The sophisticated software they used is probably more complex than anything you've ever written.
You really have no information on which to base that speculation, do you? And even if you did, it's irrelevant. The point being that I know more than enough about software engineering that "sophisticated software" doesn't do it for me. I need to know what this awesome software does before that sentence in the article has any importance to me. What's sophisticated to one person is peanuts to another.
These features are enough to classify a species according to modern cladistics. The software used, assists in comparing bone features with the hundreds of thousands of other fossils in the database, which also proves consistency.
If this is the case, I'm at a loss as to why this is a big deal and everyone is excited about his "work." Sounds more like he plugged some data into the palentologist fingerprint software and it spit out an answer. So what?
Me: So this thing basically contradicts everything we think we know about crocs, but dang it, evolution is right so this is just amazing, isn't it?
You: No actually they asked someone who is familiar with crocs how they would improve it, essentially they asked an intelligent designer what they would improve and the intelligent designer implied that it would not have been this. Therefore further giving credibility that evolution is not an intelligent process, but rather random and "bad" mutations die off. So far nothing contradicts this.
Hahaha, so you're saying that--assuming intelligent design were real--this croc expert is an authoritive answer on what the much-more-intelligent-designer would do? Ok...:)
And as far as the unpredictable comment goes, I couldn't find it in the articles, but I may have simply missed it.
Whoever said that, I'm not sure what the context was, but either they were blatantly wrong, misquoted, or trying to make this finding seem mystical in some fashion.
It was said by Paul Sereno, a University of Chicago paleontologist and National Geographic Society Explorer-in-Residence. He's also the "croc expert" who is apparently as intelligent as the intelligent designer.:)
But Evolution in an undisputed theory...
That, my friend, is incorrect. There are plenty of people who dispute it, including honest scientists in the field that recognize a lot of problems with the theory. They may "believe" in evolution and are interested in continuing research to refine it, but at least they are honest enough to recognize its limitations and problems in its current form.
You are a direct result of microevolution, this is undisputed.
Again, please be honest. Feel free to say that a lot of scientists agree with you, but to suggest that even all of those that do believe this put such blind faith in the theory is incorrect. In honest peer-review, there are acknowledgements of limitations and the potential problems of the theories and findings that are obtained.
These evolutionary changes happened on a scale too large for many humans to comprehend.
4.5 billion years isn't so big a number that intelligent humans can't comprehend it. Don't try to make this thing seem more overwhelming than it really is.
Also most humans are selfish and ignorant beings who have enough balls to claim that they were designed in the form of God. You are not as special as you think you are, you are the result of a series of random, yet directed, mutations. Get over it, you are not as important in the scheme of things as you want to be.
You are clueless to anyone's beliefs but yourself, it would seem, but I thank you for making an attempt to misrepresent mine.
err, when we refer to global warming, we're generally talking about human contribution to the greenhouse effect. and our greatest contribution has been carbon dioxide.
By all means stop all industrial production now. God forbid we increase CO2, which contributes around 26% (including natural CO2) to trapped heat, while the contribution of water vapor is in the neighborhood of 60%.
In other words, it seems rather unimportant whether our greatest contribution has been to CO2 if that contribution is dwarfed by naturally-occurring water vapor.
Our contribution to global warming is statistical noise. Removing our contribution would also amount to statistical noise.
And water is a greenhouse gas. Much moreso, in fact, than CO2. That's presumably (without reading the article) the feedback loop.
Funny, I could have sworn not too long ago I was reading sites that attacked the anti-global-warming pposition because these people (those that dispute global warming) were saying that water vapor was a much more significant greenhouse gas than CO2 and there's much more H2O than CO2 in the atmosphere than CO2; the logical conclusion being, "Why try to make massive cuts in CO2 output if the greenhouse effects of H2O completely dwarf the effects of CO2?"
So the global warming advocates put up a bunch of graphs showing how, yes, H2O was a more effective greenhouse gas, but that energy absorption was already maxed out at the H2O wavelength(s)... or something like that. Therefore, they claimed, it didn't matter that climate models couldn't properly model the effects of cloud cover nor was it valid to observe that since H2O was a much more important greenhouse that draconian efforts to reduce CO2 were misguided since, they said, the energy absorption of H2O was at a different wavelength than CO2.
Now they're saying that increased water vapor is causing a positive feedback loop that's causing the temperature change??? I thought they had said that the impact of H2O's greenhouse effect was already maxed out? If it isn't, then once again I must ask: Why do we place such efforts on reducing CO2 if water vapor seems to have a much bigger impact?
Recent research shows that the odds of life forming on earth 40 billion years ago are very plausible.
Hmmm? So how long did it take scientists in the lab to witness random organic material spontaneously form a cell wall and all necessary supporting structures?
What? They haven't seen that yet? If not, how on earth can you make the assertion that "the odds of life formating on the earth 40 (sec) billion years ago are very plausible?" Sounds like you know what the odds are? What are they?
While this isn't an interesting find because of its size, it does add to the credibility of evolution.
Y'think? Let's see some quotes from TFA:
"The researchers don't yet know what events triggered the relatively sudden emergence of the large crocodile..."
Sounds like more data that evolution can't really explain.
"Unlike the crocodiles we know today, Dakosaurus andiniensis lived entirely in the water, and had fins instead of legs."
What part of the skull did the researches base *that* conclusion on?
" Pol used sophisticated software to map the features of those bones and determine its lineage. "
Oooohh, "sophisticated software." I trust we'll hear more about the science of how they "determined its lineage". I'm a software engineer and "sophisticated software" doesn't impress me... I want to know what this software actually did.
"It measured 13 feet from nose to tail."
Still interested in how they concluded that based on the skull. I'm assuming there must be more fossil elsewhere, but curiously none of the "technical" diagrams include more than its head. Some of the "artists concept" drawings show a little more as the thing supposedly jumps out of the water, but I've seen no technical diagrams of anything but the head which leaves me wondering where this 13-feet figure is coming from.
""The most perplexing thing about the animal is that its head shape does not appear to be well suited to a fast swimming crocodilian, because rather than being streamlined, it is somewhat high and flattened from side to side," said Clark, who was not involved with the research."
So rather than contemplate other explanations (maybe it wasn't so closely related to a croc? maybe it wasn't even aquatic--sometimes mammals can actually find there way into water and die, y'know), we automatically assume this is some groundbreaking discovery? Maybe it's so weird it's wrong?
Or how about:
""If you went to a crocodile worker and said, Let's say you had a chance to evolve something new out of this group, what would you do? And you gave them a pad and a pencil, the last thing they would draw would be a skull that looks like Dakosaurus."
So this thing basically contradicts everything we think we know about crocs, but dang it, evolution is right so this is just amazing, isn't it?
This one is choice:
"It's a beautiful example of the unpredictable nature of evolution, and the variety of things that dinosaur-age crocodiles did."
And here I was thinking that science was supposed to be falsifiable, testable, and actually be a useful predictor? And here they're celebrating just how unpredictable it is? I'm glad other theories are a little more relaible. I'd hate to be walking into my house and suddenly find gravity reverse itself and hit my head on the ceiling. *
Color me unimpressed.
* Note: If gravity did reverse itself, would you be prepared? How would you keep the coins in your pocket? I have the answer: Nudity! (This poorly-quoted quote is left as an exercise for the reader to discover its source).
Your response, though long, mostly didn't even respond to my points. I already know what macroevolution is and its difference from microevolution. Your essay was redundant.
In one case, finally, a new biological species has arisen spontaneously in a laboratory. A strain of _Drosophila_paulistorum_ when first collected was interfertile with other strains but developed hybrid sterility after being isolated in a separate culture for just a few years (Dobzhansky and Pavlovsky 1971).
This, and every example of speciation that I've been able to find so far, all offer fertility and/or the interest in interbreeding as an example of speciation. While this may satisfy the technical definition of speciation (which you yourself have said is an arbitrary line), we have not seen this process produce any new useful and beneficial functions or features in the offspring. We haven't seen a lizard sprout wings so it could more easily find food. We haven't seen the "nose" of a whale suddenly shift to its back so it could more easily surface for air. We've seen mutations, but these always seem to be detrimental to the organism which often dies sooner than healthy organisms, is often sterile, and when not sterile does not pass on its genetic defect.
To say that microevolution is all that's needed to explain the wide variety of functionally different species on the planet is similar to saying that since iron dust on the ground is attracted to magnets, it's not unreasonable that that dust will spontaneously, of its own accord, generate beautiful music if it is placed near the magnetic head of a tape player.
rocesses took place to make it happen. This isn't a "tenuous" foundation, either. We've been using this knowledge heavily in the last two dozen years to make great insights into the nature of human genetic disorders like cystic fibrosis.
Again, you're straying from the topic. No-one is disputing genetics, here. We're questioning whether or not those genes could feasibly have spontaneously generated at the beginning of time and subsequently gained complex information to eventually create all the animals we see today. That we are learning to do potentially amazing things with genes that don't happen without intelligence is actually an indirect hint that maybe intelligence was involved. Or are we going to take the position that intelligence can do better work with genese than evolution? Hmmm.:)
Me: I do, however, feel that many discoveries are made that don't jive with evolution as-is and rather than making any fundamental changes to the theory, they just sort of ignore that data as an inconvenient subject that is better left as a mystery.
You: Tell me of these "many discoveries". If you can.
I happily will after you address the questions/points I made in my previous post instead of launching into an essay on the difference of micro/macroevolution or the advances in the science of genetics.
My questions from the previous post which I saw no answer to were:
1. You didn't respond to why science shouldn't address a given process if that process required intelligence. Note that I'm not saying God here, I'm saying "intelligence." If we see a hut with what looks like a firepit, an archaeologist will not assume that the hut and firepit just spontaneously formed themselves even though, I suppose, it's statistically possible. We assume some ancient people built a hut and lit a fire. So why is it when we consider the universe and the origin of life and consider the fact that either of these things happening are orders of magnitude less likely than a hut/firepit forming themselves, why do we assume that these things happened by themselves? They're infinitely more complex than the hut/firepit and yet we're to believe it "just happened?" Why is that?
2. Will you acknowledge that the law in Kansas does not shoehorn God into a
Me: It seems that with evolution facts are often shoe-horned into the theory rather than significantly adjusting the theory or admitting it's wrong.
You: And do you know why this is? Because of the overwhelming evidence in support of the process of evolution.
That's what those that have faith in evolution always say. But when you actually look for that evidence, it becomes quite underwhelming. They say the evidence is overwhelming yet you seldom see any of this overwhelming evidence.
An archeologist doesn't look for an "evolution friendly" explanation for why certain bones are unearthed in certain arrangements. An archeologist looks for the most likely explanation, based on the information available. And in the case of evolution, there is a lot of it, and it's everywhere.
No, that's the thing. There really isn't. It's a theory that everyone has rallied behind and for which lots of data exists, but a surprisingly small amount of that data truly supports the theory. People like you (and I'm not trying to be rude or point fingers) always say there is "overwhelming evidence" but never actually provide it. And thus the myth is perpetuated and scientists continue to be perplexed by the things they find that just don't fit the theory.
they could even tell when the land had been turned upside-down by geographic upheaval, because the skeletons became successively more primitive in one direction, and more complicated in the other.
That's a far cry from proving macroevolution. No-one disputes that life forms today are more complex than they were a few billion years ago. The question is how that happened.
That was then, and in two hundred years evolution has moved far beyond the realm of smoke and mirrors you purport it to be in, and become a generally accepted and thoroughly documented phenomenon. And that is why modern archeologists turn to it first.
Paleontologists probably turn to it more than archeologists... Anyway, you keep saying that there's all this proof and it's not smoke and mirrors yet you provide examples like coal layers [talk about smoke!:) ] 200 years ago with skeletons of different complexity which just proves that different life inhabited the earth at different times but says nothing about how that complexity changed. No-one disputes this (except for strict Creationists that believe the world is, what, 6000 years old?).
So go ahead, draw the line at your front door, and declare that the only things that you'll believe are things you can experimentally observe with your own eyes - but realize that you're making a straw-man argument the entire time. Science is not just about making observations, it's about explaining processes in ways that do not require belief, faith, or even the existence of humans in order to be accurate.
That's where you're being inconsistent. You mock that I will only believe things I can observe experimentally with my own eyes (which I actually never said, strawman on you) and then you turn around and say that science is about explaining processes--but what if those processes were the work of some intelligence? You have faith in evolution despite its weaknesses and yet you suggest that others are irrational for believing in something that requires the exact same kind of faith. Both require belief in something that has not been proven.
But if you want to pass a law that says scientists must shoehorn God into a statistical argument, then stop right there.
The law in Kansas says nothing of God, so you stop right there. If we're going to have a debate, let's be honest about the facts.
For decades, science teachers have been barred from even mentioning god, for fear of reprisals from twits like those in Kansas.
How do you figure? The "twits in Kansas" would probably love God being mentioned in science class. No, you have it ex
That we need to add a second every 18 months is obvious evidence that our time system is just too complex to have simply happened, and is therefore indicative of an intelligence in time design.
Your (apparent) attempt at humor succeeded, but the humor was due to the fact that you (apparently) were humorous in the exact opposite way you (probably) intended to be.
You're ignoring the process of scientific investigation at your peril, friend. It is inherently "fact-based", in that it seeks to accumulate and refine the "facts" themselves, in pursuit of an accurate explanation for them.
It seems that with evolution facts are often shoe-horned into the theory rather than significantly adjusting the theory or admitting it's wrong. When there's no reasonable explanation for a fact, rather than admitting that evolution has some serious flaws, the fact is just left out "hanging" as a curiosity so that, sometime in the future, someone can take another crack at explaining how that fact somehow works into the theory. Or sometimes grandiose conclusions are made on the basis of a single friggin' tooth.
If you set aside the "evidence" in support of evolution which is not even agreed to by the scientists that investigate it, the "overwhelming" body of evidence in support of evolution is much reduced.
The universe has been around for approximately 13.7 billion years' time, according to recent estimates based on the age of white-dwarf-class stars. That estimate has been progressively refined based on many other gathered facts and simulations, such as the layout of the galaxies, the typical formation time of stars and planets, the proportions of various elements around the universe, and yes, even that "evil" mainstay, the fossil record.
Yep. The fact is we don't know for sure. The numbers keep changing and, we hope, become more accurate. But as you said, "recent estimates" are 13.7 billion years. It'll be interesting to see what the estimates are 20 years from now. But even though we are not entirely sure of these facts and even though we've never seen life spontaneously generate so we have no way of knowing how statistically common it is, Godless evolutionists try to make a statistical argument that it must happen sooner or later.
Do you see the inherent silliness of making a statistical argument when we don't even have the statistics on which to make the argument? I know 90% of all statistics are made up, but this is ridiculous!:)
A. "we have never seen life spontaneously create itself,"
B. therefore, we do not "have any idea how statistically common it is"
Use your powers of reasoning, pal. Statement A doesn't lead to statement B. It leads to statement C:
C. therefore, it must be pretty rare, or maybe even impossible.
Yes, of course 'C' is correct. But even with 'C', we don't have enough information to determine whether or not it is statistically realistic for life to have spontaneously generated given the size and age of the universe. Yes, we know it's pretty damn rare and maybe even impossible. But how rare and whether or not it is impossible goes to the very heart of why ID is such a popular theory. Obviously if we admit it's "impossible", we are left with no other option but to consider some ID-like or Creationism-like explanation.
As soon as we are able to witness organic matter spontaneously form a functioning cell, then we can scientifically analyze the conditions that let that happen and start making some educated guesses as to how statistically probable it is and also analyze whether those conditions were feasible when life appeared on the planet. Until then, it's faith in science, nothing more. And science isn't supposed to be about faith.
By contrast, we have seen small-scale evolution happen (via natural and unnatural selection [ncseweb.org]) first-hand, in documented [earthscape.org] experiments [talkorigins.org] that you can reproduce with potted plants in a greenhouse in your own back yard. What's more, the evidence for large-scale evolution is woven throughout the history of man (domestication and spread of crops, for example), as well as pre-human history.
Microevolution is not the same as macroevolution. Minor adaptations which come from losing genetic code is not the same as theoretica
On the one hand you say that the Bible is the source of all knowledge and has never been wrong about anything and on the other you say that it may have been some Aliens or some other God responsible for creation when the bible clearly states that there is only one God and he is responsible for all creation.
Yep. That's because Intelligent Design is NOT religious nor necessarily Christian. You don't have to accept that a Christian God is the intelligence behind creation to accept the possibility that some intelligence was necessary. Once it is accepted that some intelligence was at work, it might not be inappropriate to try to identify the nature of that intelligence.
I personally do believe it was the Christian God that did it, but there is no requirement in ID that it was the Christian God.
Back in the real world there is no need to 'debunk' ID since it is a stupid idea and will remain a stupid idea until it can find some credible evidence to support it's stupid claims.
Kind of like the Big Bang and evolution, both of which are supported only by data when that data is interpreted under the assumption that the respective theories are correct. Circular reasoning. If it weren't for those theories, the data could be interpreted quite differently and not necessarily any less accurately--in fact, we might make more progress understanding our surroundings if scientists didn't feel an obligation to think within the confines of such weak theories.
So can we as long as we accept the fact that space travel will never be risk-free. Some people seem to want to make sure the Shuttle is as safe as a bicycle before it flies again. Ain't gonna happen.
Personally, if I had to take a trip into orbit (which I would very much like to), I'd pick the Space Shuttle over one of those Chinese capsules any day of the week.
I'd agree with you on the phone/camera thing. I believe the quality is getting better with recent camera-phones, but they are generally still so awful that they're only really useful as a novelty item. You're not going to start snapping pictures of your vacation with a cell phone.
But on the PDA/MP3/cell combination, I disagree. A phone already has all the features necessary to be a PDA and an MP3 player. Don't want to lose battery life? Then don't use the MP3 player. There's no reason the phone should suck any more power if the MP3 aspect isn't being used--the phone should power-down that section of the system.
Those two statements don't really go together. If God created the universe and the various physical laws that could give rise to life, knowing what the outcome of all of them would be -- and presumably all other possible outcome for permutations on the universe -- then why would he need to intervene? Surely if it's designed properly to begin with, it won't need divine intervention later.
You may have a point and I may have worded my previous post poorly. There are certainly two ways of looking at it, that God either "setup" the system initially so that it would work out perfectly and generate the life he wanted to generate, or he could've put the building blocks out there and given them the "push" needed to make them form something useful.
I don't pretend to know which happened. But either way we're talking about some intelligence doing something and the whole thing not happening all by itself.
Now before you respond that "If God set it up so perfectly that he knew it would produce life, then that same condition could have statistically happened all by itself" then I would respond that that's just speculation based on an incomplete knowledge of the universe and the origin of life. Until we see life spontaneously create itself and become more complex, any assertion as to how likely that may or may not be is entirely speculation and certainly not any more fact-based than believing in God.
Actually, yeah. Given the scope of the universe and the time available, even the longest odds are likely to be satisfied somewhere, sometime. That's just probability, and has more in its favor than postulating the existence of God.
How long has the universe existed? How large is it? How many atoms are in the universe? We don't even have the answers to these questions and we have never seen life spontaneously create itself to a degree necessary to believe we have any idea how statistically common it is or isn't.
Again, I'll grant that it's a possibility if you'll grant that it's just as much a leap of faith as believing in God.
In particular a monotheistic God -- why is that more probable to you, given the observable universe, than multiple gods, or gods that aren't interested in people?
Whether it was a single God or multiple gods or just super-powerful ETs is not the issue here. Many people want to make ID about the Christian God when, quite frankly, the identity of the intelligence isn't the issue.
Who says that we're the deliberate end product of the universe?
I don't believe ID requires that we believe that we are the only end product. I have no problems believing life exists elsewhere in the universe. As a Christian I do believe God has an active interest in us but I'm not so arrogant as to believe that that means He can't be actively interested in life elsewhere in the universe.
Sure doesn't sound like he does.... evolution doesn't explain where the first life came from, just what happened from there.
Believing in evolution does not mean you cannot believe in ID.
As mentioned a few days ago, even the Vatican believes that evolution and christianity are not mutually exclusive.
So? I agree with the Vatican on that (I don't believe evolution and Christianity are mutually exclusive). I also don't believe that ID and Christianity are mutually exclusive nor that ID and evolution are mutually exclusive.
Perhaps you do not understand the concept of ID.
I definitely do. What I don't understand is your point. Did you have one?
More to the point, ID is wrong because it is not a valid scientific theory.
Wow, that's one of the stupidest things I've read in awhile, and I've read some stupid things. So everything that isn't a valid scientific theory is wrong??? Heheheh, I'd like to see where you're going with that line of that.
It is not based on the scientific method, and it is not falsifiable (although I have seen some interesting claims of falsifiability from ID proponents, which can be reduced to nothing more than circular logic).
The Big Bang is not falsifiable either, yet it is considered science.
It is argument that essentially boils down to "Darwinism can't be right, therefore we win by default." Intelligent design is nothing more than a flawed argument from people who refuse to accept the fact that they are genetically related to monkeys.
I could care less whether I am related to monkeys. But science hasn't explained how the universe sprung into existince nor provided a viable explanation of how life began. The "argument" that "statistically, life was bound to happen because the universe is so big" is just as much a cop-out as believing in God is to a scientist. The Godless scientist (i.e. a scientist that doesn't believe in God) will claim that there is no proof of God. The person that believes in ID will point out that the scientist doesn't offer any evidence that life can actually begin the way he says it did, he just claims that the universe is sooo big (we don't know how big) that it was bound to happen sooner or later, and he offers US as evidence that he's right.
Neither option provides evidence... it's just a matter of which leap of faith you want to take. I don't have any problem with students being exposed to both sides of the argument and let them reach their own conclusions, hopefully with the active participation of their parents at home.
Its wrong because ID says that evolution is impossible due to the complexity of the genetic changes. ID basically says that every life form on Earth was specifically designed and created by God and that no evolution has ever occured.
No, that's Creationism, not ID.
ID is not what you think, it is not God tweaking with DNA, ID contends that everything was designed by God with NO EVOLUTION OF ANY KIND.
Wrong. I suggest you investigate furhter. That's Creationism.
ID theory is silly in my opinion, God is a farmer, not a micro-manager. I believe in God absolutely, but ID theory is stupid. God planted the seeds, maybe tweaked them, but He let things grow and evolve.
There is various observed evidence to support the theory of the Big Bang, for instance.
Maybe. We think we're observing things (like "echos") of the Big Bang but that is far from evidence. Others have said that science should be able to predict things and/or be falsifiable. The Big Bang is neither.
Direct and indirect evidence is completely lacking for Intelligent Design.
The Bible is a source of evidence that supports the possibility of intelligent design. Of course, people want to reject it just because it's a religious document even though nothing in the Bible has ever been demonstrated wrong and, time and time again, the Bible has been found to be an accurate about historic events. If the Bible is wrong about God creating the universe, it'd be the first time it has been wrong about anything.
Yet scientists refuse to even look at it. Truly amazing considering that scientists have been far less accurate over the ages.
ID is more akin to an interpretation of a myth, than it is to a scientific theory.
As far as I know, ID doesn't state that a Christian God was the intelligence behind creation. It could be a Christian God, it could be an Islamic God, it could be little green aliens from Alpha Centauri.
ID is a simple recognition of the fact that science hasn't adequately explained how the universe began, how order came from chaos, and how life began and became more complex.
You want to debunk ID? Science has it's work cut out for it.
However, being a science teacher and a part time admissions officer at a fairly well known University I will, for the time being, no longer accept students from Kansas into my courses.
Care to post the name of the school you supposedly work at so the lawsuits can begin? You're trolling. You are most definitely not an admissions officer. No admissions officer would say something so patently absurd and illegal.
... this makes it painfully clear that students from Kansas will not have had an adequate Science education compared to other states.
How so? They're still being taught evolution. What science knowledge will they lack?
WTF? Strikes you as the most probable? Do you realize what you're implying? That some supreme force had guiding control of how man and other species have popped into existance? That said supreme force can manipulate genetics of humans and other species at will?
No, I'm implying that God created the universe, maybe using something as scientifically improbable as the Big Bang. He instituted rules to govern his creation (that we know as physics) and knew what those rules would create billions of years later--and I don't think it's improbable that He gave early life a "push" from time to time.
That the universe just spontaneously came into existince all by itself, and that random atoms just happened to form increasingly complex (and thus less stable and less fit, in direct contradiction of what evolution would suggest) lifeforms seems far less likely to me than that God exists. Orders of magnitude less likely.
That noone has seen, heard, documented, or found evidence of this supreme force's existance?
That depends on who you talk to. Some would provide the universe itself as evidence, especially in light of the fact that order does not logically flow from chaos. The natural order of things is to deteriorate, not build itself up.
Others would say that the existince of God was well documented in the Bible and demonstrated by Jesus.
I know you are not one of these people, but the evidence is out there. You just choose to ignore it or interpret it differently.
The earth, formed from leftover material from our solar system, which exists at a border of one of many arms of one of very, very, very, very, very many galaxies, just happens to have had a supreme force guide life for an incredibly small fraction of the earth's existence?
Sure, absolutely. It's orders of magnitude more likely than that life just spontaneously happened and got more and more complex all by itself.
How about employing some logic?
Right back at 'ya.
Though the chances of evolving randomly out of some amino acids seems very small, try comparing it to how many planets might exist. You'll quickly discover that it's likely no longer that silly of an idea, it's _bound_ - by the sheer numbers - to happen.
That's the typical response by those that want to have faith in a Godless origin of life, but it's just as much a matter of faith as believing in God--and just as unprovable. Unless science lucks out and we someday witness life spontaneously create itself and grow in complexity, your assessment that it is "bound to happen" is just as much a matter of faith as my belief in God.
It's not so much about the quality of the education. It's about the idea that religion reigns supreme, and often trumps common sense.
I'd dispute that religion "trumps" common sense. Sometimes religion is common sense. That amazing order can arise from amazing chaos is inherently against common sense.
Many people do not want to live, visit or otherwise deal with a state that is a borderline theocracy.
And that's your right. I just know that Utah is a beautiful state that has some very intelligent people and I've seen no evidence that anyone or any religion in Utah is causing any negative effects on the education of its population.
But I agree, if religion bothers you, stay away from the heart of America (which is not only Utah, but pretty much everywhere outside the dense urban areas of the United States).
Intelligent design, while it is an attempt at a theory, is in no way science. It cannot be backed up by observation.
Ok, so maybe we should remove the Big Bang from the realm of science until someone reproduces and observes it? Or perhaps the mere existince of the theory of the Big Bang serves as a "goalpost" that science can work with in an attempt to reach a final explanation... and if so, why can't ID provide a similar goalpost?
Slashdot Mirror
You really have no information on which to base that speculation, do you? And even if you did, it's irrelevant. The point being that I know more than enough about software engineering that "sophisticated software" doesn't do it for me. I need to know what this awesome software does before that sentence in the article has any importance to me. What's sophisticated to one person is peanuts to another.
These features are enough to classify a species according to modern cladistics. The software used, assists in comparing bone features with the hundreds of thousands of other fossils in the database, which also proves consistency.
If this is the case, I'm at a loss as to why this is a big deal and everyone is excited about his "work." Sounds more like he plugged some data into the palentologist fingerprint software and it spit out an answer. So what?
Me: So this thing basically contradicts everything we think we know about crocs, but dang it, evolution is right so this is just amazing, isn't it?
You: No actually they asked someone who is familiar with crocs how they would improve it, essentially they asked an intelligent designer what they would improve and the intelligent designer implied that it would not have been this. Therefore further giving credibility that evolution is not an intelligent process, but rather random and "bad" mutations die off. So far nothing contradicts this.
Hahaha, so you're saying that--assuming intelligent design were real--this croc expert is an authoritive answer on what the much-more-intelligent-designer would do? Ok... :)
And as far as the unpredictable comment goes, I couldn't find it in the articles, but I may have simply missed it.
Yep, you missed it because it was at the link I provided.
Whoever said that, I'm not sure what the context was, but either they were blatantly wrong, misquoted, or trying to make this finding seem mystical in some fashion.
It was said by Paul Sereno, a University of Chicago paleontologist and National Geographic Society Explorer-in-Residence. He's also the "croc expert" who is apparently as intelligent as the intelligent designer. :)
But Evolution in an undisputed theory...
That, my friend, is incorrect. There are plenty of people who dispute it, including honest scientists in the field that recognize a lot of problems with the theory. They may "believe" in evolution and are interested in continuing research to refine it, but at least they are honest enough to recognize its limitations and problems in its current form.
You are a direct result of microevolution, this is undisputed.
Again, please be honest. Feel free to say that a lot of scientists agree with you, but to suggest that even all of those that do believe this put such blind faith in the theory is incorrect. In honest peer-review, there are acknowledgements of limitations and the potential problems of the theories and findings that are obtained.
These evolutionary changes happened on a scale too large for many humans to comprehend.
4.5 billion years isn't so big a number that intelligent humans can't comprehend it. Don't try to make this thing seem more overwhelming than it really is.
Also most humans are selfish and ignorant beings who have enough balls to claim that they were designed in the form of God. You are not as special as you think you are, you are the result of a series of random, yet directed, mutations. Get over it, you are not as important in the scheme of things as you want to be.
You are clueless to anyone's beliefs but yourself, it would seem, but I thank you for making an attempt to misrepresent mine.
I
By all means stop all industrial production now. God forbid we increase CO2, which contributes around 26% (including natural CO2) to trapped heat, while the contribution of water vapor is in the neighborhood of 60%.
In other words, it seems rather unimportant whether our greatest contribution has been to CO2 if that contribution is dwarfed by naturally-occurring water vapor.
Our contribution to global warming is statistical noise. Removing our contribution would also amount to statistical noise.
If you think the media gives "equal time" to "both sides" of the global warming debate, you have a half dozen screws loose.
Funny, I could have sworn not too long ago I was reading sites that attacked the anti-global-warming pposition because these people (those that dispute global warming) were saying that water vapor was a much more significant greenhouse gas than CO2 and there's much more H2O than CO2 in the atmosphere than CO2; the logical conclusion being, "Why try to make massive cuts in CO2 output if the greenhouse effects of H2O completely dwarf the effects of CO2?"
So the global warming advocates put up a bunch of graphs showing how, yes, H2O was a more effective greenhouse gas, but that energy absorption was already maxed out at the H2O wavelength(s)... or something like that. Therefore, they claimed, it didn't matter that climate models couldn't properly model the effects of cloud cover nor was it valid to observe that since H2O was a much more important greenhouse that draconian efforts to reduce CO2 were misguided since, they said, the energy absorption of H2O was at a different wavelength than CO2.
Now they're saying that increased water vapor is causing a positive feedback loop that's causing the temperature change??? I thought they had said that the impact of H2O's greenhouse effect was already maxed out? If it isn't, then once again I must ask: Why do we place such efforts on reducing CO2 if water vapor seems to have a much bigger impact?
Hmmm? So how long did it take scientists in the lab to witness random organic material spontaneously form a cell wall and all necessary supporting structures?
What? They haven't seen that yet? If not, how on earth can you make the assertion that "the odds of life formating on the earth 40 (sec) billion years ago are very plausible?" Sounds like you know what the odds are? What are they?
Y'think? Let's see some quotes from TFA:
"The researchers don't yet know what events triggered the relatively sudden emergence of the large crocodile..."
Sounds like more data that evolution can't really explain.
"Unlike the crocodiles we know today, Dakosaurus andiniensis lived entirely in the water, and had fins instead of legs."
What part of the skull did the researches base *that* conclusion on?
" Pol used sophisticated software to map the features of those bones and determine its lineage. "
Oooohh, "sophisticated software." I trust we'll hear more about the science of how they "determined its lineage". I'm a software engineer and "sophisticated software" doesn't impress me... I want to know what this software actually did.
"It measured 13 feet from nose to tail."
Still interested in how they concluded that based on the skull. I'm assuming there must be more fossil elsewhere, but curiously none of the "technical" diagrams include more than its head. Some of the "artists concept" drawings show a little more as the thing supposedly jumps out of the water, but I've seen no technical diagrams of anything but the head which leaves me wondering where this 13-feet figure is coming from.
Then we have this:
""The most perplexing thing about the animal is that its head shape does not appear to be well suited to a fast swimming crocodilian, because rather than being streamlined, it is somewhat high and flattened from side to side," said Clark, who was not involved with the research."
So rather than contemplate other explanations (maybe it wasn't so closely related to a croc? maybe it wasn't even aquatic--sometimes mammals can actually find there way into water and die, y'know), we automatically assume this is some groundbreaking discovery? Maybe it's so weird it's wrong?
Or how about:
""If you went to a crocodile worker and said, Let's say you had a chance to evolve something new out of this group, what would you do? And you gave them a pad and a pencil, the last thing they would draw would be a skull that looks like Dakosaurus."
So this thing basically contradicts everything we think we know about crocs, but dang it, evolution is right so this is just amazing, isn't it?
This one is choice:
"It's a beautiful example of the unpredictable nature of evolution, and the variety of things that dinosaur-age crocodiles did."
And here I was thinking that science was supposed to be falsifiable, testable, and actually be a useful predictor? And here they're celebrating just how unpredictable it is? I'm glad other theories are a little more relaible. I'd hate to be walking into my house and suddenly find gravity reverse itself and hit my head on the ceiling. *
Color me unimpressed.
* Note: If gravity did reverse itself, would you be prepared? How would you keep the coins in your pocket? I have the answer: Nudity! (This poorly-quoted quote is left as an exercise for the reader to discover its source).
In one case, finally, a new biological species has arisen spontaneously in a laboratory. A strain of _Drosophila_paulistorum_ when first collected was interfertile with other strains but developed hybrid sterility after being isolated in a separate culture for just a few years (Dobzhansky and Pavlovsky 1971).
This, and every example of speciation that I've been able to find so far, all offer fertility and/or the interest in interbreeding as an example of speciation. While this may satisfy the technical definition of speciation (which you yourself have said is an arbitrary line), we have not seen this process produce any new useful and beneficial functions or features in the offspring. We haven't seen a lizard sprout wings so it could more easily find food. We haven't seen the "nose" of a whale suddenly shift to its back so it could more easily surface for air. We've seen mutations, but these always seem to be detrimental to the organism which often dies sooner than healthy organisms, is often sterile, and when not sterile does not pass on its genetic defect.
To say that microevolution is all that's needed to explain the wide variety of functionally different species on the planet is similar to saying that since iron dust on the ground is attracted to magnets, it's not unreasonable that that dust will spontaneously, of its own accord, generate beautiful music if it is placed near the magnetic head of a tape player.
rocesses took place to make it happen. This isn't a "tenuous" foundation, either. We've been using this knowledge heavily in the last two dozen years to make great insights into the nature of human genetic disorders like cystic fibrosis.
Again, you're straying from the topic. No-one is disputing genetics, here. We're questioning whether or not those genes could feasibly have spontaneously generated at the beginning of time and subsequently gained complex information to eventually create all the animals we see today. That we are learning to do potentially amazing things with genes that don't happen without intelligence is actually an indirect hint that maybe intelligence was involved. Or are we going to take the position that intelligence can do better work with genese than evolution? Hmmm. :)
Me: I do, however, feel that many discoveries are made that don't jive with evolution as-is and rather than making any fundamental changes to the theory, they just sort of ignore that data as an inconvenient subject that is better left as a mystery.
You: Tell me of these "many discoveries". If you can.
I happily will after you address the questions/points I made in my previous post instead of launching into an essay on the difference of micro/macroevolution or the advances in the science of genetics.
My questions from the previous post which I saw no answer to were:
1. You didn't respond to why science shouldn't address a given process if that process required intelligence. Note that I'm not saying God here, I'm saying "intelligence." If we see a hut with what looks like a firepit, an archaeologist will not assume that the hut and firepit just spontaneously formed themselves even though, I suppose, it's statistically possible. We assume some ancient people built a hut and lit a fire. So why is it when we consider the universe and the origin of life and consider the fact that either of these things happening are orders of magnitude less likely than a hut/firepit forming themselves, why do we assume that these things happened by themselves? They're infinitely more complex than the hut/firepit and yet we're to believe it "just happened?" Why is that?
2. Will you acknowledge that the law in Kansas does not shoehorn God into a
You: And do you know why this is? Because of the overwhelming evidence in support of the process of evolution.
That's what those that have faith in evolution always say. But when you actually look for that evidence, it becomes quite underwhelming. They say the evidence is overwhelming yet you seldom see any of this overwhelming evidence.
An archeologist doesn't look for an "evolution friendly" explanation for why certain bones are unearthed in certain arrangements. An archeologist looks for the most likely explanation, based on the information available. And in the case of evolution, there is a lot of it, and it's everywhere.
No, that's the thing. There really isn't. It's a theory that everyone has rallied behind and for which lots of data exists, but a surprisingly small amount of that data truly supports the theory. People like you (and I'm not trying to be rude or point fingers) always say there is "overwhelming evidence" but never actually provide it. And thus the myth is perpetuated and scientists continue to be perplexed by the things they find that just don't fit the theory.
they could even tell when the land had been turned upside-down by geographic upheaval, because the skeletons became successively more primitive in one direction, and more complicated in the other.
That's a far cry from proving macroevolution. No-one disputes that life forms today are more complex than they were a few billion years ago. The question is how that happened.
That was then, and in two hundred years evolution has moved far beyond the realm of smoke and mirrors you purport it to be in, and become a generally accepted and thoroughly documented phenomenon. And that is why modern archeologists turn to it first.
Paleontologists probably turn to it more than archeologists... Anyway, you keep saying that there's all this proof and it's not smoke and mirrors yet you provide examples like coal layers [talk about smoke! :) ] 200 years ago with skeletons of different complexity which just proves that different life inhabited the earth at different times but says nothing about how that complexity changed. No-one disputes this (except for strict Creationists that believe the world is, what, 6000 years old?).
So go ahead, draw the line at your front door, and declare that the only things that you'll believe are things you can experimentally observe with your own eyes - but realize that you're making a straw-man argument the entire time. Science is not just about making observations, it's about explaining processes in ways that do not require belief, faith, or even the existence of humans in order to be accurate.
That's where you're being inconsistent. You mock that I will only believe things I can observe experimentally with my own eyes (which I actually never said, strawman on you) and then you turn around and say that science is about explaining processes--but what if those processes were the work of some intelligence? You have faith in evolution despite its weaknesses and yet you suggest that others are irrational for believing in something that requires the exact same kind of faith. Both require belief in something that has not been proven.
But if you want to pass a law that says scientists must shoehorn God into a statistical argument, then stop right there.
The law in Kansas says nothing of God, so you stop right there. If we're going to have a debate, let's be honest about the facts.
For decades, science teachers have been barred from even mentioning god, for fear of reprisals from twits like those in Kansas.
How do you figure? The "twits in Kansas" would probably love God being mentioned in science class. No, you have it ex
Yeah, not only that, but it would eliminate jetlag if we didn't have to change our watch when we landed in another timezone.
Note to blonde moderators: If you're getting ready to mod this as insightful or interesting, I'd ask you to please think it through first.
Your (apparent) attempt at humor succeeded, but the humor was due to the fact that you (apparently) were humorous in the exact opposite way you (probably) intended to be.
Better luck next time.
It seems that with evolution facts are often shoe-horned into the theory rather than significantly adjusting the theory or admitting it's wrong. When there's no reasonable explanation for a fact, rather than admitting that evolution has some serious flaws, the fact is just left out "hanging" as a curiosity so that, sometime in the future, someone can take another crack at explaining how that fact somehow works into the theory. Or sometimes grandiose conclusions are made on the basis of a single friggin' tooth.
If you set aside the "evidence" in support of evolution which is not even agreed to by the scientists that investigate it, the "overwhelming" body of evidence in support of evolution is much reduced.
The universe has been around for approximately 13.7 billion years' time, according to recent estimates based on the age of white-dwarf-class stars. That estimate has been progressively refined based on many other gathered facts and simulations, such as the layout of the galaxies, the typical formation time of stars and planets, the proportions of various elements around the universe, and yes, even that "evil" mainstay, the fossil record.
Yep. The fact is we don't know for sure. The numbers keep changing and, we hope, become more accurate. But as you said, "recent estimates" are 13.7 billion years. It'll be interesting to see what the estimates are 20 years from now. But even though we are not entirely sure of these facts and even though we've never seen life spontaneously generate so we have no way of knowing how statistically common it is, Godless evolutionists try to make a statistical argument that it must happen sooner or later.
Do you see the inherent silliness of making a statistical argument when we don't even have the statistics on which to make the argument? I know 90% of all statistics are made up, but this is ridiculous! :)
A. "we have never seen life spontaneously create itself,"
B. therefore, we do not "have any idea how statistically common it is"
Use your powers of reasoning, pal. Statement A doesn't lead to statement B. It leads to statement C: C. therefore, it must be pretty rare, or maybe even impossible.
Yes, of course 'C' is correct. But even with 'C', we don't have enough information to determine whether or not it is statistically realistic for life to have spontaneously generated given the size and age of the universe. Yes, we know it's pretty damn rare and maybe even impossible. But how rare and whether or not it is impossible goes to the very heart of why ID is such a popular theory. Obviously if we admit it's "impossible", we are left with no other option but to consider some ID-like or Creationism-like explanation.
As soon as we are able to witness organic matter spontaneously form a functioning cell, then we can scientifically analyze the conditions that let that happen and start making some educated guesses as to how statistically probable it is and also analyze whether those conditions were feasible when life appeared on the planet. Until then, it's faith in science, nothing more. And science isn't supposed to be about faith.
By contrast, we have seen small-scale evolution happen (via natural and unnatural selection [ncseweb.org]) first-hand, in documented [earthscape.org] experiments [talkorigins.org] that you can reproduce with potted plants in a greenhouse in your own back yard. What's more, the evidence for large-scale evolution is woven throughout the history of man (domestication and spread of crops, for example), as well as pre-human history.
Microevolution is not the same as macroevolution. Minor adaptations which come from losing genetic code is not the same as theoretica
Yep. That's because Intelligent Design is NOT religious nor necessarily Christian. You don't have to accept that a Christian God is the intelligence behind creation to accept the possibility that some intelligence was necessary. Once it is accepted that some intelligence was at work, it might not be inappropriate to try to identify the nature of that intelligence. I personally do believe it was the Christian God that did it, but there is no requirement in ID that it was the Christian God.
Back in the real world there is no need to 'debunk' ID since it is a stupid idea and will remain a stupid idea until it can find some credible evidence to support it's stupid claims.
Kind of like the Big Bang and evolution, both of which are supported only by data when that data is interpreted under the assumption that the respective theories are correct. Circular reasoning. If it weren't for those theories, the data could be interpreted quite differently and not necessarily any less accurately--in fact, we might make more progress understanding our surroundings if scientists didn't feel an obligation to think within the confines of such weak theories.
Your red lights only last 30 seconds? Wow... Where do you live?
Personally, if I had to take a trip into orbit (which I would very much like to), I'd pick the Space Shuttle over one of those Chinese capsules any day of the week.
But on the PDA/MP3/cell combination, I disagree. A phone already has all the features necessary to be a PDA and an MP3 player. Don't want to lose battery life? Then don't use the MP3 player. There's no reason the phone should suck any more power if the MP3 aspect isn't being used--the phone should power-down that section of the system.
You may have a point and I may have worded my previous post poorly. There are certainly two ways of looking at it, that God either "setup" the system initially so that it would work out perfectly and generate the life he wanted to generate, or he could've put the building blocks out there and given them the "push" needed to make them form something useful.
I don't pretend to know which happened. But either way we're talking about some intelligence doing something and the whole thing not happening all by itself.
Now before you respond that "If God set it up so perfectly that he knew it would produce life, then that same condition could have statistically happened all by itself" then I would respond that that's just speculation based on an incomplete knowledge of the universe and the origin of life. Until we see life spontaneously create itself and become more complex, any assertion as to how likely that may or may not be is entirely speculation and certainly not any more fact-based than believing in God.
Actually, yeah. Given the scope of the universe and the time available, even the longest odds are likely to be satisfied somewhere, sometime. That's just probability, and has more in its favor than postulating the existence of God.
How long has the universe existed? How large is it? How many atoms are in the universe? We don't even have the answers to these questions and we have never seen life spontaneously create itself to a degree necessary to believe we have any idea how statistically common it is or isn't.
Again, I'll grant that it's a possibility if you'll grant that it's just as much a leap of faith as believing in God.
In particular a monotheistic God -- why is that more probable to you, given the observable universe, than multiple gods, or gods that aren't interested in people?
Whether it was a single God or multiple gods or just super-powerful ETs is not the issue here. Many people want to make ID about the Christian God when, quite frankly, the identity of the intelligence isn't the issue.
Who says that we're the deliberate end product of the universe?
I don't believe ID requires that we believe that we are the only end product. I have no problems believing life exists elsewhere in the universe. As a Christian I do believe God has an active interest in us but I'm not so arrogant as to believe that that means He can't be actively interested in life elsewhere in the universe.
Believing in evolution does not mean you cannot believe in ID.
As mentioned a few days ago, even the Vatican believes that evolution and christianity are not mutually exclusive.
So? I agree with the Vatican on that (I don't believe evolution and Christianity are mutually exclusive). I also don't believe that ID and Christianity are mutually exclusive nor that ID and evolution are mutually exclusive.
Perhaps you do not understand the concept of ID.
I definitely do. What I don't understand is your point. Did you have one?
Wow, that's one of the stupidest things I've read in awhile, and I've read some stupid things. So everything that isn't a valid scientific theory is wrong??? Heheheh, I'd like to see where you're going with that line of that.
It is not based on the scientific method, and it is not falsifiable (although I have seen some interesting claims of falsifiability from ID proponents, which can be reduced to nothing more than circular logic).
The Big Bang is not falsifiable either, yet it is considered science.
It is argument that essentially boils down to "Darwinism can't be right, therefore we win by default." Intelligent design is nothing more than a flawed argument from people who refuse to accept the fact that they are genetically related to monkeys.
I could care less whether I am related to monkeys. But science hasn't explained how the universe sprung into existince nor provided a viable explanation of how life began. The "argument" that "statistically, life was bound to happen because the universe is so big" is just as much a cop-out as believing in God is to a scientist. The Godless scientist (i.e. a scientist that doesn't believe in God) will claim that there is no proof of God. The person that believes in ID will point out that the scientist doesn't offer any evidence that life can actually begin the way he says it did, he just claims that the universe is sooo big (we don't know how big) that it was bound to happen sooner or later, and he offers US as evidence that he's right.
Neither option provides evidence... it's just a matter of which leap of faith you want to take. I don't have any problem with students being exposed to both sides of the argument and let them reach their own conclusions, hopefully with the active participation of their parents at home.
No, that's Creationism, not ID.
ID is not what you think, it is not God tweaking with DNA, ID contends that everything was designed by God with NO EVOLUTION OF ANY KIND.
Wrong. I suggest you investigate furhter. That's Creationism.
ID theory is silly in my opinion, God is a farmer, not a micro-manager. I believe in God absolutely, but ID theory is stupid. God planted the seeds, maybe tweaked them, but He let things grow and evolve.
Sounds like you believe in ID!
Maybe. We think we're observing things (like "echos") of the Big Bang but that is far from evidence. Others have said that science should be able to predict things and/or be falsifiable. The Big Bang is neither.
Direct and indirect evidence is completely lacking for Intelligent Design.
The Bible is a source of evidence that supports the possibility of intelligent design. Of course, people want to reject it just because it's a religious document even though nothing in the Bible has ever been demonstrated wrong and, time and time again, the Bible has been found to be an accurate about historic events. If the Bible is wrong about God creating the universe, it'd be the first time it has been wrong about anything.
Yet scientists refuse to even look at it. Truly amazing considering that scientists have been far less accurate over the ages.
ID is more akin to an interpretation of a myth, than it is to a scientific theory.
As far as I know, ID doesn't state that a Christian God was the intelligence behind creation. It could be a Christian God, it could be an Islamic God, it could be little green aliens from Alpha Centauri.
ID is a simple recognition of the fact that science hasn't adequately explained how the universe began, how order came from chaos, and how life began and became more complex. You want to debunk ID? Science has it's work cut out for it.
Care to post the name of the school you supposedly work at so the lawsuits can begin? You're trolling. You are most definitely not an admissions officer. No admissions officer would say something so patently absurd and illegal.
How so? They're still being taught evolution. What science knowledge will they lack?
No, I'm implying that God created the universe, maybe using something as scientifically improbable as the Big Bang. He instituted rules to govern his creation (that we know as physics) and knew what those rules would create billions of years later--and I don't think it's improbable that He gave early life a "push" from time to time.
That the universe just spontaneously came into existince all by itself, and that random atoms just happened to form increasingly complex (and thus less stable and less fit, in direct contradiction of what evolution would suggest) lifeforms seems far less likely to me than that God exists. Orders of magnitude less likely.
That noone has seen, heard, documented, or found evidence of this supreme force's existance?
That depends on who you talk to. Some would provide the universe itself as evidence, especially in light of the fact that order does not logically flow from chaos. The natural order of things is to deteriorate, not build itself up.
Others would say that the existince of God was well documented in the Bible and demonstrated by Jesus.
I know you are not one of these people, but the evidence is out there. You just choose to ignore it or interpret it differently.
The earth, formed from leftover material from our solar system, which exists at a border of one of many arms of one of very, very, very, very, very many galaxies, just happens to have had a supreme force guide life for an incredibly small fraction of the earth's existence?
Sure, absolutely. It's orders of magnitude more likely than that life just spontaneously happened and got more and more complex all by itself.
How about employing some logic?
Right back at 'ya.
Though the chances of evolving randomly out of some amino acids seems very small, try comparing it to how many planets might exist. You'll quickly discover that it's likely no longer that silly of an idea, it's _bound_ - by the sheer numbers - to happen.
That's the typical response by those that want to have faith in a Godless origin of life, but it's just as much a matter of faith as believing in God--and just as unprovable. Unless science lucks out and we someday witness life spontaneously create itself and grow in complexity, your assessment that it is "bound to happen" is just as much a matter of faith as my belief in God.
I'd dispute that religion "trumps" common sense. Sometimes religion is common sense. That amazing order can arise from amazing chaos is inherently against common sense.
Many people do not want to live, visit or otherwise deal with a state that is a borderline theocracy.
And that's your right. I just know that Utah is a beautiful state that has some very intelligent people and I've seen no evidence that anyone or any religion in Utah is causing any negative effects on the education of its population.
But I agree, if religion bothers you, stay away from the heart of America (which is not only Utah, but pretty much everywhere outside the dense urban areas of the United States).
Please demonstrate that Intelligent Design is wrong. I'm curious.
The more we understand, the more we come to realize just how inevitable it is that some sort of order must come out of universal chaos.
Please expand on that, too. :)
Ok, so maybe we should remove the Big Bang from the realm of science until someone reproduces and observes it? Or perhaps the mere existince of the theory of the Big Bang serves as a "goalpost" that science can work with in an attempt to reach a final explanation... and if so, why can't ID provide a similar goalpost?