Well, the moon recession rates and dust a famous straw man arguments. Arguing against them is easy and really only arguing against the straw man of the uneducated creationist.
As long as some creationists are using them, then it's not a strawman to rebut them.
To find out what thinking, educated creationists think, have a look at www.reasons.org. This organization is devoted to building a viable scientific theory of creation.
I went their, and found the website hard to navigate. I was looking for a summary (with evidence) of what thinking, educated creationists think, but all that I could find where reasons for me to send them money. The few examples of science were pretty flawed (the deep sea vents article on their front page was extremely one sided, and lacked objectivity).
Do you know of a good page on their site which relates what they believe, and what evidence there is to back up these beliefs?
As far as I know (and I aren't a biologist) is that you are mostly correct, but species is still a fuzzy concept. What you have described sounds a lot like a ring species (some Northern Hemisphere seagulls are about the only example that I could name), and these are a good indication of why the term species is fuzzy. Given that mating small dogs with huge dogs may lead to machanical differculties, it could well be said that dogs are on their way to becoming a ring species.
The reason why I asked is that many creationists use the arguement "sure it's changed over time, but it's still a [insert whatever type of life form you so desire]", and unless they give a concreate defination of what defines that life form (many do not accept inability to successfully breed with fertile offspring), it really is impossible to say when it has evolved enough to meet their requirements.
Not on Faroe Island, where imported mice rapidly (over approx. 250 years) diverged from there orginal stock enough to no longer be of the same species.
Rather, we have witnessed dogs get big, small, and get new colors, shorter tails, bigger eyes, But over thousands and thousands of years, they're still dogs.
Could you please define what a dog is, and how much divergence is needed for you to consider a dog breed to be a different species?
True, they are both theories, however, evolution has literally tons of experimental evidence behind it, whereas creationism (by this I mean "scientific creationism" - as in a young earth) has none (and in fact, plenty of evidence which just plain doens't fit with it.
Therefore, in a scientific sense, evolution is by far the strongest theory.
I'm currently doing a PhD in chemistry, and personally I feel that it would be very easy to make up results. This is especially true if the research is giving unsurprising results.
It is actually quite differcult to reproduce many chemical reactions which have been published in the science lit. So when you can't repeat someone's work, do you raise a stink (only to find out that everybody but you can reproduce it), or do you find another workaround to the problem that you are trying to solve?
The Tasmanian wolf is a different matter. That is an actual cloning effort from a many-decades-old hide with scraps of tissue on it.
Some minor anal corrections:
* They have more than just a hide, there is a whole preserved pup (when it was preserved, they used alcohol not the usually preservative, so the DNA survived).
It's against FAA rules to attempt a launch of a space vehicle from American ground and airspace without prior permission. And they only give NASA and a few select companies (that can't send people, only cargo) the clearance to do so.
If a company truely believes that it can make money off sending people to space it will get around this, by either lobbying for permission, or moving to a different country. If your the sort of person who is willing to travel to the moon/mars/whatever, then an international flight shouldn't worry you.
And then, like a spoiled kid, lose their expensive toy, shrug, and ask their Uncle Sam for a new one.
Has NASA requested more money because of this loss?
I'm not saying that NASA would be bankrupted by private industry, but rather, there is lots of money too be made by putting stuff into orbit, and if private companies can really beat NASA, surely they would be doing it now.
My skeptism towards private launch companies arises because they have only produced plans and nothing solid, whereas NASA actually (more often than not) puts things into space.
Surely if NASA is so bad, then private companies would be taking it business away from it as we speak. Any satellite company would jump at the chance for cheaper launches, that is, if a private launch company would offer something other than hot air.
The only thing that creation provides that evolution does not is a starting point and a way to explain the *IMHO* total leap of faith that random chance could produce beings with even the complexity of a bacterium.
These two points contradict each other.
If evolution doesn't provide a starting point, then it has no need to explain where the first life came from.
If it can explain where the first life came from, then it provides a starting point.
The first situation is the correct one. Evolution says nothing about the creation of life. As far as Darwin's fine theory is concerned, life could have arrived by natural processes, been placed here by God, or planted by aliens. It doesn't really matter.
What you should be critising is the theory of abiogensis (the creation of life through natural processes). This isn't a big issue, however, I like to correct it when it comes up as some young earth creationists like to confuse things by attacking evolution through abiogensis.
And one more minor point, abiogensis doesn't claim that beings similar to bacteria where created by random chance.
Re:I guess I am too young ...
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The Last Place
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I haven't been to either China or India, but I have been to Vietnam (which is poorer than China and maybe India) and I got the exact opposite impression. There are TV ariels everywhere. I even have the most impressive picture of a village on the banks of the Mekong, with literally thousands of TV ariels everywhere. And as it was the world cup season when I was there, trust me, people without a tv missed it alright.
back to my original question which you seem to have ignored: how do you know this skull is an intermediate form?
Because it has traits common to both species. For example the braincase is comparate in size to a chimps, yet, the face has features only found in humans (and proto-humans).
The reason why Creationism has "absolutely nothing like this" is because it's not a scientific theory. To assume Creationism is a scientific theory is absolutely wrong (and any Creationists out there arguing from a scientific standpoint are wasting their time).
While I have no arguement with this statement, many creationists would very strongly disagree with you.
As for the quote, nice one, but your orginal post (which included a one word quote from Darwin, hence very easy to mischaractarise, then supply the full one when challenged) implied that Darwin seperated civilised people from the great apes. Something that he didn't.
How can something "make creationism right?"
Evidence.
You either accept and believe Creationism to be correct,
And surrender your ability to think and reason. At least scientific creationists have a look outside their window.
or you don't and opt for some half-baked theory due to a racist and a bad scientist that appeals to,
Wow, harsh judgement. Many would disagree with you (especially with reguards to the bad scientist remark). However, your slandering of those who you disagree with is duely noted.
and promotes, your Liberalist and hedonistic mind frame.
If this wasn't so funny, I might be offended. Given that you have never met me, and read (at most) only a tiny fraction of my thoughts, this is one of the most stupid things you could writen.
Tell me of examples of rates of mutation where a beneficial mutation occurs compared to harmful/harmless mutations.
This is irrelevent. Natural selection kills off harmful mutations, leaves the neutral alone, and boasts the effects of positive mutations. This leads to a net increase in postives, despite that before natural selection applies it's filter there is a net decrease.
Cite an example where such beneficial mutations are shown to take place on enough of a regular basis to be useful.
Sickle cell anemia in malaria effected areas. Now can you define a beneficial mutation?
Also, take note of this: most mutations are recessive.
Is this true? It doesn't really matter, but it seems more logical to me for about half of mutations to be recessive.
That means that natural selection plays no role in the survival of that beneficial genetic mutation.
Wrong. It acts on homozygous individuals, also hetrozygous individuals sometimes show traits (just to a lesser degree than there homozygous cousins).
Also take note, that along with the single beneficial recessive mutation a host of harmful recessive mutations are becoming deeply ingrained in a creature's gene pool. This is known as genetic load - the combined disadvantage far outweighs any advantage.
Why does the incorporation of one mutation lead to the addition of multiple harmful mutations? This only occurs if you pretend selection doesn't occur.
Consider this problem also - for a recessive beneficial mutation to express itself, both parents must possess the same gene, and both parents must pass the gene on (1 in 4 chance).
Wrong. Your example is true in the case of two hetrozygous parents having a homozygous recessive offspring. There is also a 1/2 chance that the mutation will be passed on, but masked.
However, you have selected (and whoever said creationists ignore selection events?:) ) the best situation for your case, and ignored the possiblity that one or both parents are homozygous recessive. If the mutation is beneficial, this is likely to the case (that natural selection thing again). And if this happens the chance of the trait being expressed rises to 1 in 2 for the case of one homozygous parent, to 1 in 1 for the case of two homozygous parents. This changes your odds very significantly.
Consider also that for two parents to possess the same beneficial mutation, they must have obtained it from a common ancestor
Your use of the word "must" is misleading, and should be replaced with "most likely".
- meaning that they likely inherited a number of other harmful recessive mutations -
Only if you have a strawman arguement is true.
of which there is a much greater chance of the child inheriting them and expressing them. So if a child has both recessive genes of a harmful mutation, he likely has inherited a number of other, harmful recessive genes.
And then his or her chance of passing on genes (and hence harmful mutations) on is reduced, and more fitter individuals take his place. Natural selection in action.
This is why close relatives marrying is both essential to evolution, and the very thing that proves it wrong.
Wrong, you have shown that peusdoevolution is wrong. Luckly, nobody beleives in peusdoevolution, so better luck next time.
Global warming? There's no evidence that the actions of humans have had a significant effect on climate.
And your peer reviewed scientific evidence for this is???
The Greenhouse Effect? Evidence indicates that the increased amount of CO2 in the air is stimulating the growth of trees, and thus, the production of O2.
So...
What does more O2 production have to do with the greenhouse effect? Do you even know what the greenhouse effect is? (Here's a hint, extra oxygen doesn't neutralise it).
Oil spills? Sorry, we're no match against nature. Large amounts of oil gush into the ocean every day through naturally occurring cracks in the ocean floor. Not to worry, though. Certain bacteria happen to think that petro tastes yummy, so they eat it up!
Phew... and I was worried about local effects.
Oh wait, you just ignored that.
Yeah, a few birds and fish will get a nasty oil bath from top-surface spills, but they'll restore their numbers within a generation.
And your scientific peer reviewed evidence for is???
Ok, I'll reply the first part of post in a different one, but now onto this post...
Firstly, you have confused evolution with abiogensis (sp?) (creation of life from nonliving matter via. natural causes). As far as Darwin's fine theory is concerned, it is irrelevent as too how the first life got here. Whether it was planted by aliens, created by God, emerged out of a warm pool, or whatever other reason you can think of, doesn't matter one bit. The theory of evolution says nothing about the creation of the first life on earth. What you are argueing against is abiogensis (which is incidently a much weaker theory, which is why I suspect many creationist organisations confuse the two).
Unfortually, your probability calculations are irrelevent with reguards to abiogensis as well as they don't address real abiogensis works (at least the current theories of it). I don't think that any researcher proposes that single celled life arose out of random combinations of peptides. I'm not a expert on abiogensis, but I believe theories such as the RNA world, plus clay catalysised reactions are what you need to rebute, not this strawman. That being said, you may find this essay interesting.
As for Methinks it's a weasel, it isn't meant to be a model of evolution, but rather a graphic illustration about the effects of selection of probability. Until creationist calculations take into effect selection, they mean nothing.
Evolution requires the entire sentence to be complete to be meaningful. It can't work if one character is missing.
This statement is also false. Take the humble protein haemoglobin (it transports oxygen round your body and gives blood it's red colour), did you know that gorrilla haemoglobin is just one amino acid different than mine and yours (and chimp) haemoglobin?
Clearly biochemistry can happly ignore some spelling mistakes.
I've got one minor disagreement with your post, I feel that the Drake equation is very useful, not in generating answers, but rather for provoking discussion about the variables are.
Wow, nice long answer. Because I'm lazy, I'll only look at the second part of it (the first part is also shot with flaws but it's late here...).
Your part 2 is essentially a giant strawman arguement. That is, you (or rather Walt Brown, who's answer it is) have misconstructed an arguement, and attacked this false arguement rather than the real one.
In reality, simple probability calculations fall apart when a concept like "selection" is thrown into the mix. A very key part of evolutionary theory is "natural selection". Even creationists should have heard of it.
For a excellent example of the effect of selection on probabilities you should investigate Richard Dawkins example of Methinks like a weasel (or words to those effect, it's been a long time for time).
If you had a series of fossils with crustaceans and house characteristics, you might have a arguement instead of a strawman.
However, rather than stupid arguements, Darwin's theory predicted that a series of ancient proto-human apes lived. Given that evidence this was only found in 1925, it's a pretty good prediction. Creationism has absolutely nothing like this.
Oh, and by the way, nice try at slandering Darwin. Yes, he was a man of his age, but just because he doesn't meet todays PC standards (btw, you could have found real example of what he said rather than mischaracterising his words) it doesn't effect his theory one bit. Even if Darwin beat up priests and sold poisoned milk to schoolkids, it still wouldn't make creationism right.
1. Yes, it does take time. Fortunally the historical records rate of evolution change is fully consistent with lab studies on the rate of evolutionary change.
2. If you take a pack of cards, shuffle them, then lay them out one by one, what is the probability that you get the particular sequence that you just drew? Pretty damm low. Likewise for any particular evolutionary sequence.
When was the last time you read of someone using "The Theory of Evolution" to make a valid, provable prediction on the evolution of a species?
This is pretty ironic.
Given that Darwin himself predicted the past existance of a common ancestor between humans and the great apes, the very article which you are posting about answers your question.
No, the bet was not cancelled. If it had have been Simon would be $1000 richer. Instead he read a paper by Roger Sedjo, realised that Alabama wasn't completely isolated from the rest of the world, and forfeited on the bet.
A more cynical person would also note that at the time he pulled out, he was losing very badly.
If Simon's had an ironic sense of humor, he would have also noted that the price of the timber started to drop shortly after he got cold feet.
Likewise in the '70s there was a guy named Julian Simon who became quite popular for making claims that "natural resources have become cheaper rather than more expensive".
He was so confident about this that he took a bet with David South about the price of Pine Sawtimber, and lost it. David South is now $1000 richer.
I'm doing a PhD in chemistry, and have never heard of this. Are you sure that you aren't getting some of the 2nd law of thermodynamics mixed into this?
If somebody else knows, more information would be great.
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Given that many Christians believe in evolution, and not in the creation myth in a literal sense, it can't be that fundamental.
Well, the moon recession rates and dust a famous straw man arguments. Arguing against them is easy and really only arguing against the straw man of the uneducated creationist.
As long as some creationists are using them, then it's not a strawman to rebut them.
To find out what thinking, educated creationists think, have a look at www.reasons.org. This organization is devoted to building a viable scientific theory of creation.
I went their, and found the website hard to navigate. I was looking for a summary (with evidence) of what thinking, educated creationists think, but all that I could find where reasons for me to send them money. The few examples of science were pretty flawed (the deep sea vents article on their front page was extremely one sided, and lacked objectivity).
Do you know of a good page on their site which relates what they believe, and what evidence there is to back up these beliefs?
As far as I know (and I aren't a biologist) is that you are mostly correct, but species is still a fuzzy concept. What you have described sounds a lot like a ring species (some Northern Hemisphere seagulls are about the only example that I could name), and these are a good indication of why the term species is fuzzy. Given that mating small dogs with huge dogs may lead to machanical differculties, it could well be said that dogs are on their way to becoming a ring species.
The reason why I asked is that many creationists use the arguement "sure it's changed over time, but it's still a [insert whatever type of life form you so desire]", and unless they give a concreate defination of what defines that life form (many do not accept inability to successfully breed with fertile offspring), it really is impossible to say when it has evolved enough to meet their requirements.
So we have witnessed one species become another?
Yes.
Where was I?
Not on Faroe Island, where imported mice rapidly (over approx. 250 years) diverged from there orginal stock enough to no longer be of the same species.
Rather, we have witnessed dogs get big, small, and get new colors, shorter tails, bigger eyes, But over thousands and thousands of years, they're still dogs.
Could you please define what a dog is, and how much divergence is needed for you to consider a dog breed to be a different species?
True, they are both theories, however, evolution has literally tons of experimental evidence behind it, whereas creationism (by this I mean "scientific creationism" - as in a young earth) has none (and in fact, plenty of evidence which just plain doens't fit with it.
Therefore, in a scientific sense, evolution is by far the strongest theory.
I'm currently doing a PhD in chemistry, and personally I feel that it would be very easy to make up results. This is especially true if the research is giving unsurprising results.
It is actually quite differcult to reproduce many chemical reactions which have been published in the science lit. So when you can't repeat someone's work, do you raise a stink (only to find out that everybody but you can reproduce it), or do you find another workaround to the problem that you are trying to solve?
The Tasmanian wolf is a different matter. That is an actual cloning effort from a many-decades-old hide with scraps of tissue on it.
Some minor anal corrections:
* They have more than just a hide, there is a whole preserved pup (when it was preserved, they used alcohol not the usually preservative, so the DNA survived).
* It's the Tasmanian Tiger, not wolf.
It's against FAA rules to attempt a launch of a space vehicle from American ground and airspace without prior permission. And they only give NASA and a few select companies (that can't send people, only cargo) the clearance to do so.
If a company truely believes that it can make money off sending people to space it will get around this, by either lobbying for permission, or moving to a different country. If your the sort of person who is willing to travel to the moon/mars/whatever, then an international flight shouldn't worry you.
And then, like a spoiled kid, lose their expensive toy, shrug, and ask their Uncle Sam for a new one.
Has NASA requested more money because of this loss?
I'm not saying that NASA would be bankrupted by private industry, but rather, there is lots of money too be made by putting stuff into orbit, and if private companies can really beat NASA, surely they would be doing it now.
My skeptism towards private launch companies arises because they have only produced plans and nothing solid, whereas NASA actually (more often than not) puts things into space.
Surely if NASA is so bad, then private companies would be taking it business away from it as we speak. Any satellite company would jump at the chance for cheaper launches, that is, if a private launch company would offer something other than hot air.
Since your into books of such scientific calibre, perhaps you should check out these great works of psudeoscience.
The only thing that creation provides that evolution does not is a starting point and a way to explain the *IMHO* total leap of faith that random chance could produce beings with even the complexity of a bacterium.
These two points contradict each other.
If evolution doesn't provide a starting point, then it has no need to explain where the first life came from.
If it can explain where the first life came from, then it provides a starting point.
The first situation is the correct one. Evolution says nothing about the creation of life. As far as Darwin's fine theory is concerned, life could have arrived by natural processes, been placed here by God, or planted by aliens. It doesn't really matter.
What you should be critising is the theory of abiogensis (the creation of life through natural processes). This isn't a big issue, however, I like to correct it when it comes up as some young earth creationists like to confuse things by attacking evolution through abiogensis.
And one more minor point, abiogensis doesn't claim that beings similar to bacteria where created by random chance.
I haven't been to either China or India, but I have been to Vietnam (which is poorer than China and maybe India) and I got the exact opposite impression. There are TV ariels everywhere. I even have the most impressive picture of a village on the banks of the Mekong, with literally thousands of TV ariels everywhere. And as it was the world cup season when I was there, trust me, people without a tv missed it alright.
back to my original question which you
seem to have ignored: how do you know this skull is an intermediate form?
Because it has traits common to both species. For example the braincase is comparate in size to a chimps, yet, the face has features only found in humans (and proto-humans).
The reason why Creationism has "absolutely nothing like this" is because it's not a scientific theory. To assume Creationism is a scientific theory is absolutely wrong (and any Creationists out there arguing from a scientific standpoint are wasting their time).
While I have no arguement with this statement, many creationists would very strongly disagree with you.
As for the quote, nice one, but your orginal post (which included a one word quote from Darwin, hence very easy to mischaractarise, then supply the full one when challenged) implied that Darwin seperated civilised people from the great apes. Something that he didn't.
How can something "make creationism right?"
Evidence.
You either accept and believe Creationism to be correct,
And surrender your ability to think and reason. At least scientific creationists have a look outside their window.
or you don't and opt for some half-baked theory due to a racist and a bad scientist that appeals to,
Wow, harsh judgement. Many would disagree with you (especially with reguards to the bad scientist remark). However, your slandering of those who you disagree with is duely noted.
and promotes, your Liberalist and hedonistic mind frame.
If this wasn't so funny, I might be offended. Given that you have never met me, and read (at most) only a tiny fraction of my thoughts, this is one of the most stupid things you could writen.
Tell me of examples of rates of mutation where a beneficial mutation occurs compared to harmful/harmless mutations.
:) ) the best situation for your case, and ignored the possiblity that one or both parents are homozygous recessive. If the mutation is beneficial, this is likely to the case (that natural selection thing again). And if this happens the chance of the trait being expressed rises to 1 in 2 for the case of one homozygous parent, to 1 in 1 for the case of two homozygous parents. This changes your odds very significantly.
This is irrelevent. Natural selection kills off harmful mutations, leaves the neutral alone, and boasts the effects of positive mutations. This leads to a net increase in postives, despite that before natural selection applies it's filter there is a net decrease.
Cite an example where such beneficial mutations are shown to take place on enough of a regular basis to be useful.
Sickle cell anemia in malaria effected areas. Now can you define a beneficial mutation?
Also, take note of this: most mutations are recessive.
Is this true? It doesn't really matter, but it seems more logical to me for about half of mutations to be recessive.
That means that natural selection plays no role in the survival of that beneficial genetic mutation.
Wrong. It acts on homozygous individuals, also hetrozygous individuals sometimes show traits (just to a lesser degree than there homozygous cousins).
Also take note, that along with the single beneficial recessive mutation a host of harmful recessive mutations are becoming deeply ingrained in a creature's gene pool. This is known as genetic load - the combined disadvantage far outweighs any advantage.
Why does the incorporation of one mutation lead to the addition of multiple harmful mutations? This only occurs if you pretend selection doesn't occur.
Consider this problem also - for a recessive beneficial mutation to express itself, both parents must possess the same gene, and both parents must pass the gene on (1 in 4 chance).
Wrong. Your example is true in the case of two hetrozygous parents having a homozygous recessive offspring. There is also a 1/2 chance that the mutation will be passed on, but masked.
However, you have selected (and whoever said creationists ignore selection events?
Consider also that for two parents to possess the same beneficial mutation, they must have obtained it from a common ancestor
Your use of the word "must" is misleading, and should be replaced with "most likely".
- meaning that they likely inherited a number of other harmful recessive mutations -
Only if you have a strawman arguement is true.
of which there is a much greater chance of the child inheriting them and expressing them. So if a child has both recessive genes of a harmful mutation, he likely has inherited a number of other, harmful recessive genes.
And then his or her chance of passing on genes (and hence harmful mutations) on is reduced, and more fitter individuals take his place. Natural selection in action.
This is why close relatives marrying is both essential to evolution, and the very thing that proves it wrong.
Wrong, you have shown that peusdoevolution is wrong. Luckly, nobody beleives in peusdoevolution, so better luck next time.
Global warming? There's no evidence that the actions of humans have had a significant effect on climate.
And your peer reviewed scientific evidence for this is???
The Greenhouse Effect? Evidence indicates that the increased amount of CO2 in the air is stimulating the growth of trees, and thus, the production of O2.
So...
What does more O2 production have to do with the greenhouse effect? Do you even know what the greenhouse effect is? (Here's a hint, extra oxygen doesn't neutralise it).
Oil spills? Sorry, we're no match against nature. Large amounts of oil gush into the ocean every day through naturally occurring cracks in the ocean floor. Not to worry, though. Certain bacteria happen to think that petro tastes yummy, so they eat it up!
Phew... and I was worried about local effects.
Oh wait, you just ignored that.
Yeah, a few birds and fish will get a nasty oil bath from top-surface spills, but they'll restore their numbers within a generation.
And your scientific peer reviewed evidence for is???
Ok, I'll reply the first part of post in a different one, but now onto this post...
Firstly, you have confused evolution with abiogensis (sp?) (creation of life from nonliving matter via. natural causes). As far as Darwin's fine theory is concerned, it is irrelevent as too how the first life got here. Whether it was planted by aliens, created by God, emerged out of a warm pool, or whatever other reason you can think of, doesn't matter one bit. The theory of evolution says nothing about the creation of the first life on earth. What you are argueing against is abiogensis (which is incidently a much weaker theory, which is why I suspect many creationist organisations confuse the two).
Unfortually, your probability calculations are irrelevent with reguards to abiogensis as well as they don't address real abiogensis works (at least the current theories of it). I don't think that any researcher proposes that single celled life arose out of random combinations of peptides. I'm not a expert on abiogensis, but I believe theories such as the RNA world, plus clay catalysised reactions are what you need to rebute, not this strawman. That being said, you may find this essay interesting.
As for Methinks it's a weasel, it isn't meant to be a model of evolution, but rather a graphic illustration about the effects of selection of probability. Until creationist calculations take into effect selection, they mean nothing.
Evolution requires the entire sentence to be complete to be meaningful. It can't work if one character is missing.
This statement is also false. Take the humble protein haemoglobin (it transports oxygen round your body and gives blood it's red colour), did you know that gorrilla haemoglobin is just one amino acid different than mine and yours (and chimp) haemoglobin?
Clearly biochemistry can happly ignore some spelling mistakes.
I've got one minor disagreement with your post, I feel that the Drake equation is very useful, not in generating answers, but rather for provoking discussion about the variables are.
Wow, nice long answer. Because I'm lazy, I'll only look at the second part of it (the first part is also shot with flaws but it's late here...).
Your part 2 is essentially a giant strawman arguement. That is, you (or rather Walt Brown, who's answer it is) have misconstructed an arguement, and attacked this false arguement rather than the real one.
In reality, simple probability calculations fall apart when a concept like "selection" is thrown into the mix. A very key part of evolutionary theory is "natural selection". Even creationists should have heard of it.
For a excellent example of the effect of selection on probabilities you should investigate Richard Dawkins example of Methinks like a weasel (or words to those effect, it's been a long time for time).
If you had a series of fossils with crustaceans and house characteristics, you might have a arguement instead of a strawman.
However, rather than stupid arguements, Darwin's theory predicted that a series of ancient proto-human apes lived. Given that evidence this was only found in 1925, it's a pretty good prediction. Creationism has absolutely nothing like this.
Oh, and by the way, nice try at slandering Darwin. Yes, he was a man of his age, but just because he doesn't meet todays PC standards (btw, you could have found real example of what he said rather than mischaracterising his words) it doesn't effect his theory one bit. Even if Darwin beat up priests and sold poisoned milk to schoolkids, it still wouldn't make creationism right.
Common Creationist Misconceptions.
1. Yes, it does take time. Fortunally the historical records rate of evolution change is fully consistent with lab studies on the rate of evolutionary change.
2. If you take a pack of cards, shuffle them, then lay them out one by one, what is the probability that you get the particular sequence that you just drew? Pretty damm low. Likewise for any particular evolutionary sequence.
When was the last time you read of someone using "The Theory of Evolution" to make a valid, provable prediction on the evolution of a species?
This is pretty ironic.
Given that Darwin himself predicted the past existance of a common ancestor between humans and the great apes, the very article which you are posting about answers your question.
No, the bet was not cancelled. If it had have been Simon would be $1000 richer. Instead he read a paper by Roger Sedjo, realised that Alabama wasn't completely isolated from the rest of the world, and forfeited on the bet.
A more cynical person would also note that at the time he pulled out, he was losing very badly.
If Simon's had an ironic sense of humor, he would have also noted that the price of the timber started to drop shortly after he got cold feet.
Likewise in the '70s there was a guy named Julian Simon who became quite popular for making claims that "natural resources have become cheaper rather than more expensive".
He was so confident about this that he took a bet with David South about the price of Pine Sawtimber, and lost it. David South is now $1000 richer.
Are you sure about this?
I'm doing a PhD in chemistry, and have never heard of this. Are you sure that you aren't getting some of the 2nd law of thermodynamics mixed into this?
If somebody else knows, more information would be great.