Regarding Joe Rich's March 2 letter "Evolution letter missed key points": Mr. Rich opens his letter with a claim that reproduction itself shows "design" and asks, "Does he thinks the first beings were asexual?" As a matter of fact, I do!
Sexual reproduction began long after life on Earth was well established. And asexual reproduction continues today. In fact, considering the mass of the bacterial and algal forms of life, it's the clear winner! There is a common logical fallacy that because life appears complex that only design could cause the complexity.
It's also untrue that only more complex structures are evolved. Look at the hooves of the modern horse and compare them with the multiple toes of the fossil horse eohippus. The modern hoof is a much simpler affair. There is no need for "motivation," as Mr. Rich implies. Any adaptation may show up in the evolutionary chain. In the case of the dodo, it just didn't work out.
Mr. Rich claims that his designer's work is superior. The S-shaped curvature of the human spine and splayed angle of our pelvis is an adaptive compromise, not a great engineering exemplar! So once again, we can see a simple, natural explanation for our world, or we need to generate a very complex, supernatural one full of gods, angels, original sin and arcane rituals to appease and atone for our existence.
I choose the simple explanation because it predicts what we'll find in the future. The creation/design folks can only try to wiggle, fit and deny findings. Each time a fossil such as archaeopteryx (the transitional reptile/bird) is found, they moan and ask for the next "missing link." God is not in the gaps!
Johnnie Poole
Augusta
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Evolution is the only theory that offers answers without demanding blind faith. It is scientific, whereas biblical explainations were useful to pre-scientific societies. There is no denying that fact. Evolution = science, backed by evidence. Intelligent design = religion, backed by faith. Take your pick. Personally, I find science and free enquirey far more interesting. Faith stops all discussion in favor of ignorance and simplification. Science is far more fascinating to a mature mind. Fairy tales are only satisfying to a child or a simple-minded adult.
Very good letter. It speaks for scientific explainations as being the best answer. We do not live in a pre-scientific age when bible stories were a necessary means to explain natural phenomena. Despite science, the ignorant continue to clutch thier bibles and religion and a cartoon science of intelligent design or creationism. Just who do they think designed the designer? No answers, just blind faith. Not good enough for a thinking person, but good enough for most of the fools of the CSRA and the editors of the AC.
You tell them Johnnie. 4.6 BILLON years ago there was a Big Bang. Earth was just a hot rock that got rained on for millions of years making oceans. Out of the oceans primordial soup was formed from which came amebas then tadpoles, frogs, etc, etc until poof...we are here. So that means Great-Great-etc etc (to like the tenth power) grandpa was ......a rock? Yes folks it's true, Great-Great (you know) grandpa was a ROCK! And that doesn't take any faith at all to believe does it. He must be where we get out intellegence from.
jedex6. Evolution offers explanations backed by observations of facts that back up those observations. Intelligent design offers explanations backed by observations of facts that back up those observations. Where's the problem with either THEORY?
KingoftheUSA, very possible that great grandpa was a rock. Look at our last pResident as in dumb as a rock.
LOL Retired Army... my grandpa was an asexual lizard... guess that means he was my grandma too..... and I have no problem with this... my world isn't coming to an end because I'm not a church goer. I prefer to think for myself.
Forgot to say.. Good Letter Mr. Poole
I will just stick to the Book of Genesis.
Evolution is a fact and the theory does provide predictive models as any good theory should. Now if we could just figure out the origin of life-abiogenesis, etc. Amino acids form in nature quite readily and conditions may have favored some nucleic acids, but until the last five years all models favored life couldn't have originated during the Haldane era. New hypotheses and ideas have resurrected abiogenesis again. The iron-sulfur,RNA, Lipids, or PHA world in clay or deep vents or bubbles are one of many hypotheses offered to explain the orgin of life (the building blocks are hypothesized to have terrestrial and extraterrestrial origins). Back in the 19th century people believed life could spontaneous generate but Louis Pasteur demonstrated that life does not ever generate spontaneously. This fact has only one exception offered in abiogenesis as the origin of life. No one has built from the bottom up a protocell that has the properties of life (self-assembling and dividing but still not life) which argues against these hypotheses. So evolution has risen to theory but the origin of life is still hypothetical and mostly a black box. Evolution is a fact-origin is still a mystery.
Evolution explains the what and how but doesn't address the why. As the LTE mentions bacteria are the most successful of any organism on earth-yet they have changed little. Rodents are the most successful mammal in variety and number. Variation in sexual populations is demonstrated in gene alleles-same gene mutates producing variation, and in asexual populations by gene duplication mutations then further point mutations. These mutations were long thought random as the neutral or near-neutral (Kimura and Ohta)theories suggested but since we've started mapping genomes we find mutations occur in hot spots and aren't random at all-i.e. all traits aren't equal in the eyes of evolution, that "significant" mutations are non-random, that gene networks and interactions determine whether mutations will contribute to phenotypic evolution. This does not support "intelligent design" non-science, but does advocate principals of design that have molded evolution (no implication of designer). The environment and ecological interactions mold life and life molds the environment and ecology. There are some circular arguments obviously.
There is one answer to the origin of Life: GOD. My wfe has an 82 year old aunt, who suffered a heart attack, upon going to the emergency room, the doctor's found several blocked arteries. This aunt has always had a deep faith in God, and until the heart attack, held down two parttime jobs. The doctor's had no other choice but to perform open heart surgery. After the surgery the prognosis was grim according to the doctors.That was three months ago. Today she is still recovering from the surgery,but she is active, and gets sbout well. Of course she had to give up the two part time jobs, but she is still on the go. GOD is the giver of life and the sustainer of life and the creator of life.
The evolution idea is not scientific. The scientific method requires observation and testing. Assumptions are made and some scientific tests on rocks and bones are made, but if any of the assumptions are false then the conclusion is also false. That doesn't deter evolution believers from statements like: Sexual reproduction began long after life on Earth was well established. Mr Poole must be very old if he used the scientific method!
While reproduction is less than with asexual reproduction than with the sexual one, the latter spread the number of good mutations bring more of the good ones togethel, eliminatng more of the bad ones. From the side of religion, theistic evolution recognizes God as the director off evolution in some manner. Bizarro, you are no more an acolyte of Duane Gish than I of Ward Churchill [ Yea, Winston! By the way, Chamberlin did blast Hitler after his appeasing him!].
To iedex6
At least ignorant creationists like me can spell inquiry.
What type of evolution are we talking about?
1) Cosmic evolution-the origin of time, space and matter.
2) Chemical evolution-the origin of higher elements from hydrogen.
3) Stellar and planetary evolution-origin of stars and planets.
4) Organic evolution-origin of life from inanimate matter.
5) Macroevolution-Changing from one kind into another.
6) Microevolution-variations within kinds.
Only no 6 has been observed. One definition of evolution is given (descent with modification) and the others are assumed to be true by association. The evolutionist are using faith for the first five types of evolutions only the last is scientific. Many people who believe in the intelligent design theory have studied evolution as taught in school but have like-wise been involved in studying material that contradicts the theory of evolution. It is the evolutionist who has not and will not allow themselves to be exposed to the scientific data on evolution. The creationist does not need to "cling to their Bible" objective evidence is on their side. I challenge people to read the book "A Case for a Creator" by Les Strobel. It is a good scientific read on evolution and Intel design.
Gish is a nut. Like Kent Hovind is a crook. I find the ID lot to be a particularly unethical lot (oh the irony) with all kinds of trickery and treachery-just unbelievable at times reminds me of PETA advocates. All the courts have ruled ID non-science-as well as just simple logic. I am a strong advocate for evolution but believe life orginated elsewhere and "came" to the this planet-perhaps even more than once as one hypothesis holds life may have had multiple orgins. It was once thought that asexual reproduction would be limiting in evolution-Muller's ratchet but evidence has demonstrated this to be false with rotifers and other examples of asexual critters with tremendous variation. The evolution of "sex" is still a mystery but hypotheses abound.
Evolution is a theory and is not fact. Theory and fact are opposites of each other. I prefer the blind faith over evolution anytime because I have a book called the Bible that tells me so. Evolution does not have a whole lot of proof.
It's been proven that the Earth and everything on it was not created in 6 days. And that is a fact.
bions its all about bions..............
here bizzaro this is for you. http://www.orgonomy.org/Articles/Reich/The_Bions1.html
if a man who knew the absolute truth were to stand on a soapbox and give you this truth, he would be killed and it would cause great wars................. such is mankind.
There is a medical condition called Progeria where there is advanced aging secondary probably to a genetic mutation. A 10 year old child (chronologically) will have a body that demonstrates advanced ages (50+) and will die of "old age" but still be very young. A designer that could create the universe and Time itself could manage to fit just about anything into a 6 day period while our detection of that process remains limited.
Reich was an interesting man-I liked his psych work and Orgone experiment which Einstein demonstrated the folly of orgone energy. The Bions experiments were demonstrated to be contaminated with life. Life comes from life is a pretty basic tenet of biology-even viruses.
Evolution is a fact as evidence in domesticated plants, livestock, and dogs. Artificial selection is still evolution-and we are part of nature so no different than ants selecting and breeding fungi for their gardens. The theory is science's best answer to explain what and how it happens mechanistically. Microevolution and macroevolution aren't real distinctions noted by evolutionary biologist both are evolution just different in time scale or degree of change over time scale. Evidence indicates "aging" evolved, and would argue against longevity research to increase the lifespan of man.
What I don't understand about "Intelligent Design" is how do you qualify "intelligent"? The bible states God is omniscient and his ways aren't are not human's ways so to characterize God's creation in human terms of intellect would be a grave insult. Now define "Design" and realize numerous examples of self-assembly and the complex "design" of snowflakes by natural forces and the fallacy of design by intellect.
All this verbiage and not one believer in a Designer can answer the one simple question: Just who do you think designed this infinitely complex Intelligent Disigner? You can't say "God" because God and the Designer are presumably the same entity. You are back to square one with a useless circular reasoning. It is proof that God, Designers, Devils, angels, and others are all figments of the human imagination, explain absolutely nothing, and are kept alive by the human need to believe that there is something out there, a Daddy of the Sky, and not just a big, empty, meaningless VOID.
It seems that to jedex6, that if he/she doesn't or more likely can't understand it, then it can't be true.
The premise of intelligent design is the belief that their is something greater than us that created us. That takes no more faith than to believe that we defied nature and evolved from simple to complex....counter to every other system in the universe. If you were to see a grandfather clock you would assume that someone built it....even if you had no evidence beyond it's existence.....OR would you believe that it just occurred by chance in nature? Which premise seems more unlikely?
Bizarro, ant that counts also against theistic evolution! Planning God contradicts unplanning natural selection, the anti-chance agency off Nature. B,. you know the theory better than I but I wonder about panspermia. Thanks for ever trying to educate the undecideds and perhaps a few creationists.
SisterAbdullahX, If there is something greater that us that created us, then I will ask the question again: Who created the "something greater than us" ? Did this thing just come out of nowhere? You cannot believe that a grandfather clock just appeared, but that someone had to build it, and yet you are perfectly willing to believe that no one built the "something greater than us". There are many things that I do not understand, such as nuclear physics, and yet I believe they are true. That is because they are backed by scientific evidence and the evidence of my senses. Your creationism, by contrast, I cannot believe in, not because I don't understand it, but because it offers me no evidence that my senses can validate.