Religion Creationism, Evolution and the Bible

ShadowsOfParadox

Well-known member
Dude... in this world today, we have a vast diversity of lifeforms that cannot, and do not, survive in the same environments. Bacteria for which atmospheric Oxygen is a poison, as an extreme example. A river frog cannot survive in the same body of water as a basket starfish, for example. The environment at the bottom of the sea is incompatible with life-as-we-know-it on land, tropical plants will not grow in Siberia, etc etc.
The bugs did not live at the bottom of the ocean or inside ice, or anywhere else that could have had that degree of difference.
Do you think that Oxygen levels are identical all across the Earth, right now? Or air density and humidity?
Climb up a high mountain, and you can see different plant biomes at different altitudes, on the same mountain.
Problem, the bugs WEREN'T in some super low altitude with super high air pressure inflating the oxygen density, they were everywhere.

Like, to clarify something, the atmospheric difference between the Carboniferous and today is the same relative difference as what you'd experience going from sea level to the peak of Mount Everest today. In that analogy, the peak of Mount Everest is today. You are not going to find bugs and dinos at the same time. And to argue that you even vaguely could is to argue that somehow massive chunks of the planet had at least that much of a elevation difference. Which simply has less than no evidence, it is, in fact, contraindicated by every piece of evidence we've ever found.
 

Scottty

Well-known member
Founder
The bugs did not live at the bottom of the ocean or inside ice, or anywhere else that could have had that degree of difference.

Problem, the bugs WEREN'T in some super low altitude with super high air pressure inflating the oxygen density, they were everywhere.

Like, to clarify something, the atmospheric difference between the Carboniferous and today is the same relative difference as what you'd experience going from sea level to the peak of Mount Everest today. In that analogy, the peak of Mount Everest is today. You are not going to find bugs and dinos at the same time. And to argue that you even vaguely could is to argue that somehow massive chunks of the planet had at least that much of a elevation difference. Which simply has less than no evidence, it is, in fact, contraindicated by every piece of evidence we've ever found.

The problem with your "bugs" is that their respiration system would not work well enough with today's atmosphere. Agreed?

Now where is your argument about the vertebrate lung system not working in the "Carboniferous" biome of the Pre-Flood world?
There are fossil tetrapods found there with those bugs, are there not?
 

ShadowsOfParadox

Well-known member
Now where is your argument about the vertebrate lung system not working in the "Carboniferous" biome of the Pre-Flood world?
There are fossil tetrapods found there with those bugs, are there not?
Yes. Mostly amphibians, which, btw, even today, breathe at least partly using their skin. Also, unlike spiracles, lungs are pretty good at extracting more or less oxygen based on need. That said, you can still get oxygen poisoning with lungs. So while an animal with lungs could exist in the Carboniferous, they evolved with that oxygen level, changed as the oxygen level did. Dinosaurs did not. The first Dinosaurs happened in the Triassic, following the Permian mass die off caused at least partially by a precipitous drop in atmospheric Oxygen. At the start of the Triassic, it was a very low 12%. Toward the end there was more oxygen, but still with a ceiling of about modern concentrations. Lungs are not that flexible.

And if you want to argue about the age of these things, go argue with electro-magnetism and the nuclear forces.
 

Scottty

Well-known member
Founder
Yes. Mostly amphibians, which, btw, even today, breathe at least partly using their skin. Also, unlike spiracles, lungs are pretty good at extracting more or less oxygen based on need. That said, you can still get oxygen poisoning with lungs. So while an animal with lungs could exist in the Carboniferous, they evolved with that oxygen level, changed as the oxygen level did. Dinosaurs did not. The first Dinosaurs happened in the Triassic, following the Permian mass die off caused at least partially by a precipitous drop in atmospheric Oxygen. At the start of the Triassic, it was a very low 12%. Toward the end there was more oxygen, but still with a ceiling of about modern concentrations. Lungs are not that flexible.

And if you want to argue about the age of these things, go argue with electro-magnetism and the nuclear forces.

I think I'm seeing a tendency in you to accept as unquestioned fact, things about the Earth's history that you merely read somewhere. Are you not aware that the story changes all the time? There have been different theories about the cause of the Great Dying, as you call it.

(YEC view: the Permian and Triassic fossil assemblages are different because they are from different biomes.)
 

ShadowsOfParadox

Well-known member
Dude... fundamentally, Spiracles need higher oxygen concentrations than exist today to permit creatures that size. And no geographic distance is going to explain that.

Additionally, many of these fossils are found on top of each other, in layers of rock we can date as millions of years apart, 40 days of water movement is NOT going to relocate species in giant chunks across the planet. And even if it did, it wouldn't deposit them in neat distinguished layers. It'd be even messier than it already is.
 

LordsFire

Internet Wizard
How, exactly, are your arguments anything beyond "It Does Not Have All The Answers, Therefor It's Wrong"?
I could use this same argument to demand you believe in Young Earth Creationism, much less Intelligent Design.

The issue isn't 'it doesn't have all the answers,' the issue is that 'there's definitive things that it has been functionally proven it cannot answer.'

As opposed to infinitesimal as with an omniscient creator, a counter-point you simply dismissed with "of course the supernatural doesn't follow natural law"? And you're still clinging to the extremely bloated number that's been shown wrong a variety of ways you started with instead of revising your talking point to be accurate.

For reference, 1,308,759 is the number of base pairs in the genome of the smallest verified fully free-living organism (my previous examples turned out to be intracellular parasites and symbionts), giving 787,952 digits for the naive combinations.

Boy, you really don't understand the math I was using, do you?

I was saying using the 10^230 number based off of a single chromosome, if you're going to just hand me things like this, then we're running over 1 in 10^787,952 zeroes.

Let's put it another way. I've claimed that improbability is the only argument that you need, you don't seem to accept that argument.

What level of improbability would you need to say 'no, I can't rationally believe this happened anymore'?
 

ShadowsOfParadox

Well-known member
The issue isn't 'it doesn't have all the answers,' the issue is that 'there's definitive things that it has been functionally proven it cannot answer.'
Fossils and the dating of such are themselves a fundamental problem with any form of Creationism.
What level of improbability would you need to say 'no, I can't rationally believe this happened anymore'?
The problem with declaring "improbability" is that the time scales are such that, well, it's not actually that improbable anymore.

Well, the time scales, and the number of possible locations.

Between how long the universe has had to random it, and how many places in the universe it COULD random it, the odds are not nearly as bad as you think.
 

LordsFire

Internet Wizard
The problem with declaring "improbability" is that the time scales are such that, well, it's not actually that improbable anymore.

Well, the time scales, and the number of possible locations.

Between how long the universe has had to random it, and how many places in the universe it COULD random it, the odds are not nearly as bad as you think.

So you literally have not been listening to the foundation of my primary argument at all.

I said, back in March, that even if you account for all matter and all time, you don't have enough to get you life, and the odds are an enormous number of Zeroes long. Like 1 in 10^200,000 type long just to get you some DNA, not an actually viable cell.

To reiterate, that is if you take all the mass of the universe for all the time the universe is supposed to have existed, by the numbers the evolutionists use.

Ignoring the fact that the universe is not entirely made up Guanine, Adenine, etc. It in fact mostly is not made up of such things, and if you account for that properly, you start needing to add hundreds if not thousands more zeroes to your figure.

I know the odds damned well. That's why I call abiogenesis out for the dogmatic BS that it is.



Edit: I've just gone back through a lot of this thread, and it keeps coming back to the same thing:

Me: Evolution is an irrational religious dogma, as evidenced by the insane improbability of Abiogenesis.
Evolutionist: You just don't understand the numbers. It's not actually that unlikely.
Me: Yes I do. Here, let me show you some math. Oh look, when I do some number-crunching with better information than I had last time, it's actually even more improbable than I thought.
Evolutionist: No response.


Actually bring some relevant math, or give up and admit that evolution is a dogma to you.
 
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ShadowsOfParadox

Well-known member
I said, back in March, that even if you account for all matter and all time, you don't have enough to get you life, and the odds are an enormous number of Zeroes long. Like 1 in 10^200,000 type long just to get you some DNA, not an actually viable cell.
Ah yes, your "I ran numbers years ago, I got this result", with no given numbers and a supporting guy who's of the opinion that actually it's all space virii. No idea where he thinks the space virii came from but he's pretty adamant that space virii are how new species happen. Great evidence. Definitely made for interesting reading though. Fun theory. Still doesn't disprove Evolution.

Once again, you run into the problem of arguing that Origin is a defining feature of evolutionary theory when it very much isn't.

And you continue to have 0 explanation for fossils at all.
 

LordsFire

Internet Wizard
Ah yes, your "I ran numbers years ago, I got this result", with no given numbers and a supporting guy who's of the opinion that actually it's all space virii. No idea where he thinks the space virii came from but he's pretty adamant that space virii are how new species happen. Great evidence. Definitely made for interesting reading though. Fun theory. Still doesn't disprove Evolution.

Once again, you run into the problem of arguing that Origin is a defining feature of evolutionary theory when it very much isn't.

And you continue to have 0 explanation for fossils at all.

The origin of the numbers is simple.

4 possible values in a position. G, C, T, and A. A number of positions dictated by how long the DNA strand is. It's very basic math. Math that anyone with a decent high school level education can follow. If you see a flaw with it, or can explain why it's not a valid formula, explain so.

Hand-waving like this accomplishes nothing.

Also, I don't have to explain fossils, as they do not cohere to evolutionary theory in the first place.
 

ShadowsOfParadox

Well-known member
Also, I don't have to explain fossils, as they do not cohere to evolutionary theory in the first place.
That a random sampling is incomplete is not a surprise and not a problem with evolution. It is, however, a problem for the statement "God Created everything at the same time" given that many of these creatures fundamentally cannot exist in the same atmosphere.
 

Scottty

Well-known member
Founder
That a random sampling is incomplete is not a surprise and not a problem with evolution. It is, however, a problem for the statement "God Created everything at the same time" given that many of these creatures fundamentally cannot exist in the same atmosphere.

There are animals living on Earth now that cannot exist in the same environment as other animals, that live on Earth now.

But how about actually trying to deal with LF's arguments, rather than whatabouting?
 

ShadowsOfParadox

Well-known member
There are animals living on Earth now that cannot exist in the same environment as other animals, that live on Earth now.
...dude, there is a difference between animals that would die of heatstroke in the Sahara, and animals existing in basically the same geographic area, with similarish plant life, and using spiracles to be bigger than a human.

Environment is NOT Atmosphere. Show me the macroscale life that lives(normally) at the pinnacle of Mount Everest and also at the mountain's base. That is the scale of the difference in atmosphere composition.
 

LordsFire

Internet Wizard
That a random sampling is incomplete is not a surprise and not a problem with evolution. It is, however, a problem for the statement "God Created everything at the same time" given that many of these creatures fundamentally cannot exist in the same atmosphere.

You're still not actually responding to my point.

How does evolution overcome the probability issue?
 

Scottty

Well-known member
Founder
You're still not actually responding to my point.

How does evolution overcome the probability issue?

It doesn't.
They will hand-wave about "billions of years" and then change the subject to what-abouting at Young Earth Creationism.
Ever since the Neo-Darwinian Synthesis came out, attempts have been made to quantify the whole thing mathematically, and the calculations have always lead to the same conclusion:
That the Darwinian theory does not work.
Even with all of the billions of years that modern cosmology can give them, there have simply not been anywhere close to enough metaphorical monkeys hammering away at typewriters to get to even the most basic forms of life, let alone from there to anything we have now. Not even remotely. And that's assuming that it would even be possible at all.
The top evolution people know this. They don't care.
 

ShadowsOfParadox

Well-known member
How does evolution overcome the probability issue?
It doesn't need to. As many others have already stated, everything about Origins is extraneous to the actual Theory of Evolution. People like fiddling with it because it's interesting but A. it doesn't need to, B. what has happened has odds of 1.

And, of course, there's the lovely question of, why do people keep assuming DNA happened in one brilliant moment. Even your Space Virii friend runs into this fundamental flaw. Fossils are not all from one instant. RNA exists. There are forms of DNA that ARE NOT Chromosomal. Chromosomes are not mandatory.

Experiments that got E. Coli to actually eat a new nutrient looked like there was no change for ages and then suddenly it could eat. But it's not "then suddenly it could eat" it was "there were a bunch of independently do nothing changes that then only needed one more change to bring them together into a nutrient channel".

Plenty of people argue that DNA is impossible because improbability or energy. None of them consider the question, "why would DNA come first?" DNA does fuck all on it's own. It must first be READ. The first step is not creating the record, it's creating literacy. And that's a very interesting question, because the literacy of an individual is dependent on the writing, but literacy itself just needs A writing system. DNA is a specific writing system, but the question is not "what are the odds of DNA" but "what are the odds of a molecular writing system?"

Why do people fixate on DNA then? Well, frankly, for the same reason you are. They don't WANT Evolution to be true so they go for something that FEELS like a strong argument.

Also, you are still not responding to my point. So frankly, until you have a response, I'm going to stop engaging with your "but IMPROBABILITY" from here.
 

Scottty

Well-known member
Founder
It doesn't need to. As many others have already stated, everything about Origins is extraneous to the actual Theory of Evolution. People like fiddling with it because it's interesting but A. it doesn't need to, B. what has happened has odds of 1.

Which begs the question of exactly what "has happened". Life coming into being by Divine miracle, or life somehow self-assembling by itself?
(Which would still be something happening in the universe God created and designed. Run away from the Watchmaker Argument, and you'll find the Anthropic Principle waiting for you)

Just waving the topic away as irrelevant is not an honest way to respond here.

And, of course, there's the lovely question of, why do people keep assuming DNA happened in one brilliant moment. Even your Space Virii friend runs into this fundamental flaw. Fossils are not all from one instant. RNA exists. There are forms of DNA that ARE NOT Chromosomal. Chromosomes are not mandatory.

Bacteria have little loops of DNA. Chromosomes are a Eukaryote thing.

but the question is not "what are the odds of DNA" but "what are the odds of a molecular writing system?"

If you mean, what are the odds of any such thing coming together by chance? Basically zero.
Hand-waving about other possible ways of doing it than DNA and enzymes made from amino acids is just that, hand-having.
Any such system would be very complex and need all of the parts to be there before there was any point to the others.
Because it's not just a system for copying data, that's no good if there's no data to copy, or the data is gibberish.
And also there needs to be a system to actually do something with the data.

 

bintananth

behind a desk
If you mean, what are the odds of any such thing coming together by chance? Basically zero.
Basically zero is not equal to zero. Even the most improbable of things can happen completely at random once or more than once. Take this 1952 experiment, for example:


That relatively simple experiment produced more different amino acids than those which are found in the genetic code. It's entirely possible and quite likely that the conditions were or currently are just right near more than one of the approximately 200 sextillion (2×10^23) stars in the observable universe for life as we (somewhat) know it to spontaneously say "Hi!" and thrive.
 

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