18 posts were split to a new topic: God a Guided Evolution
Right, because God solves any problem. Thatâs a bug not a feature. The âsolutionâ doesnât make any logical sense, it just becomes a matter of declaration by fiat that God wanted it that way.
Take the example of the supposedly wrong chronology of fossils nevertheless implied to lie on a direct line of descent. What is the God-governed evolution phrase supposed to solve here? God made the supposed descendant give birth to itâs ancestor? Well with God thatâs of course possible, He just made one organism travel back in time, and then made it give birth to something completely different.
Does that sound like a sensible solution to you?
No, the real issue here is that the video is simply wrong in presenting the different fossils as being on a direct line of descent. They are cousin species and merely represent morphological transitionals within some span of time.
Of course, what creationism doesnât at all explain is why morphologically transitional species should even exist in the first place. Never mind that they arenât exactly in the ârightâ chronological order to imply a neat morphological progression on a direct line of descent.
Ask yourself, why should there even exist an organism with transitional features like the nostrils further up on the skull, and almost non-existent hind-limbs? God just decided to make an organism that looked like itâs almost completely but still not quite fully adapted to aquatic life, but the transition never even occurred so it was just for fun? The prankster God? What youâre suggesting with this âGod-Governed Evolutionâ nonsense is barely any better.
The problem with creationism is it has zero explanatory power. It never explains why we see any of the things we see. Creationism (and itâs pretentious cousin Intelligent Design) always and only ever amount to pointing out supposed problems with evolution. One could also ask why God bothered to create millions upon millions of past biospheres and ecosystems, only to wipe them out again and replace them with new similar ones that sort of look like theyâre derived.
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In what way is that a problem?
But it doesnât. Why wonât you explain, or at least quote Haarsmaâs explanation, which Iâm unable to find?
That video shows just how low the DI have sunk in their desperate attempts to attack the evolutionary sciences. A Gish Gallop cartoon video aimed at children (or those with a child like mentality) full of misrepresentations, errors of omission, and outright lies. Shameful.
Looks like the DI has finally thrown in the towel and climbed into the any-lie-about-science-is-a good-lie gutter with Ken Ham and Walter Brown.
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When we have a sufficient quantity and quality of positive supporting evidence to remove all reasonable doubt. The evolution of cetaceans from terrestrial mammals passed that threshold decades ago.
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Never hesitate to ask for details from me. I am quite generous with my time.
After asking for the same details three or four times⌠I can probably assure you I wonât be.
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A âdegenerated flipperâ(in a species with a tail fluke no less) with a femur, tibia, and metatarsal?
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For those looking for more substantive food for thought on cetacean evolution than the video in the OP, Iâd recommend some of my favourite papers on the subject:
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Pyenson, N. D. 2017. The Ecological Rise of Whales Chronicled by the Fossil Record. Current Biology 27:R558âR564.
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Buchholtz, E. A., and J. K. Gee. 2017. Finding sacral: Developmental evolution of the axial skeleton of odontocetes (Cetacea). Evolution & Development 19:190â204.
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Gatesy, J., J. H. Geisler, J. Chang, C. Buell, A. Berta, R. W. Meredith, M. S. Springer, and M. R. McGowen. 2013. A phylogenetic blueprint for a modern whale. Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution 66:479â506.
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McGowen, M. R., J. Gatesy, and D. E. Wildman. 2014. Molecular evolution tracks macroevolutionary transitions in Cetacea. Trends in Ecology and Evolution 29:336â346.
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Nery, M. F., D. J. GonzĂĄlez, and J. C. Opazo. 2013. How to Make a Dolphin: Molecular Signature of Positive Selection in Cetacean Genome. PLoS ONE 8:2â8.
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Gingerich, P. D., B. H. Smith, and E. L. Simons. 1990. Hind limbs of eocene Basilosaurus: evidence of feet in whales. Science 249:154â7.
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Thewissen, J. G. M., L. N. Cooper, J. C. George, and S. Bajpai. 2009. From Land to Water: the Origin of Whales, Dolphins, and Porpoises. Evolution: Education and Outreach 2:272â288.
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Cooper, L. N., K. E. Sears, B. A. Armfield, B. Kala, M. Hubler, and J. G. M. Thewissen. 2018. Review and experimental evaluation of the embryonic development and evolutionary history of flipper development and hyperphalangy in dolphins (Cetacea: Mammalia). Genesis 56.
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Xu, S., X. Sun, X. Niu, Z. Zhang, R. Tian, W. Ren, K. Zhou, and G. Yang. 2017. Genetic basis of brain size evolution in cetaceans: insights from adaptive evolution of seven primary microcephaly (MCPH) genes. BMC Evolutionary Biology 17.
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McGowen, M. R., C. Clark, and J. Gatesy. 2008. The vestigial olfactory receptor subgenome of odontocete whales: phylogenetic congruence between gene-tree reconciliation and supermatrix methods. Systematic Biology 57:574â590.
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Lambert, O., M. MartĂnez-CĂĄceres, G. Bianucci, C. Di Celma, R. Salas-Gismondi, E. Steurbaut, M. Urbina, and C. de Muizon. 2017. Earliest Mysticete from the Late Eocene of Peru Sheds New Light on the Origin of Baleen Whales. Current Biology 27:1535-1541.e2.
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Mourlam, M. J., and M. J. Orliac. 2017. Infrasonic and Ultrasonic Hearing Evolved after the Emergence of Modern Whales. Current Biology 27:1776-1781.e9.
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correct. even in wiki they are aware about that:
âPossible uses for the structure have been given, such as clasper-like body functions. These limbs would have been used to guide the animalsâ long bodies during matingâ
and even in its restoration it doesnt have legs but fins (image from wiki):
so yes, its not a leg.
No, not correct. First of all Iâm amused that creationists are suddenly totally okay with reduced vestigial structures of an evolutionary past.
But none of that actually explains why the whales found with legs contains the same bone structures of legs in terrestrial mammals, connected to pelvic bones by muscle and tendons. You know, like you would expect from a load-bearing limb. Much less why some have been found with digits, as in toes. For some of these structures they were basically embedded in the whale body, and were not shaped like fins. They were round elongated limbs(scroll up and look at the picture in the 4th post in this thread). For others they just produced rounded swellings.
Sharks have functional pelvic fins without having any of this. Indeed whales have dorsal fins and tail flukes without any bones in them. The only explanation for the legged whales that makes sense is that they inherited these bone structures from their terrestrial ancestors, and that they are connected together the way they are because they once used to be actual legs that bore the load of the body weight.
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since we know that similar structure also supporting the whale front flippers and since they are function very well at this job we have no evidence that they were used for other function than flippers. even base on the Basilosaurus case.
sure. we even find it in modern whales with several shapes. and even so scientists find out that its a part of the whale reproductive system:
Yes and why are they found in the whale front flipper when theyâre not strictly required for functional fins or flippers? Why do the front flippers contain that particular pattern of bones?Because they inherited them from their terrestrial ancestors.
No, legs are not part of the whale reproductive system. A leg is not a pelvic bone.
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this is your problematic assumption. you never designed a whale flipper so you cant realy know if different design will function the same.
again you assume that its a remains of legs. when in reality we dont need to assume such a thing.
I donât need to assume anything, I can just look at and compare the structures in different aquatic organisms and see that there is no obvious reason why different whale flippers have to contain the particular pattern of bones and muscles they do to perform their functions.
Thereâs a pretty clear pattern of shared similar characteristics in mammals that only makes sense as a product of evolution.
No I arrive at that conclusion by considering all the relevant evidence. Whales today donât have legs, they usually just have a small pelvic bone embedded in the body. They still mate and give birth to whales, hence whatever function you are rationalizing they could serve in mating, isnât actually required, and you have no evidence at all that these rare-birthed legged whales actually use them for anything at all.
Much less why they would need to be constituted of a femur, tibia, fibula, metatarsals, and some times even digits, all connected by muscles and tissues as if they were once moving articulated, load-bearing limbs connected to the pelvis. None of what you are suggesting makes any sense or explains why these structures should exist, be connected, or shaped the way they are. Or why they only happen to be developed extremely rarely. Why they normally start developing in the embryonic stage only later to be aborted again. They donât look like or function as fins in the large whales where they have been found(as can be clearly and obviously seen when you look at the picture in post number 4), and clearly arenât in any way necessary for any extant whale to mate and give birth.
The only thing that actually explains all of the relevant evidence, such as the various levels of reduction seen in different fossil specimens, the chronological span of time in which these fossils are exclusively found, the fact of their existence as rare births in extant whales, their shapes and connections, is that they are the evolutionary developmental remnants of the legged terrestrial past of ancestral cetaceans.
In contrast the creationistic rationalization becomes a huge collection of disconnected, ad-hoc excuses on no sensible or functional basis, having to be invoked for each individual example.
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again a problematic assumption. a whale is very different in many aspects from a fish. the swimming type is different and its large size. maybe these facts are related to the whale internal flipper structure. you dont know that and actually no one knows. so you only have an assumption.
agree. as some cave fish have lost their vision for instance.
my image in comment 47 falsify that claim. so we can clearly see that this internal structure can also be used for flippers. and thus we dont need to assume it was once used for something else.
You keep using this word âassumptionâ even though I just explained that I donât assume any of the things you are saying.
With respect to your comment about your image it simply doesnât make sense because I havenât said the bones canât be or are not present in a fin. What Iâm saying is there is no reason for them to exist for that purpose, since whales have dorsal fins and tail flukes yet these contain no bones.
Much less does it make sense to have a mere bodily potrusion internally connected to the pelvis through multiple bony articulations in the patterns seen in all other mammalian and tetrapod legs, just to support a pelvic fin. That only makes sense as an artifact of common descent.
Yes I know, you can sit there and make up some ad-hoc excuse for why it should be, and yet you have zero evidence to support why that excuse should be true. Youâre literally just making it up.
And to make matters worse you now have to come up with some unique, ad-hoc excuse every time we find some particular cetacean specimen or fossil with different degrees of preservation of this different structures.
Oh you see species X1 uses them for function A1 in a unique and special way God wanted it to. But in species X2 this obviously degraded and less-leg-like version serves a special and unique other function A2 in another way God wanted just and only for this one. And so on.
Oh and in modern whales theyâre âdegraded flippersâ that âfunction in the reproductive systemâ that whales are some times extremely rarely born with because well thatâs just want God wanted in this particular rare case. But itâs the best solution, trust me. And they all just so happen to consist of various levels of preservation of the same bone structures seen in legs, because that just happens to be the best for serving the made-up function you have no evidence for.
This is exactly the problem with creationism. You have no overarching theoretical framework to make sense of any of the patterns in similar morphology, much less their distribution in fossils and extant species. You are just forced time and again to make up some new story on the spot for why God decided this particular thing was best for this particular purpose for every single individual organism.
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but you are. you are assuming that a fish-like fin will do the same job as the whale internal flipper structure. when in reality you dont know that. you also forget that the burdon of proof isnt on the ID anyway.
first: it can do both. second: even evolutionery experts are saying that it probably was used for several functions so i dont see any problem here.
Whale dorsal fin(look at orcas), tail fluke(all whales). Whale, not fish. No bones. Work just fine as fins.
When you are claiming that something is required for some function, which you are doing for these bones, then you have a burden of proof. But all youâre offering is made up excuses and speculations. If you think speculations are sufficient, then I can just as well offer speculations back to rebut yours.
You can make up all the explanations you like. It can do one, it can do the other, it can do both, it can do all sorts of things. There is no limit to what you can imagine it might do. What you need is a theory that makes sense of all the observations. Preferably a theory with some predictive power. The more observations your theory makes sense of, the better.
Thatâs what common descent does. Thereâs a single theory of common descent that makes sense of all the observations of genetics, development, and morphology, in all the species of cetaceans, extant and extinct. It predicts nesting hierarchical patterns in the distribution of shared and derived morphological, developmental, and genetic characteristics, and consilience of independent phylogenies derived from each of these types of data.
And it predicts that in some restricted timespan of geological time there should be found cetaceans with transitional features. That is what we find. And because of this, it also makes sense of the fact that we still some times, but rarely, find living whales with the kinds of bone structures and muscles that look like degraded vestigial legs.
But you donât have such a theory. You have a totally disconnected collection of ad-hoc hypotheses you make up for each individual case, and no good evidence for any of them. And the only reason youâre coming up for them in the first place, since theyâre not at all obvious given the mere observation of these structures, is that youâre trying to avoid the inference of common descent. So your ad-hoc hypotheses are all actually badly motivated.
Experts offer their own speculations too, that does not excuse or constitute evidence for yours.
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