Really? Dinosaurs inhabited most eco systems. Mammals inhabited the same eco systems. The stratification we see in the fossil record makes zero sense under YEC.
Where did that sedimentary rock come from?
3 Likes
This is not a prediction. “Shared homologies” is just a way of saying “similarities” as far as you’re concerned, and similarities due to similarities is vacuous. Passions and experiences do not influence the genome and so explain nothing. A shared genetic template doesn’t explain differences, only identities. And why should there be a shared genetic template?
Good try, but it doesn’t explain the fossil record at all. No idea what internal clocks and thermal regulators would have to do with it, nor do “eco system” explain biotic succession. This too is vacuous.
What they show is that YEC has nothing to say about phylogenetics or paleontology.
Once again you fail to account for nested hierarchy, which is not in any way a prediction of separate creation.
Let me know when you have anything real to say. Your paradigm, as we have seen, has shown absolutely zero predictive ability. If this is the best you can do, that’s just pathetic.
Apparently you don’t know what a postdiction is either. No.
Not in any way an answer to the question. A deepity.
Great. What are the kinds? What exactly is the prediction?
1 Like
The date on Lynch’s article is 22 December 2019. He is talking about an attitude still frequently found among theorists today, not an attitude that was long ago (beginning in the 1930s) properly modified. He is saying there is still an over-inflated idea of the importance of natural selection today. This is clear if you read beyond the brief quoted words. You can argue that Lynch is mischaracterizing the current situation in evolutionary theory, but you can’t argue that Lynch didn’t say what he said. I see nothing misleading in Paul Nelson’s statement as a report of what Lynch said.
I have never found Paul Nelson to be anything but a straight shooter, and I don’t believe he engages in deliberate dishonesty of any kind. There is a difference between having a different interpretation of statements or facts than others, and manipulating statements or facts dishonestly.
Accusations of dishonest motives are all too frequent here, and on other sites where origins are discussed. The question arises why these accusations of dishonesty seem to come disproportionately from people who self-identify as atheists or who seem, based on their lines of argument, to be atheists. Is there something about atheism that causes its adherents to throw charges of dishonesty at people that disagree with it? Or is it only the small sample of atheists who debate origins on the internet, a sample not representative of the whole body, that has this unappealing habit?
Quoting from this article
https://biologos.org/articles/testing-common-ancestry-its-all-about-the-mutations/
“One way we can test for shared ancestry with chimpanzees is to look at the genetic differences between the two species. If shared ancestry is true, these differences result from lots of mutations that have accumulated in the two lineages over millions of years. That means they should look like mutations. On the other hand, if humans and chimpanzees appeared by special creation, we would not expect their genetic differences to bear the distinctive signature of descent from a common ancestor.”
I give my response:
The last statement is not true namely because they are foisting conditions and constraints on special creation – a creation that they do not understand.
Special creation would entail using a common genetic template for say humans and chimpanzees. Then turning on a rapid aging mechanism that would accelerate the molecular genetic clock, thereby causing a rapid accumulation of mutations in each species and specified divergence. This could occur in a veritable moment of time. The result would be the emergence of created “kinds”. Mutations would continue to accumulate in each species over their lifespans. Shared similarities between species would cause dissimilarities in genomic sequencing to continue, driven by species-specific pressures of natural selection – convergence in nuanced, but distinctive environments for each created kind.
Genesis 1:24…
And God said, Let the earth bring forth the living creature after his kind, cattle, and creeping thing, and beast of the earth after his kind: and it was so.
Speir…
2 Likes
Yes Eddie, and I am not denying any of that. There is a well known dispute as to the relative importance of natural selection (championed by ‘Adaptionists’) and Genetic Drift (Championed by ‘Neutral Theorists’).
But disputing “the idea that natural selection is solely responsible for every feature of biological diversity” (my emphasis) is not the same as expressing “skepticism about the efficacy of natural selection”.
(And I would note that the word “solely” was miraculously missed out of Nelson’s original quote of Lynch: “In his most recent writings, Michael Lynch, for instance, has called natural selection a ‘religious commitment’ on the part of evolutionary biologists.”)
This means that Lynch’s 2019 statement does not in fact contradict his 2012 statement that Coyne was “correct that it is wrong to characterize [him] as someone who doesn’t believe in the efficacy of natural selection.”
But in any case, even if Lynch’s views had in fact changed in the years since, it is still an appallingly bad excuse for misrepresenting his views back when Nelson made his claims about them (well before the purported changes). You may consider this to be ‘straight shooting’, I most emphatically do not.
The question arises why these accusations of dishonesty seem to come disproportionately from people who self-identify as atheists or who seem, based on their lines of argument, to be atheists. Is there something about atheism that causes its adherents to throw charges of dishonesty at people that disagree with it?I might be willing to entertain this line of reasoning if it weren't for the vast evidence of Creationist dishonesty.
Quote Mine Project: Examining 'Evolution Quotes' of Creationists would be a good starting place. Please feel free to check if it contains any false accusations of dishonesty.
They in fact proudly publish whole books of quotemines, e.g. That Their Words May Be Used Against Them by Henry M. Morris.
Creationist misrepresentation of science has been a part of it since an early date. Prominent ichthyologist and founding president of Stanford University, David Starr Jordan described the work of early Young Earth Creationist George McCready Price as “based on scattering mistakes, omissions, and exceptions against general truths that anybody familiar with the facts in a general way can not possibly dispute.” Whilst I have seen it said that Jordan “remained almost entirely aloof from organized religion”, I’ve seen no indication that he was an atheist.
I would also point out that I did not start out by accusing Nelson of dishonesty. I posted my original full quote of Carroll without any accusation. It was only after further reflection, and a dispute rose over his treatment on this forum, that I raised the accusation of quote-mining. It was then only after r_speir made a big issue over that, and Nelson compounded the issue, that my wording escalated to “misrepresentation.” You have raised the issue of explicit “dishonesty”, and whilst I would not have used that word unprompted, I will not back away from it when challenged.
Addendum: The foregoing should not however be read as me denying the existence of at least a few honest Creationists. Kurt Wise and Todd Wood immediately come to mind. But my impression is that their modus operandi is very different from the creationist mainstream. More modest in their claims. More willing to acknowledge the strength of their opponents’ evidence. More inclined to indulge in research than in polemics.
2 Likes
Why?
Why?
You’re just making up a creation process to fit the data. That’s not a prediction. And it’s a creation process specifically designed to mimic what we would expect from evolution. There’s no reason to expect that to be how God would create species. As a matter of fact, it seems pointless and insane.
5 Likes
LOL! Right on cue comes Eddie projecting his faults and the faults of other Creationists onto pro-science people (“atheists” to Eddie 
) I suppose it wouldn’t be a day at PS without at least one Eddie disingenuous strawman or false accusation. 
Heh. Like you supposedly understand it? You can’t answer even the simplest questions about empirical data which directly refutes your claims.
1 Like
Why? Because it endorses a Supreme Creator God? Because it underscores the biblical account of created kinds? Because it fits the evidence? Because it has predictive ability?
You don’t own the science. I have told you that time and again. You only own a personal interpretation of the evidence we witness of God’s creation. My interpretation is no less valid than yours, and is probably more so because I heartily give God his due as Creator of all things.
The empirical evidence does not endorse any God or Gods. The empirical evidence 100% refutes the idea of Biblical “kinds”. Biblical special creation does not fit the evidence and has no predictive ability.
That’s demonstrably false because the accepted scientific interpretation explains ALL the evidence in a coherent consilient matter. Special Creation only hand picks small snippets of data they can make ad hoc stories for. Just look at all the evidence you keep ignoring and questions you keep ducking for lots of good examples. Science is better.
1 Like
Speaking of which, has Creationism, let alone YEC, ever made a concerted attempt to explain the corpus of evidence that constitutes the field of Biogeography - Wikipedia ?
2 Likes
No, and no.
There is a third possibility that’s so obvious that Eddie can’t possibly have missed it: the accusations of dishonesty come mostly from atheists because they are not the ones being dishonest.
1 Like
No. Because it endorses a deceptive creator who creates the appearance of evolution for no apparent reason other than to deceive.
What predictive ability? You have yet to make a prediction. Note that this prediction would have to be something not predicted by standard evolutionary biology.
It’s much less valid than mine, since it’s constructed out of nothing, purely to enable you to claim creation in the face of the data.
1 Like
Why would god arrange things so that human embryos STILL develop gill slits… and THEN the gills go away?
Why would God made SO MANY different beetles?
If you claim that special creation would entail the use of a common genetic template you are foisting conditions and constraints on special creation.
That’s an ad hoc rescue. The only reason you are proposing these mechanisms is to fit the data.
1 Like
On the contrary, the statement is true for the reason you just stated: we do not understand special creation, and therefore have no reason to expect it to carry a distinctive signature of common descent.
That doesn’t explain the data. You have to explain why humans and chimps show this pattern, but also why every other mammalian species pair shows it, regardless of how different they are genetically. If rapid aging caused the genetic differences between humans and chimps, what caused the much larger genetic differences between humans and monkeys – which display exactly the same pattern?
3 Likes
By the way . . . did @r_speir ever get back to us to reveal why I’m not to be trusted?
1 Like
You look a little shifty to me.
2 Likes