Chimps Used Simple Tools 5 Million Years Ago

David_Bloom writes: "Evidence that chimps have been using simple tools over 500 million years ago has been unveiled by an archeological dig in West Africa. Tragically, it will probably be another 500 million years before my mom figures out how to use the simple Windows taskbar. [sigh]" Update: 05/23 22:45 GMT by T : Actually, as the linked article really says, that should be five million, rather than 500 million.

Comments

Umm, that 5 million years ago.

[Halvard]

Read closer!

Re:Umm, that 5 million years ago.

[David_Bloom]

D'oh!

IF A MODERATOR IS READING THIS: Could you please modify the story so it says 5 million, not 500 million? TYVM in advance.

500 = 5

[rw2]

But you were only off by a factor of 100. Probably and astrophysicist, eh?

Re:500 = 5

[Anonymous Coward]

and?

By any chance...

[Snafoo]

By any chance, is your Mom named 'Lucy'?

Re:By any chance...

[mgarraha]

Did the archaeologists find a large black monolith among all the little stone fragments?

Important calculation.

[Anonymous Coward]

"Tragically, it will probably be another [5] million years before my mom figures out how to use the simple Windows taskbar. [sigh]"

At which time she will be 5,000,055 years old.

What are their dating methods anyways?

[hbmartin]

They didn't post any evidence for thier dating. I just refuse to accept every claims blindly. They've been wrong about their monekys before :)

Re:What are their dating methods anyways?

[ObviousGuy]

I believe they took them out dinner and observed them eating with a knife and fork.

Millions of years of tool using, and they can barely feed themselves in a civilized manner. Products of bad breeding, I say.

Too Bad

[erasmus_]

It's too bad most of the Slashdot crowd is so progressive. This is one of those perfect articles to get into flame wars about whether or not evolution really happened. And how every thing that seems to contradict the Biblical version of time is placed on this earth as "a test of faith."

Regardless, this is clearly fascinating. Although in my mind it raises the question of why that species has not advanced significantly more in all this time. I realize the article states that the researchers will look for differences in modern behavior, but my guess is that their methods are still basically the same.

Which I guess is good for us, as who wants super-monkeys taking away all of our jobs. Although if they could just comment their code, I might give them a shot.

Re:Too Bad

[Anonymous Coward]

There are many issues with at least the CNN report; for example: how do they know the tools were used by chimps and not humans or very agile now-extinct plants? Just because of close placement?

And if evolution were to be true, why would one species (us) "evolve" into intelligence and one that had the nascent beginnings just stagnate for vast amounts of time?

Re:Too Bad

[Milo77]

I've always seen it as a contradiction to hold to the Bible's portrayal of creation while clinging to the belief that it's portrayal is detectable by science. If what the Bible says is true it is almost certainly indetectable to science; "super-natural", in other words "outside of nature".

Further, the seemingly natural origins of the universe do not create "tests of faith" - rather, they allow for Faith. What would happen to Faith if one could prove conclusively (hypothetical) that the Bible was correct in its telling of the story(to the point where no intelligent person could reject it)? Would this not destroy Faith?

Re:Too Bad

[ashtonb]

What do you mean 'whether or not evolution really happened'?

It is still happening. You can watch it happen in our hospitals right this very moment. Take a look at those people with drug resistant bacterial infections... some of these bacteria simply didn't exist 10 years ago. They are all descendants of older non resistant bacteria's.

Evolution never stopped, and cannot be stopped.

I place people who don't believe in evolution with people who think the world is flat in the the same group... stubbornly blind followers of dogma.

I can show you evidence of evolution... now can you show me evidence of creation, or a god?

Re:Too Bad

[codeButcher]

... the Biblical version ...

I find that most views attributed to the Bible ("The Bible says this or that") are actually someone's mindless regurgitations of some other ostensibly learned theologician's obviously flawed interpretation of the scriptures, usually made to fit his particular church's teaching. Quite difficult to get involved in a flame war where you agree with neither side :-)

Re:Too Bad

[kroymen]

Regardless, this is clearly fascinating. Although in my mind it raises the question of why that species has not advanced significantly more in all this time. I realize the article states that the researchers will look for differences in modern behavior, but my guess is that their methods are still basically the same.

Evolution doesn't just happen. Life doesn't move inexorably toward "higher" forms. Life forms only evolve when there is environmental pressure to do so. If there weren't any huge challenges to the chimps' survival in that time that would have required intellectual adaptation, there's no reason that they would evolve. We, however, presumably had certain survival pressures that favored complex social interaction and abstract communication...like LAN gaming parties and slashdot comments.

Re:Too Bad

[erasmus_]

Good point. Of course, as the article points out, there has been some of that environmental pressure that you mention, which is why that species is now getting to be a rarity. Of course on an evolutionary scale, this has come only recently, due to humans, so the species has not yet had a chance to adapt.

Re:Too Bad

[Anonymous Coward]

Let's see your evidence of evolution. Are you going to cite Haekel's embryos? Or perhaps vestigial organs?

Of course it helps to define terms - micro-evolution as in how to get different dog breeds is not what is typically interpreted as evolution, though some unwise people might use that. Evolution as we're talking here is goo-to-you, major new functionality type change, are we agreed on that?

If you really delve into the details on resistant bacteria, you will find that the drug resistant strains can't compete with the "in-the-wild" strain if there are no drugs around, the resistant strains have deleterious mutations. They have not gained an ability but rather lost one. For example, if they are unable to transport certain nutrients across their membranes, that may make them drug resistant to a particular drug, but it does not make them better than the original strain. There has not been progress, it's devolution not evolution that's demonstrated.

In fact even Richard Dawkins, evolution cheerleader extraorinaire, can't cite an example of an information-gaining mutation.

And your claim that the resistant bacteria spontaneously arose is ill-informed, some recently exhumed bodies from like 150 years ago were tested recently and found to have the same mix, resistant and wild, in them as well.

If as you claim evolution has evidence for it, what's your evidence?

Re:Too Bad

[ashtonb]

You have not given any real counter-evidence. You may be right that super germs are not an example of recent spontaneous mutations, but they are an excellent example of natural selection.

Okay. Like you said, let's define terms. Here is a good definition of evolution:
'"Evolution," in the context most biologists intend to use it, is correctly defined simply as "descent with modification."' (Robert Moss)

New lets look for some evidence. Hmm. Don't suppose you have ever heard of a study on the beaks of finches in the Galapagos? I an not talking about what Darwin saw, but what a more recent investigation led by Peter Grant found.
His work is a great example of natural selection, a major part of evolution.

Now you are saying... 'that is only natural selection... we have no more species than before, no information gain.'

So now we get to the second half of evolution, change/mutation of genes.
Much of an organism is defined by its genes. There is little argument about this, even from creationists.
Forgetting natural selection, let's think about the reproduction of simple lifeforms. 'Either there is variation (mutation) or the cells copy themselves perfectly, every single generation, with absolutely no mistakes. Given entropy, that's just not possible! Mistakes are inevitable.' (Robert Moss).
Mutations do occur. But as you said, in the case of resistant bacteria, these are not information gaining mutations. Mutations never gain information. That isn't how it works. Mutations are about changing information.

So how does a genome gain information?
Let's imagine a hypothetical organism with one gene in a resource rich world. It reproduces constantly. Those organisms that have fatally deleterious mutations never breed. Those with other mutations breed at different rates, but since this is a resource rich world, all survive, and share their mutations with their neighbors. There is no speciation occurring, just one species with a single gene that constantly changing. They are a pretty homogeneous group.
Let's suppose this group got split in two. We have two separate colonies quickly becoming different species. But still we have single gene organisms. This goes on for a while, the two different species become adept at two different ways for getting energy out of the resources available.
Suddenly the colonies join again. The organisms are not so different that they can't still exchange genetic information, but are different enough that their genes cannot merge into a single hybrid gene. There is now some organisms with two genes. Both these genes have different methods of turning available resources into energy.
All these bacteria have been growing exponentially for sometime now. We have different species because this is a big world and the resources vary, and some of those species now have multiple genes. Suddenly we find that they have taken up all available area, and now must compete. Natural really kicks in, and many of the weaker variations of the major species disappear.
This world now has many distinctly different species, and some of these species have more genetic information than others. All the processes that I have described continue to occur. Sometimes there is a major event that knocks out most of the life, allowing new species to come to dominance. There is constant variation in the environment of this world, creating niches for organisms to specialize in. At some period a species develops the ability to join with others and becomes multi-cellular. This species finds it survives especially well in some niches. Et cetera, et cetera, until today, where all this evolution has resulted in todays world.
Sorry, I forgot to include individual genes growing in size/complexity. I am tired.

We have established that change and natural selection both happen. I have also demonstrated a method to gain new genes.
Evolution doesn't make any claims about the origin of life, just how life became to be a diverse as it is today.

Re:Too Bad

[Anonymous Coward]

Ah, you say "proof of evolution", then you say "Let's imagine a hypothetical organism". Somehow that doesn't seem to meet the criteria for proof that is widely understood.

Your hypothetical case has a couple of points where I think you are a bit vague. You claim there would be additional information gained when two colonies are isolated; but no one has yet seen an information gain anywhere as a result of a mutation. And that's after many decades of bombarding lots of poor fruit flies with massive doses of gamma radiation to encourage mutation. As we'd all expect, many mutations have happened, but not one positive one yet. Yes of course mutations happen, but no gain comes from them that has ever been observed. Again, where's the proof? You sound suspiciously like you're exercising faith rather than supplying proof, when you don't cover the details of where the new information comes from.

I never said, and do not know anyone who would, that natural selection doesn't work. It is clearly observable everywhere. But it is a culling or winnowing process, one which restricts variation by encouraging only the fittest to survive. Without information gain in mutations, natural selection can only choose among the least weak. And in doing so it will actually remove information (the bad choices) from the gene pool, it will not add information.

To engage in your hypothetical style, imagine a variation which miraculously arose and started to grow a new organ would not have immediate benefit, since the entire feedback mechanism, chains of enzyme cascade reactions, etc. would not arise by chance in the same time frame. In fact that new organ would have only a deleterious effect, since it would be an energy drain on the subgroup that had more of this potentially but not yet fully useful organ. Resources normally dedicated to existence would be diverted into the nascent feature. So natural selection would then act against that new not-yet-ready-for-prime-time development, squishing it out of the gene pool before it could mature into something useful.

Darwin's finches are an excellent case against evolution actually - the beak size actually varies cyclically (if you read ALL the papers by Peter and Rosemary Grant et al., not just the 1977, but also particularly the 1987 paper) based on whether it's an El Nino or La Nina season in the Pacific. The charts in textboooks that show just the beaks changing size in one direction don't continue the chart out a few more years, because what looks like a nice smooth curve becomes something closer to an offset mild amplitude sinusoidal wave. And in fact Weiner's work on the finches, supplementing the Grants' work, has shown that the hybrids there are merging back together, not splitting further apart.

You say evolution "doesn't make any claims about the origin of life", that's certainly not what textbooks present.

And you said I didn't offer any counter-evidence to evolution. Since you're the one that stated in your original post

I place people who don't believe in evolution with people who think the world is flat in the the same group... stubbornly blind followers of dogma. I can show you evidence of evolution

It's not up to me to disprove evolution but up to you to prove it.

However there is evidence that goes against evolution and its assumptions. If you don't accept what I've already mentioned, how about the evidence that pokes holes in the ancient-earth theory. For example, Po 218, oceanic salinity, amount of sediment on the seabed, Helium measurements, lack of quantity of Stone Age skeletons, etc. etc. Without the vast ages of time, there's no time for evolution to work.

Re:Too Bad

[Anonymous Coward]

I've spent the last two days watching you to argue about evolution verses creation. It is interesting (and quite normal) to see that both of you are being selective and 'vague' in your arguments.

What I see is that AC agrees that there is natural selection and genetic mutations, but that these mutations never lead to an increase in genetic information. S/he also then implies that the world is very young, giving a list of false and/or disproven arguments to back him up.

I see Ash being convinced that evolution happens, but having little idea about how to argue for it. He states that there is selection, genetic mutation and that these mutations can lead to new genes, complexity, information, and beneficial changes to existing genes.

What Ash is missing is references to real evidence.
Ash, links are not that hard, see.

I have seen Ash try to present parts of the scientific theory of evolution, though it is obvious he doesn't know enough about it to counter AC's arguments.

What I have not seen is AC give any of a scientific theory of creation. S/he refers to young earth, but does not seem to realise that every argument listed has been proven false.

Why don't you post as a user, AC? It would make it so much easier to follow.

Re:Too Bad

[Anonymous Coward]

I often see people make reference to the wings and hollowness of bones on birds like the penguin as evidence for evolution. I also see the creationists refute these arguments, though poorly.

What I don't see is mention of the fact that birds have the genes for teeth. Why would a designer put in genes that are not used?

Evolutionist decided that birds are decendents of early dinosaurs. Biologists found out that birds have the genes to make sharp pointed teeth after the bird-dinosaur relationship was discovered.
Creationism doesn't explain this at all.

Re:Too Bad

[Anonymous Coward]

Why do some whales have leg bones?

Re:Too Bad

[Anonymous Coward]

Or the rudimentary legs of some snakes (boas, etc.). Other species of snakes seem to do fine without them.

Ot the small lung of snakes with only one lung significantly large. Inheritance from two-lunged ancestors?

Re: Too Bad

[Black Parrot]

> What I see is that AC agrees that there is natural selection and genetic mutations, but that these mutations never lead to an increase in genetic information.

And are we to suppose that AC has ever actually measured the information in a parent and offspring to see what the difference is?

Or even has a rigorous definition for 'information' in the context of inheritance?

Re:Too Bad

[Anonymous Coward]

If you're referring to the supposed vestigial pelvis of a whale, I can answer that easily. Many evolution texts erroneously list those as a proof of evolution.

If you remove those bones, you'll get no more baby whales. The muscles attached to those bones are vital for the reproductive act in the whale. They are not vestigial.

Re:Too Bad

[Anonymous Coward]

Gee AC why do I post as an AC. Well actually I usually post not that way, but I just got hit with the IBM 75GXP drive failure glitch on my own machine and therefore have to post using my work machine. Until I get the other one restored I should not do any non-work related posts from that IP using any identifiable trace, that's the policy.

It's very interesting to see your very selective nitpicking. A link to the NEJM article about the DNA sequence showing "ancestry" is amusing, there are many counter-links that could be used to show, for example in one gene study, that humans are closer to marigolds than to monkeys. It's just a matter of each side picking the evidence that is favorable to them. I don't know of an unbiased review of the topic or I'd link to it.

A point of your vagueness is knocking things without bothering to say why. Let's take Po218 for example - there are some dreadfully bad attempts to refute Gentry on the net, such as Brawley's, which are great examples of wasted time spent putting it together. Do you have something that actually refutes (not name-calling) the papers published in Science, Nature, and Geophysical Letters? Far from having been proven false, Po218 is a continuing mystery to ancient-earth believers. It takes a lot of faith in evolution to continue to believe in the face of that hard evidence.

If you note the original post, ashtonb initiated it by stating that anyone who didn't believe in evolution was someone he put in the same class as someone who believes in the flat earth. Actually many scientists in past centuries believed in a flat earth, that heavy objects fall faster than light, etc. And did you know that such giants of our past as Newton, Maxwell, Pasteur, Pascal, and Babbage were creationists?

Re: Too Bad

[Anonymous Coward]

I have not personally measured the number of base pairs; very few have I'm sure. And yes to some degree this is like Pirenne in "Foundation", just talking about others' research.

However evolutionists are the ones claiming that you can get something from nothing; it's up to you/them to come up with examples, it's not up to me to dance for you.

Re:Too Bad

[kelddath]

Far from having been proven false, Po218 is a continuing mystery to ancient-earth believers. It takes a lot of faith in evolution to continue to believe in the face of that hard evidence.

Nonsense. Gentry's halos have been debunked time and time again. See http://www.ebonmusings.org/evolution/gentry.htm for example.

If you note the original post, ashtonb initiated it by stating that anyone who didn't believe in evolution was someone he put in the same class as someone who believes in the flat earth. Actually many scientists in past centuries believed in a flat earth, that heavy objects fall faster than light, etc. And did you know that such giants of our past as Newton, Maxwell, Pasteur, Pascal, and Babbage were creationists?

Is this the best argument you can muster? You're even more pathetic than I first thought. Hint: Sometime go and look up the birth dates of most of them and then look up the date of publication of the Origin of Species.

Re:Too Bad

[Anonymous Coward]

Gentry's halos have been attacked time and time again; the link you provided even cites Brawley's sad attack as evidence. Please, if you're going to try to refute something as solid as Gentry's evidence, read his papers for yourself and you'll see that Brawley's concept was specifically addressed and dismissed by experiments Gentry did decades before Brawley did his work.

The crux of the site you mentioned however is to cite Odom and Rink's paper. It's quite instructive to note that Odom and Rink (at least at the time they wrote that paper) had never seen a Polonium halo, and in communications they had with Gentry, expressed an interest in seeing them some time.

In fact one quote from Odom's letter (10/27/89) to Gentry is quite interesting:

I told you that I would send you the editorial comments about our reference to an "instantaneous creation" as a suggested explanation for the Po halos. I now recall that these comments were made on the edited manuscript which I had to return with our revision. The editor suggested that we leave this reference out of our paper, but we felt that a reader new to the subject should be aware of other explanations that had been offered. Our original manuscript had to be cut 30%.

So even the authors of the paper you're citing as refuting Gentry admit that his work shows instantaneous creation as an explanation. Just the tyranny of the orthodox controllers of the media kept that from being known.

Re: Too Bad

[ashtonb]

No, creationists are the ones claiming you can get something out of nothing.
(A god appeared out of nothing, and created universe out of nothing more than a few words).

Evolutionist say that you can have a complex entity form from a less complex entity, or visa-versa

Now please define information, and please define an increase in information.

Re: Too Bad

[Anonymous Coward]

Hmmm. He should define information, and how to measure it information.

Re:Too Bad

[Anonymous Coward]

I was not referring to vestigial pelvis of a whale, but the vestigial limbs of a whale. What use are these?

Re:Too Bad

[ashtonb]

(See the discussion in P. Gingerich et al, "Hind Limbs of Eocene Basilosaurus: Evidence of Feet in Whales," Science 249, July 13, 1990, p. 154).

Why would an animal be born with traces of legs when it currently has no use for legs?
That the vestigial stumps have no functional purpose in modern whales is obvious.
How, then, are we to explain the case of the whale's vestigial structures in a logical manner?

Re:Too Bad

[ashtonb]

Here. I ripped this wholesale another persons post.

----
A mutation can be a point mutation (change of information at one point within the genome), a deletion (loss of a nucleotide) or insertion (increase of information by one nucleotide). Any of these changes will change the nature of the sequence of the expressed protein, and may lead to loss of function, change of function or increase in efficiency of function. Mutations provide the de novo alteration of the genome. But not necessarily an increase in information, unlike the example I will discuss below

A well documented phenomenon in biology is that of "unequal crossing over' during meiosis. During meosis (the process whereby germ cells such as eggs and sperm as formed), the chromosomes are duplicated and four haploid cells emerge (each with a half genome). When these recombine with another haploid (ie sperm + egg) we get a fertilized egg. During meosis, the chromosomes undergo a shuffling, which is called recombination. During this recombination, the genome is shuffled with (ideally) each chromosome getting a new combination of old alleles. However, in some cases there is unequal recombination, and one chromosome ends up with both copies of a particular gene, and the other chromosome with no copies. When these gametes go their separate ways one of them (missing a vital gene) may eventually die, whereas the other has N+1 copies of the allele. This extra allele may then be subject to less constraint during subsequent mitotic/meotic duplication. If errors occur because of point, insertion or deletion mutation and it is not a burden on the cell, that extra new information is carried in the genome. Further selection may change the sequence of the gene slightly if the new sequence confers a slightly altered novel function for the expressed protein. We see evidence of this in what are called gene families. It is called "Duplication and Divergence". For example many of the genes in the globin family (protein that carries O2 and CO2 in blood) are obviously altered copies of each other, similarly, in rodents there are multi-gene families of serine proteinase inhibitors (proteins that regulate proteolysis). In humans there are not gene families of serpins, but all serpins (such as antithrombin, antichymotrypsin, plasminogen activator inhibitor I, II and III) are related to the archetype (alpha 1-proteinase inhibitor). Further some genes for human serpins are located close to pseudogenes. Pseudogenes are duplicated genes which did not get selected for on the basis of a change of function, are non-functional ie not expressed, but are not enough of a burden on the genome to disappear. Chimps and Hominids share some pseudogenes, suggesting that the unequal crossing over event took place before chimps and hominods split from their ancestor. Thus unequal crossing over provides an increase in genetic information in a subset of cells that go on to survive and reproduce.

Further, it has long been known that some plants are polyploid ie they contain entire genome duplications, mots common food crops are polyploid. The phenomenon is documented also for some frogs. Recent evidence is showing that major changes in evolution occur as a result of entire genome duplication (the theory was put forward in the 60's by a Japanese Scientist whose name escapes me, but a search at "Science' should bring up a recent article on the subject). Genome sequencing efforts of a variety of species have revealed the tell-tale trail of genome duplication.

Now obviously, duplicating a gene or a genome results in a net increase in genetic information.

No-one can argue with that, can they?
----

Thanx Steen

Re: Too Bad

[Black Parrot]

> Gentry's halos have been attacked time and time again

I presume it's a waste of time arguing with you, but any lurkers who don't want to be led astry might want to read this explanation.

Re: Too Bad

[Black Parrot]

> I have not personally measured the number of base pairs; very few have I'm sure.

If you're equating "the number of base pairs" with "information" then your argument is lost before you start, because we know that the number of base pairs can increase or decrease between parent and child.

> However evolutionists are the ones claiming that you can get something from nothing; it's up to you/them to come up with examples, it's not up to me to dance for you.

Actually, the theory of evolution is just the invocation of known facts to explain known facts. It is beyond argument that species have changed over time, and modern genetics gives us an explanation for how this happens. Creationists don't like this and so they incorrectly invoke the second law of thermodynamics or make up their own "fourth law of thermodynamics" to 'prove' that the biological explanation is wrong.

It is quite clear that children differ from their parents. Is this a change in 'information'? Who knows; creationists generally avoid defining their terms, because they always find themselves shown wrong when they do.

Do we "gest something from nothing" when a snowflake forms? Until you can answer that quantitatively then you should recognize that you're talking out your ass. (Or rather, echoing what came out of some creationist leader's ass.)

Re:Too Bad

[Anonymous Coward]

Duplicating existing information no more leads to a net increase in information than printing five extra copies of today's NY Times leads to an increase in information. A tragic example that is nevertheless clear: trisomy-21. This is a condition where three of the 21st chromosome are in the zygote and cause what was rather insensitively called "mongolism" in the past. Your post would seem to assert that this was a gain in information; but it didn't actually provide any new capability to the organism that it didn't already have.

Show how the "primordial soup" came alive and you'll demonstrate information from randomness. Meiotic gene swapping only decouples genes that had been on one instance of a chromosome from each other; the net information quantity is unchanged.

Re:Too Bad

[Anonymous Coward]

I already addressed the "vestigial pelvis", it's required for whale reproduction. Not vestigial at all.

Also note that while lots of Basilosaurus fossils have been found, and lots of whale fossils, nothing intermediate has ever been found.

Basilosaurus was clearly fully aquatic, and the "hind limbs" were, as with the case of the whale "pelvis", actually is now believed to be necessary for reproduction (holding on during the act).

Re:Too Bad

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't be a twit. There are whales today that have vestigial limbs. These limbs have no hope of helping in the reproductive act. It would be like two 15,000kg boulders trying to pull themselves together with a pair of 20cm appendages.

Alse, many whales have the bones, muscles and nerves for limbs that do not extrude from the body.

Re:Too Bad

[Anonymous Coward]

Trisomy-21 is a 'gain in information'.
It does not provide any new capability.
There is no casual relationship between a 'gain in information' and 'new capability'; evolution does not require one.

A 'new capability' requires a change in 'information'
A change in 'information' does not force a change in 'capability'.

You have been asking for an example with both a 'gain in information' and a 'new capability'.

Here is one such example:

Copley, S. D. (2000). "Evolution of a metabolic pathway for degradation of a toxic xenobiotic: the patchwork approach." Trends Biochem Sci 25(6): 261-5.

A bacteria species, Sphingomonas, has within the past 70 years evolved the ability to break down pentachlorophenol (PCP) and use it as a source of carbon. PCP is a manmade chemical, very unnatural and highly toxic; since it did not exist in the wild until several decades ago, when it was created and released by humans, it is impossible to claim that these bacteria already had the ability to break it down. The pathway that the bacteria have evolved to do this consists of *three* new enzymes.

Re: Too Bad

[Black Parrot]

> t's too bad most of the Slashdot crowd is so progressive. This is one of those perfect articles to get into flame wars about whether or not evolution really happened.

I'm curious why you use the word "progressive" in this regard. The issue isn't progressive ideas vs. others, but rather whether you are going to let your views on the history of the world be guided by the evidence. This hardly strikes me as a "progressive" viewpoint, since the basic issue was resolved by all but the religion-dominated somewhere around 200-300 years ago.

Also, re -

> ...whether or not evolution really happened.

That evolution happened is beyond doubt, since the fossil record very clearly shows that the collection of species inhabiting the earth varies greatly over time, at least on geological timescales. The only thing open to rational discussion is what the mechanism for the changes was, not whether the the changes happened.

It happens that we have a theory that appears to explain that mechanism very well, to the point of making predictions about what you'll see if you go down to the lab and do some gene sequencing tomorrow. Some people object to that theory because it contradicts their religious beliefs, and it is commonly believed that others object to it due to a peculiar political ideology (namely that religion-as-opiate-of-masses is a good thing), but neither party has actually done any science that calls the current theory into question. So they resort to bogus pseudo-scientific claims, handwave arguments, misrepresentation of facts, mendacity (e.g., carven human footprints at Paluxy), attempts to poison the well by undercutting the public's trust of science in general, attempts to misportray their ancient mythology as science, attempts to bring science down into the gutter with their own beliefs by labelling it as a mere philosophy or even a religion, and sometimes to arguments that are so truly loopy that it is often commented that creationism is impossible to parody.

But something is needed to explain the changes to the species over time, and right now the only available explanations are the theory of evolution and magic. And the only theory constrained by the facts is the theory of evolution.

Re: Too Bad

[Black Parrot]

> And if evolution were to be true, why would one species (us) "evolve" into intelligence and one that had the nascent beginnings just stagnate for vast amounts of time?

Once a population splits the theory of evolution does not predict that they will evolve in parallel -- all the more if they move into distinct environments or adopt distinct lifestyles.

Also, don't underrate the intelligence of chimps. I suspect that an objective measure would put them a lot closer to the intelligence of humans than to the intelligence of, say, snails.

Re:Too Bad

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't have access to the original paper, so I'll have to just ask a question on this one.

Isn't it just a modification of the monooxygenases, and doesn't it have activity against a lot of polyhalogen phenols? So it might be just a minor variation. As far as my limited research on this shows, it has not been sequenced to find its origin and derivation.

Regardless, it's still a bacteria.

Re:Too Bad

[Anonymous Coward]

Your research is limited.

PCP-4-monooxygenase exhibits broad substrate specificity against polyhalogenated phenols.

Pentachlorophenol (PCP)-4-monooxygenase (hydroxylase) has been purified to homogeneity and its gene (pcpB) sequence determined (Orser et al., 1993; Xun & Orser, 1991).

So it might be just a minor variation.

Is evolution not about minor variations?

Regardless, it's still a bacteria

Are you suggesting that bacteria are fundementally different from other living entities?

That is an arrogant view to take.

Anyway. Your halo debate looks more interesting, and you appear to be getting somewhere with it. Do you wish to cease this line of debate? It is going nowhere for you.

Re:Too Bad

[Anonymous Coward]

Since I don't have access to the paper you've cited (do you? have you read the original yourself?), discussion based on it would not be productive.

Re:Too Bad

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes.
I do not know how your library system works, but here I just visit any one of dozens of libraries in my city and read what I like. (I am interested in everything; there is always something new to be interested in).

Re:Too Bad

[Wayne Hoxsie]

Quote: --

Regardless, it's still a bacteria

Are you suggesting that bacteria are fundementally different from other living entities?

That is an arrogant view to take.

-- Indeed! To a first-order approximation, all life on earth is bacterial.

Even if you only consider animals, Insects make up more biomass than all other animals put together!

Re:Too Bad

[Wayne Hoxsie]

Quote:
--

Now obviously, duplicating a gene or a genome results in a net increase in genetic information.

No-one can argue with that, can they?

--
Of course they can argue, but it is obvious they are wrong.

How hard is it--for even an average American with our paltry math/science knowlege--to not see that n+1 > n?

Re:Too Bad

[Anonymous Coward]

So to you printing 5 extra copies of the New York Times is an increase in information? And you think there's an increase also when a child grows to an adult (more cells with that DNA)?

While it may be a decrease in entropy and therefore an increase in order, it is not an increase in information, merely ordering disordered matter into an already known pattern. There is a difference.

If you copy someone else's work for a college paper, you are not increasing information and your grade (if you get caught) will reflect that. If however you do something original that will increase information, you have generated new information.

Re:Too Bad

[Wayne Hoxsie]

Quote:
--

So to you printing 5 extra copies of the New York Times is an increase in information? And you think there's an increase also when a child grows to an adult (more cells with that DNA)?

--
Hmmm. I don't recall newspapers being able to SELF-replicate, nor do INDIVIDUALS evolve, so the analogy is flawed from the start.

At any given time a breeding population has n number of alleles in the gene pool. If one of those alleles in one individual becomes mutated, then there are now n+1 alleles in the breeding population. How tough is that?

Thermo strawman alert!
Quote:
--

While it may be a decrease in entropy and therefore an increase in order, it is not an increase in information, merely ordering disordered matter into an already known pattern. There is a difference.

--
I can't make much sense of this, but you are clearly confusing thermo entropy with Shannon/Weaver entropy. Probably deliberately in order to equivocate.

Nonetheless, it is trivial mathematically to show that no thermo laws are broken by evolution. Let's take a dog genome, dg, and nucleotides AGCT, nu, and energy (ultimately from the sun), e:

dg + x(nu) + e -> 2(dg) + x(H_2O)

Now, let's add a cat genome (roughly the same size),cg, to each side of the equation:

cg + dg + x(nu) +e -> cg + 2(dg) + x(H_2O)

Now subtract a dog genome from each side:

cg + x(nu) + e -> dg + x(H_2O)

Now we see that thermodynamically, it is entirely possible for a dog to become a cat with no violation of thermo laws. Of course it is statistically so improbable as to be impossible, but it is clear that the thermo arguments are a strawman.

If you want to argue Shannon/Weaver entropy, then let's go. Where is any law violated?

Re:Too Bad

[Anonymous Coward]

since the Noah's Ark story is utterly improbable, almost impossible in a literal sense, we already know parts of the bible aren't the literal truth of an all-knowing God...since this story is flawed in this way, others are likely to be also.

Once we have that established, we can either become fundementalists, and concock ridiculous fake-science ways that the Ark could have been built, or, we can say that the bible is truth in the form of fables, with themes that are to be absorbed and not literal facts. This would allow evolution to work nice and comfy alongside creation...

Of course, once we bring the bible to this level, there is nothing to make the bible stand out from the oooodles of other holy books out there, both still in use and defunct.

I'm an atheist, therefore. This test of faith nonsense only applies to those who are in the bible-tunnel, and perhaps other similar religions. Evolution is cool.

Re:Too Bad

[Anonymous Coward]

why couldn't it's views be detectable by science? So you think that things are outside of science, now and forever? Where is your proof?

What mystical force do you think science is? It's observation and testing; we are here, we can try and talk to God, see if we get a reply, etc., we can check the age of the earth, we can see if the whole planet flooded - the list goes on and on!

Prayer has already been clinically tested and, guess what, it doesn't work. Big surprise. Telling me that it's not testable is the sign of a charlatan.

Re:Too Bad

[Anonymous Coward]

Go ahead and do arithmetic with your genome if you wish, it does not get you much of anywhere. If you want to play with numbers, calculate the probability of one small peptide (say 250 amino acids) arising at random, given an assumed infinite supply of all 20 (for simplicity) in 39 possible (glycine is not chiral) flavors. Do it again, allowing for any (properly chiral) substitution at 10% of the sites.

Hint to others: there are less atoms in the known universe than the odds against ONE exact protein arising by chance. And theorists figure 300 to 400 are the minimum required for a functioning cell.

Re:Too Bad

[Anonymous Coward]

Since you say Noah's ark is "utterly improbable", I challenge you to read Woodmorappe's excellent study on how the ark would be extremely possible, ISBN is 0932766412. It shows there was plenty of space for what was needed. He spent seven years on researching the book, and it's thorough.

Re:Too Bad

[Wayne Hoxsie]

Strawman alert!
No one but creationists think that the laws of nature work by random chance. Even your hero Yockey claims that most of say a hemoglobin protein is just bulk and its amino acid sequence is superfulous http://www.asa3.org/archive/evolution/199602/0123. html.

Anyway, you are arguing against abiogenesis. Please stop moving the goalposts. The math above shows that there is no thermodynamic reason why a dog genome cannot become a cat genome in a single step. I acknowleged the fact that it is statistically nearly impossible. Fortunately for science, none of this is necessary for evolution to work. Since abiogenesis research is not likely to ever give the exact answer on how the first self-replicator on this planet formed, I have no beef with theistic evolutionists who claim god made the first self-replicator and let evolution work from there. I take it that this is NOT your position however, right?

Re:Too Bad

[Wayne Hoxsie]

See http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/woodmorappe-review . tml then bring up one or two points to argue. The entire paper is beyond the scope of critque on /.

Re:Too Bad

[Anonymous Coward]

And note Woodmorappe's refutation of Morton's paper (the work cited at talkorigins) is also available for your study. And as mentioned, since Woodmorappe's book alone has over 1400 references, this is a topic for an entire board, not one topic on /. However one quick example will show the quality of what talkorigins uses:

> He spends very little space describing how these animals could have
> survived out in the turbulent flood waters.

False. I have a whole chapter addressing, among other things, the frivolous "turbulent water problem"--to the extent that this anti-Creationist charge has any coherence at all.

Re:Too Bad

[Anonymous Coward]

>>

Apart from where they live longer, for instance.

There are cochroaces that can not just survive DDT, but digest the stuff with new enzymes. There are bacteria that maintain antibiotic resistance with no metabolic loss - these are a real problem.

Information is added to the genome - usually - by the process of gene duplication (where two copies of the same gene end up on the same strand of DNA, a common mutation initself), followed by divergence of these genes. For example, humans have 4 types of Haemoglobin which have relatively recently diverged.

>>

First - show me a new organ! Body plans in animals are highly conservative for the this very reason. This is why human knees, for example, are so shoddy - they are a design co-opted from 4 legged animals, which was co-opted from reptiles, which was co-opted from fish fins. Evolution does not have the luxury of a re-design.

The last really radical change was the change from 2-layer(inside, outside) to 3-layer (inside, outside, middle) organisms around 700 million years ago. All of our current organs were then able to develop from specialised groups of cells in this middle layer.

>

This is in contradiction to your 'winnowing process' as described further up.

>

Which comes from Ra-222 (Radon), which diffuses through rocks...

>>

Right. If we take Aluminium concentration as our dating method, the earth is 100 years old!

>>

There is this thing called 'plate tectonics'. You may wish to look it up.

>>

Please... no problem if you do the calculations properly. Like including all the inputs and outputs.

>>

Ever heard of lions?

Of course, if all fossils were made in the flood, as you creationsts often claim, then there would have been standing room only beforehand.

Re:Too Bad

[Wayne Hoxsie]

Let's narrow it down a little further and discus one aspect of the "turbulent water problem."

Since I don't have (nor intend to purchase) Woodromappe's book, how does he explain how coral could have survived a global flood? Coral is very sensitive to even the slitest climatic changes. Adding even a few meters of water--not to mention water contaminated by silt from ground runoff--is sufficient to destroy coral due to blocked sunlight(1). Coral is also very sensitive to temperature, salinity, and nutrient load changes(1).

For now, we'll ignore the fact that coral, like trees and their rings, show anual layering that can be counted and like tree rings show climatic changes(2). Nowhere in the coral record of several reefs is there any evidence of a global flood.

1. Biology and geology of eastern Pacific coral Reefs Cortes, J CORAL REEFS 16: S39-S46, Suppl. S JUN 1997

2. Photosynthesis and calcification at cellular, organismal and community levels in coral reefs: A review on interactions and control by carbonate chemistry, Gattuso, JP;Allemand, D;Frankignoulle, M AMERICAN ZOOLOGIST 39: (1) 160-183 FEB 1999

Re:Too Bad

[Anonymous Coward]

Indeed the flood was catastrophic; it buried billions of animals and wiped out just about everything.

However if you're going to count ice rings and the like, you first have to show that they are based on annual data. For example, in Greenland the "lost squadron" of P-38's landed there during WWII. In the 90's some guy from Kentucky (rich man with an obsession, I guess) went up there with advanced echo-location sonars and found them under the ice. He dug them out. When they got down there, they were still perfectly level. If they'd sunken into the ice, they are so front-heavy that they would be tilted downward. And on the way down, he saw hundreds to thousands of ice layers (seen as rings if looked at in a core instead of from inside a tunnel). He stated that those layers form sometimes in days, that they are warm/cold not summer/winter rings. The point of this is, don't just assume annual unless you've proved it.

And if you measure the growth rate of the Great Barrier Reef, it comes out to being roughly 4000 years old. Just old enough to have started growing right after the flood.

Re:Too Bad

[Wayne Hoxsie]

Quote:
Indeed the flood was catastrophic; it buried billions of animals and wiped out just about everything.

Yet somehow a bronze-age boat survived?

Quote:
However if you're going to count ice rings and the like, you first have to show that they are based on annual data.

OK, from:
http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/295/555 9/1511/DC1 Describes in painful detail the methodology used in dating the Great Barrier Reef.

Quote:
For example, in Greenland the "lost squadron" of P-38's landed there during WWII. In the 90's some guy from Kentucky (rich man with an obsession, I guess) went up there with advanced echo-location sonars and found them under the ice. He dug them out. When they got down there, they were still perfectly level. If they'd sunken into the ice, they are so front-heavy that they would be tilted downward. And on the way down, he saw hundreds to thousands of ice layers (seen as rings if looked at in a core instead of from inside a tunnel). He stated that those layers form sometimes in days, that they are warm/cold not summer/winter rings. The point of this is, don't just assume annual unless you've proved it.

If you want ice core data, then see:
Climate and atmospheric history of the past 420,000 years from the Vostok ice core, Antarctica Petit, JR;Jouzel, J;Raynaud, D;Barkov, NI;Barnola, JM;Basile, I;Bender, M;Chappellaz, J;Davis, M;Delaygue, G;Delmotte, M;Kotlyakov, VM;Legrand, M;Lipenkov, VY;Lorius, C;Pepin, L;Ritz, C;Saltzman, E;Stievenard, M NATURE 399: (6735) 429-436 JUN 3 1999

Here we see a painstaking description of the methodology used in dating the Vostok Antarctica ice core samples. Contrast this to your second-hand anecdotal reference to some airplane affectionado's wild-ass guess.

Quote:
And if you measure the growth rate of the Great Barrier Reef, it comes out to being roughly 4000 years old. Just old enough to have started growing right after the flood.

Another lie from the anonymous coward. See:
Geology 29, 483 (2001).

From the abstract:

Coral reefs are important as marine ecosystems, and their growth has been linked to the carbon dioxide content in Earth's atmosphere. However, the timing of major reef growth has been uncertain for many reefs, including Earth's largest, the Great Barrier Reef of Australia. Analysis by an international consortium of two recent drill cores taken from the Great Barrier Reef indicates that it began to form about 600,000 years ago. This age is based on magnetic stratigraphy through the drill core (and the absence of the marked geomagnetic reversal 790,000 years ago) and on the Sr isotope composition of the corals. This age implies that the Great Barrier Reef has grown by about 10 to 28 centimeters per year, which is similar to the growth rate of other reefs worldwide. Why reef growth started at that time is unknown, but it might reflect a period of increased sea surface temperatures, a connection with atmospheric carbon dioxide levels, or both.

Re:Too Bad

[Anonymous Coward]

It's amazing, boats survive floods that things attached to or dependent on dry land don't. Is that so amazing to you?

Using radioactive dating to date something is not deterministic, there are many evidences of that, but that's an entire other topic and this forum is not far from timing out, I doubt we'd get that one very far.

And a "wild-ass guess" the Greenland ice was not; I attribute the airplane afficionado as you termed him to have an ability to count, and those planes were there for an exactly known period of time. If that's not hard data then perhaps you're just unwilling to admit anything outside your comfort zone.

Re:Too Bad

[Wayne Hoxsie]

You keep spouting these mysterious "evidences" yet can't seem to come up with any that actually work. Where's the reports on this greenland airplane ice study? It took scientists over 5 years to select the vostok site to be absolutly sure that they were getting a core from ice that was not moving and that had remained undisturbed for millenia. Where's the fesability study for for the greenland airplane ice site?

Where's there any studies on the problems with radiometric dating? There are entire journals devoted to radiometric dating with all their data out there in the open for anyone to examine and critique. You'd think with all the so-called problems creationts claim there is with radiometric dating, at least one of them would submit a scientific critique to those journals. Maybe scientists doing real science actually come up with methods that work.

Do you think it is just a bizzare coincidence that ice-core layer counting, ice-core CO2 radiocarbon dating, ice-core 36Cl radiometric dating, cave stagmite layer counting, cave stalagmite 36Cl radiometric dating, stalagmite U-Th radiometric dating, overlapping oak tree-ring counting, oak tree-ring 14C dating, coral layer counting, coral 90Sr radiometric dating, and the SINT200 stacked geomagnetic record all just happen to give very similar overlapping calibration curves? The odds would be astronomical (something about a tornado in a junkyard comes to mind). All these dating projects were done independantly and at different times over the last few decades and remarkably, they all tell a similar story as to the age of the earth. Sure, creationists can spout off anecdotes about how such-and-such rock gave a date 5 million years off or somesuch, but they never seem to produce any real data to back up these claims. Its all hearsay, or outright fabrication. Even if they did have a genuine datapoint or two that didn't seem to fit, that pales in comparison to the mountain of data that do fit.

I kown you'll just brush this off too. Fine with me; live in your fantasy world. It's obvious you don't care about evidence or real science. You just cheerfully handwave it away. That's your right, but don't try and cram your religous propaganda into our public schools and at least have the decency to admit that creationism is a religion and has nothing to do with science.

Have a nice day.

Re:Too Bad

[Anonymous Coward]

First about ice cores: the site was easily selected, just find the planes, and you have a known event at a known time to synch up the measurement. It's better than theory, it's fact.

See that's the thing about dating methods, no human was around (m|b)illions of years ago to record what happened - it's all inferred from measuring decay rates and making assumptions. But if C14 is so accurate (half-life roughly 5730 years, so >100K it should all be quite gone), why do coal seams have C14 activity? That should not be possible, the carbonaceous period was supposed to be ~300MYa.

If you're actually interested in investigating radiometric dating, check out Woodmorappe's book "Mythology of Modern Dating Methods", it is both stunningly boring and very thorough. I'm sure you'll post now some site about why that book is in error, probably written by some one who has read it no more carefully than Brawley read Gentry's work. In Woodmorappe's book you'll find just how all those methods were fudged to get the alignment right - the proof of it is taken straight from the evolutionist journals.

I notice that you introduced schools into the mix - and yes that's an issue. Why are kids taught about Haeckel's embryos? Isn't 125 years long enough to get that error out of the textbooks? Why use known false "proofs" of evolution unless there's nothing better? The decision to include things like "ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny" is made by evolutionists, not by creationists. Why?

Re:Too Bad

[Anonymous Coward]

I agree we should should keep religion out of public schools, our Constitution makes that clear (although government schools are not in the Constitution).

And the thing is, that exclusion of religion also would keep out evolution. By the plain admission of many evolutionists, there is more faith than science in evolution.

For example, Richard Lewontin, who is I believe a Harvard genetics Professor:

'We take the side of science in spite of the patent absurdity of some of its constructs, in spite of its failure to fulfill many of its extravagant promises of health and life, in spite of the tolerance of the scientific community for unsubstantiated just-so stories, because we have a prior commitment, a commitment to materialism. It is not that the methods and institutions of science somehow compel us to accept a material explanation of the phenomenal world, but, on the contrary, that we are forced by our a priori adherence to material causes to create an apparatus of investigation and a set of concepts that produce material explanations, no matter how counter-intuitive, no matter how mystifying to the uninitiated. Moreover, that materialism is an absolute, for we cannot allow a Divine Foot in the door.'

Richard Lewontin, 'Billions and billions of demons', The New York Review, January 9, 1997, p. 31.

From Jerome Lejeune, another genetics Professor (translation from French by Peter Wilders):

'We have no acceptable theory of evolution at the present time. There is none; and I cannot accept the theory that I teach to my students each year. Let me explain. I teach the synthetic theory known as the neo-Darwinian one, for one reason only; not because it's good, we know it is bad, but because there isn't any other. Whilst waiting to find something better you are taught something which is known to be inexact, which is a first approximation. . .'

Professor Jerome Lejeune, from a French recording, at a lecture given in Paris on March 17, 1985

And another from him:

'The neo-Darwinist is now reaching the point of dignity in the history of science that the Ptolemaic system in astronomy, the epicycle system, reached long ago. We know that it does not work. And that is interesting. Because from the actual structure of the chromosome we can demonstrate that the human species did not come from a progressive humanisation of a pre-human.'

Quoted from Conference Paper dated October 1975, The Beginning of Life, by Professor Jerome Lejeune, Chair of Fundamental Genetics, University of Paris, France

Then Dr. Michael Shallis, astrophysicist now at Oxford:

'It is no more heretical to say the Universe displays purpose, as Hoyle has done, than to say that it is pointless, as Steven Weinberg has done. Both statements are metaphysical and outside science. Yet it seems that scientists are permitted by their own colleagues to say metaphysical things about lack of purpose and not the reverse. This suggests to me that science, in allowing this metaphysical notion, sees itself as religion and presumably as an atheistic religion (if you can have such a thing).'

Shallis M., 'In the eye of a storm', New Scientist, January 19, 1984, pp. 42-43

and finally Michael Ruse, Professor of zoology and philosophy at Guelph:

'Evolution is promoted by its practitioners as more than mere science. Evolution is promulgated as an ideology, a secular religion -- a full-fledged alternative to Christianity, with meaning and morality. I am an ardent evolutionist and an ex-Christian, but I must admit that in this one complaint -- and Mr [sic] Gish is but one of many to make it -- the literalists are absolutely right. Evolution is a religion. This was true of evolution in the beginning, and it is true of evolution still today.

'... Evolution therefore came into being as a kind of secular ideology, an explicit substitute for Christianity.'

Michael Ruse, professor of philosophy and zoology at the University of Guelph, Canada (recently moved to Florida), How evolution became a religion: creationists correct? National Post, pp. B1,B3,B7 May 13, 2000

So yes by all means I agree with you absolutely, we need to teach hard facts in schools, not religion. Let's start a grassroots organization, Scientists Campaign Against Religious Extremists, and push to remove both creationism and evolutionism from schools, and allow the kids to be taught just the facts.

Re:Too Bad

[Wayne Hoxsie]

Quote mining. The last refuge of the creationist scoundrel. I'm sure those are all out of context, but I'm not going to bother looking. It is clear enough that you don't care about reality. Just for the record, I did do a quick search for Richard Lewontin as I've seen his work before and I know that your characterization of him is absurd. Here's a typical creationist misquote of Lewontin:

The WTBTS book, Life -- How Did it Get Here? By Evolution or by Creation?

Requoting Jim Lippard >
> That question has already been resolved--they sure have. For examples,
> see Hector Avalos, "The Jehovah's Witnesses and the Watchtower Society,"
> _Free Inquiry_, vol. 12, no. 2, Spring 1992, pp. 28-31. A couple
> instances:
>
> _Life_, p. 143: "Zoologist Richard Lewontin said that organisms 'appear
> to have been carefully and artfully designed.' He views them as 'the
> chief evidence of a Supreme Designer.'"

Note what the book says - "He [Lewontin] views them as [literal quote]the chief evidence of a Supreme Designer.[end literal quote]" Now if this doesn't say that Mr. Lewontin holds this view, then I'm not who I think I am! If you think that it doesn't say that, then English is not something with which you are especially skilled.

The complete Lewontin response:

> Cited source: Lewontin, "Adaptation," _Scientific American_, September
> 1978, p. 213.
> Lewontin himself, complaining about this exact same misquotation as
> presented in an issue of the Institute for Creation Research's
> _Acts _Scientific American_, from which these snippets were lifted, was
> precisely that the 'perfection of organisms' is often illusory
> and that any attempt to describe organisms as perfectly adapted is
> destined for serious contradictions. Moreover, the *appearance* of
> careful and artful design was taken *in the nineteenth century before
> Darwin* as 'the chief evidence of a Supreme Designer.' The past tense
> of my article ('It *was* the marvelous fit of organisms to the
> environment ... that *was* the chief evidence of Supreme Designer') has
> been conveniently dropped by creationist [Gary] Parker in his attempt to
> pass off this ancient doctrine as modern science." (Lewontin, "Misquoted
> Scientists Respond," _Creation/Evolution_ VI, Fall 1981, p. 35)

He clearly shows that He does not hold that view, and that the original quote cleary stated that he was referring to belief's of people who are all DEAD now! But the WTBTS clearly states that it is indeed _his_ view, now!

Typical liars for jesus. Your god must be proud.

Re:Too Bad

[Anonymous Coward]

Trying to tar creationism with the JW's is like tarring science with Piltdown man - there are scam artists in all fields; bringing out the worst in each only proves that man is not inherently good. As if anyone needs further proof of that. JW's believe in a very different God and Jesus than Christians do (we believe the Bible, they have rewritten the Bible to fit their twisted beliefs).

You also ignored the point about the blatant lies in textbooks... want to give that one a try?

Simple tools

[Anonymous Coward]

When reading this headline, I immediately thought of 'grep' and 'tee'.

How does one know that a rock is a tool?

[BusterB]

I know that they found these rock fragments concentrated around trees, but how does that mean that they were being used as tools? I can use a rock to break open a pecan, but when I put it down, does it suddenly look like a tool? Would someone be able to pick up that rock later and say 'hmm..looks like someone cracked a pecan with this one.' You can call it a 'tool fragment', but come on, these are rocks around a tree. Apes could have been eating them and pooping around trees, for all we know.

Re:How does one know that a rock is a tool?

[Anonymous Coward]

they can make judgements based on wear patterns

Re:How does one know that a rock is a tool?

[americanFatCat]

I think it usually has to do with the way the rocks have been shaped. Then again, I'm not a paleontologist, neither are you. They would know the answers. they don't get funding for nothing. Your comment is like saying, "I can't divide. therefore, division can't be done."

Re:How does one know that a rock is a tool?

[flewp]

BBC Article URL: http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid_2 006000/2006309.stm (I use it as a reference in this post)

Well, they found pits in the rocks that indicate they've been used repeatedly (perhaps for generations) for the same purpose. Using another object for a specific task repeatedly is a tool, no? Okay, so that's not the exact definition of a tool, but it sure fits the criteria for a tool if you ask me. The stones also took a degree of skill to use, and could take 7 years to master. Hit it too hard, and you smash the inside of the nut, hit it too soft, and you still get nothing. So it's not a matter of just smashing things with a rock. The younger chimps apparently practice too as well, using smaller rocks. One thing they haven't done though, is create tools of different shapes and sizes.
Yeah, they could be eating and pooping them out, but the rocks weighed 15 kilograms.

Re:How does one know that a rock is a tool?

[teamhasnoi]

I saw 'The Scorpion King'. The Rock is a Tool.

oog use tools

[Anonymous Coward]

oog use tools! oog use win95 in 29 days! oog have high tech carreer!

Re:oog use tools

[fdisk3hs]

Stop flinging your dung at me Koko.

LR

From the article

[ynotds]

at the close of what is known as the Miocene era, when Ice Age conditions cooled the planet

Any paleontologist worth their salt will be so familiar with the stratigraphic boundaries between the various geological epochs, including the Miocene, that they aren't going to think to give their dating a special mention, especially not in a CNN one page summary.

hominids

[BigBir3d]

if the hominids of the time were doing the same thing, who says that the apes didn't learn from the hominids, or vice versa?

maybe hominids had a higher capacity for creativity and were able to do more with the 'simple tools' once they 'saw the light?'

this is all such a intrigueing, yet wasteful thing to discuss, until we have time travel. i guess i need to fall through a worm hole and find out ;-)

tool use ibn the animal kingdom

[Cyno01]

this raises questions about other parts ters use rocks to cof the animal kingdom, otrack open oysters, sea urchins and the heads of greenpeace members to feast on the innards. also, many members of the animal kingdom use trees to scratch their butts

sorry about the above comment

[Cyno01]

sorry, i accidentally highlighted and dragged a piece w/o realizing it, it should have read... this raises questions about other parts of the animal kingdom, otters use rocks to crack open oysters, sea urchins and the heads of greenpeace members to feast on the innards. also, many members of the animal kingdom use trees to scratch their butts

n/c

[Anonymous Coward]

test