Biblical law (or any other) at the time against it yet. Later, when the population grew a bit, there were taboos and then laws against such behavior. By Noah’s time, it was clearly against the rules. When that law was decreed, I don’t know, but it obviously could not have existed to start. The decree against murder, in fact killing of any kind, was from the beginning, According to Genesis, man was not given animals to eat until after the flood, nor did it rain until the flood. The thing to “take home” out of this is that no history ever written contains every event and every person that took place during a given time. Only the highlights are usually recorded. Likewise, not every birth and every law are in the story of Genesis.
3)

With the mental contortions and outright denial required to maintain such faith it’s no wonder some Christians crack under the strain and do things like bash their children’s heads in because they start hearing voices.

I’d like to see the statistics that show that fundamental Christians are more likely to do these things than anyone else. Certainly, when it does happen to Christians it gets more press, but I don’t think it actually happens anymore frequently.

Wow, so many words, words, words. So many arguments, counter-arguments, counter-counter argurments.

Unfortunately, there’s very little actual communication. Typically, the Christian or other believer falls back on his/her interpretation of the bible as the basis for argumentation, and wants to assume that the bible is the common basis of all knowledge for all people, on all sides of an issue. In general, the atheist has found religion and all of the ritual that tends to go with it completely irrelevant to the living of his/her life. The Christian simply cannot understand how anyone can not believe in God, and more specifically, the Christian version, since it is so obviously (for them) correct and true. They view the atheist’s lack of belief as perversely contrarian - rather like the child who won’t take his medicine even though he knows “darn” well it is good for him. “Religion is GOOD for you. God is GOOD for you. Jesus is GOOD for you. Why can you not see this? Surely you see it, and in your heart you know it’s true, but something must have happened to you to make you bitter and that’s why you’ve turned against God.”

The atheist, for the most part, marvels over how the Christian accepts that the bible is THE true and accurate basis of all of his/her philosophy without any proof that this is so, other than the fact that generations of human beings have passed this belief down. The atheist also wonders why most religions in general, including Christianity, have the pathological need for belief in an “afterlife,” and how so many of their actions seem calculated to earn enough points to get into the “good place” when death comes.

Very often, the Christian wants the atheist to “prove” that there is no God, while the atheist generally believes that the burden of proof is on the person who asserts that something does indeed exist.

The attitudes of the atheist and the Christian are so at odds with each other that there can never be a true meeting of the minds.

I was raised Catholic, but stopped “buying it” by the time I was in 8th grade. I figured then that any truly omniscient and omnipotent being couldn’t possibly be as petty as the Catholic rituals taught. I had no further use for Catholicism, and shortly thereafter, I had no further use for the concept of God. I found that I did not need God to give life meaning, or to make sense of the world. I do not “hate” God any more than I “hate” Vishnu, Zeus, or Odin.

I see very little point in “presenting arguments” as all the arguments that could possibly be presented on all sides of this issue already have been presented. Don’t get me wrong, it can still be fun to read them, and to watch some folks get almost apoplectic over all of it. But nothing changes. The Christian remains a Christian; the atheist remains an atheist.