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Yehren

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Please explain how an increase in available oxygen would lead to the Cambrian explosion.

Moot point. There wasn't a dramatic increase in oxygen levels in the Cambrian. The one key cause seems to be the evolution of full exoskeletons. That allowed many new ways of life, and the evolutionary radiation that followed is known as the Cambrian explosion.

I suspect that since such organisms are much more efficient predators, there followed an arms race between predator and prey species.
 
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Yehren

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How do you know what is in the fossil record? A: You rely on a relatively few paleontologists to inform you.

Well, no. First, the data is available to anyone. Second, I have some knowledge of biology and general science, and I'm quite capable of looking at the evidence for myself.

And much of what we know of conditions then, comes from physics. Physicists and geochemists are very good at learning about the environment at the time, from the chemicals and radioisotopes in the rocks. For example, we know that the early walking whale Ambulocetus, was a fresh water animal, by the oxygen ratios in it's fossils.

Paleontologists may ignore data that doesn’t fit the Darwinist model - data that is not presented to the public, because it is regarded as irrelevant.

Sorry, that fails, simply because I can read the evidence and see for myself. The dodge "they are lying, all of them!" is a loser for that, and other reasons.

Technically, evolution is an observed phenomenon.

None of the (alleged) neo-Darwinian process of the evolution of a single cell into all the life-forms on earth can be observed.

Well, let's ask an honest and knowledgeable YE creationist:

Evidences for Darwin’s second expectation — of stratomorphic intermediate species — include such species as Baragwanathia27 (between rhyniophytes and lycopods), Pikaia28 (between echinoderms and chordates), Purgatorius29 (between the tree shrews and the primates), and Proconsul30 (between the non-hominoid primates and the hominoids). Darwin’s third expectation — of higher-taxon stratomorphic intermediates — has been confirmed by such examples as the mammal-like reptile groups31 between the reptiles and the mammals, and the phenacodontids32 between the horses and their presumed ancestors. Darwin’s fourth expectation — of stratomorphic series — has been confirmed by such examples as the early bird series,33 the tetrapod series,34,35 the whale series,36 the various mammal series of the Cenozoic37 (for example, the horse series, the camel series, the elephant series, the pig series, the titanothere series, etc.), the Cantius and Plesiadapus primate series,38 and the hominid series.39Evidence for not just one but for all three of the species level and above types of stratomorphic intermediates expected by macroevolutionary theory is surely strong evidence for macroevolutionary theory. Creationists therefore need to accept this fact. It certainly CANNOT be said that traditional creation theory expected (predicted) any of these fossil finds.
YE creationist Kurt Wise, Toward a Creationist Understanding of Transitional Forms

Evolutionary theory assumes life began and explains how it changes. Even Darwin just assumed that God created the first living things:

"There is grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed by the Creator into a few forms or into one; and that, whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being evolved."
Charles Darwin, last sentence of On the Origin of Species, 1872

However, God says that nature brought forth living things, and the evidence indicates that is true. One hint is that the one absolutely essential organelle for life as we know it, is also the most simple organelle, and forms spontaneously from molecules known to be abiotically produced.

So God was right, after all.

 
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Yehren

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The explanatory power of evolutionary theory is seriously overrated - it is impotent when faced with many realities.

Well lets ask another honest and knowledgeable creationist:

I hope this doesn't turn into a rant, but it might. You have been warned.

Evolution is not a theory in crisis. It is not teetering on the verge of collapse. It has not failed as a scientific explanation. There is evidence for evolution, gobs and gobs of it. It is not just speculation or a faith choice or an assumption or a religion. It is a productive framework for lots of biological research, and it has amazing explanatory power. There is no conspiracy to hide the truth about the failure of evolution. There has really been no failure of evolution as a scientific theory. It works, and it works well.

I say these things not because I'm crazy or because I've "converted" to evolution. I say these things because they are true. I'm motivated this morning by reading yet another clueless, well-meaning person pompously declaring that evolution is a failure. People who say that are either unacquainted with the inner workings of science or unacquainted with the evidence for evolution. (Technically, they could also be deluded or lying, but that seems rather uncharitable to say. Oops.)

Creationist students, listen to me very carefully: There is evidence for evolution, and evolution is an extremely successful scientific theory. That doesn't make it ultimately true, and it doesn't mean that there could not possibly be viable alternatives. It is my own faith choice to reject evolution, because I believe the Bible reveals true information about the history of the earth that is fundamentally incompatible with evolution. I am motivated to understand God's creation from what I believe to be a biblical, creationist perspective. Evolution itself is not flawed or without evidence. Please don't be duped into thinking that somehow evolution itself is a failure. Please don't idolize your own ability to reason. Faith is enough. If God said it, that should settle it. Maybe that's not enough for your scoffing professor or your non-Christian friends, but it should be enough for you.
Todd Wood, The Truth about Evolution


Another weakness of the Darwinian theory regarding life’s origins is that it is untestable: How do you test the theory that a bird evolved from a reptile via the Darwinian process of mutations and natural selection? You can’t.

See above. Your fellow YE creationists admits that there is very good evidence for that.

If Darwin stood up today and declared his belief that God created the first living organisms, the atheism-dominated scientific community would laugh him out of the building and probably out of a job.

Dr. Francis Collins asserts this regularly. And he was not only not laughed at, he was given the directorship of the Human Genome Project. I took my first course in Immunology from a very good tenured professor, who happened to be a YE creationist. So your story won't work with anyone who is familiar with the evidence.


 
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Yehren

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Yes, please show me how environmental conditions are “deterministic”.

Notice that the weather service can accurately predict the path of hurricanes. If environmental conditions were random,that would not be possible.

Notice that Dr. James Hansen was able to accurately predict the amount of atmospheric warming thirty years in advance, based on the limited data he had back then. If environmental conditions were random, that would not have been possible.

The environment determines the direction of evolution.

People used to believe that. It now is clear that often, organisms push back and change the environment. We are the most salient example, but there are other interesting cases. Decline in elk populations in Yellowstone, led to recovery of rivers in the area. It wasn't just the reintroduction of wolves, it was also additional hunting and growth of bear populations. But that allowed willows to grow along the rivers, and in so doing, restored the earlier balance.

A huge example, is the rise of photosynthesis. The early Earth had very little free oxygen. Photosynthesis began to dump lots of oxygen into the environment. And it's poisonous to anoxic organisms. The Banded Iron formations show alternating periods of growth and death for photsynthetic organisms.

Eventually, oxygen-utilizing organisms evolved,but the Earth was forever changed.

Lots of other examples. Would you like to see some more?

Furthermore, scientifically speaking, the genetic mutations that would be required to enable a bird to evolve from a reptile are necessary are randomly produced.

That was Darwin's great discovery. Changes in organisms are random, but only those that are useful to the organisms tend to be retained. Hence the evolution of birds proceeded in steps that were each useful to the dinosaur possessing them and phylogenetic evolution is not a random process. Would you like to learn about that?
It is possible that God provided the mutations and the environmental conditions to steer evolution in the direct he wanted, but that is not scientific hypothesis.

It is possible that God provided the mutations and the environmental conditions to steer evolution in the direct he wanted, but that is not scientific hypothesis.

Turns out, He's a lot smarter than creationists thought. He built the potential for evolution into the universe He created.
 
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bbyrd009

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Please explain how an increase in available oxygen would lead to the Cambrian explosion.
well i would lean more toward nature abhorring a vacuum, so to speak, i guess the oxygen ^ would more likely just make bigger flora and fauna? So for the PC explosion i would maybe contemplate that in light of 99% of all the species that have ever existed being extinct now maybe? Seems equally hard to get ones head around anyway.

But i wonder now what your postulate is? Could you state it succinctly? Surely there are scientists somewhere who hold the same pov, at least on the mechanics of it? In my experience scientists maybe get to Yah a different way, but i would hesitate to paint them all as like Samaritans or whatever...they just arent Galileans maybe
 

RogerDC

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Probably because there are few paleontologists who are that ignorant of the fossil record.
Hallucigenia, the ancestor of arachnids and insects had needle-like fangs | Daily Mail Online
"’Günter Bechly: Rich Fossil Record Says No to Insect Evolution’
Posted on March 11, , 2019
On this episode of ID the Future, Dr. Günter Bechly, paleoentomologist and former curator for amber and fossil insects for the State Museum of Natural History in Stuttgart, Germany, talks with host Andrew McDiarmid about evidence for macroevolution among insects. The fossil record is “saturated,” Bechly says. By that he doesn’t mean there aren’t new fossil forms to discover. Bechly himself has discovered several. He means we have an extensive enough sampling to confidently discern the major patterns of change and stasis in the history of life. And it shows no sign of insect evolution. It shows no transition from marine arthropods to terrestrial insects, none from wingless insects to winged insects, and no gradual evolution to insects (such as beetles and butterflies) that go through a metamorphosis that includes a pupal stage. And evidence for common ancestry is either contradictory or missing. In short, Bechly argues, the insect fossil record is much better explained by intelligent design than blind evolution."

Who is Gunter Bechly?
"Günter Bechly is a distinguished scientist focusing on the fossil history of insects. He has authored or co-authored about 150 scientific publications, including a co-edited book published by Cambridge University Press and a popular science book on evolution. He has discovered and named more than 160 new species, and has 10 biological groups named in his honor. He has served on the editorial boards of two scientific journals, and has organized five large public exhibitions on Earth history and evolution. He has been interviewed widely in German media and served as a science advisor for two natural history documentaries on the BBC." Günter Bechly

Günter Bechly: Rich Fossil Record Says No to Insect Evolution


Probably because there are few paleontologists who don't know that there were many complex animals living before the Cambrian.
Ediacara fauna | Definition, Biota, and Facts
“A few of the gaps (which are systematic in the fossil record) they claim to fill, but there’s another deposit in the region that throws the whole evolutionary story into disrepute: the Chengyiang bed in southern China. Here, the Cambrian Explosion has been documented in fine detail; all the major animal phyla appear in the early Cambrian without precursors. Even though conditions for the preservation of ancestral forms, whether soft-bodied or microscopic, are ideal (even sponge embryos are found in similar strata), the precursors are nowhere to be found. Paleontologist J. Y. Chen said in the film Icons of Evolution, “Darwinism is maybe only telling part of the story for evolution. Darwin’s tree is a reverse cone shape. Very unexpectedly, our research is convincing us that major phyla is starting down below at the beginning of the Cambrian. The base is wide and gradually narrows. This is almost turned a different way.” His colleague Zhou Qui Gin, a senior research fellow at the site, says (translated), “I do not believe that animals developed gradually from the bottom up. I think the animals suddenly appeared. Among the Chengyiang animals we have found 136 different kinds of animals. And they represent diversity in the level of phyla and classes. So they sudden appearance makes them very special …
If all the animal and plant types appeared abruptly at the Cambrian, then evolution is debunked right there. Zhou, Barrett and Hilton cannot therefore make a case for Darwinism in the Cretaceous. Perhaps with different glasses on, paleontologists will find the same ‘reverse cone’ in the Jehol strata. Earlier epochs were much richer in species diversity. By comparison, our world is impoverished. This is devolution, not evolution.
Chinese Fossil Bed Astounds Paleontologists, freerepublic.com 2003
www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/854288/posts?page=2

In February 1999, I had arranged for a talk at the University of Washington for Jun-Yuan Chen, a Chinese paleontologist who was an acknowledged expert on the Cambrian explosion — in which the major animal phyla appeared abruptly in the fossil record … The 1909 discovery of the Burgess Shale in the Canadian Rockies provided the best fossil record of the Cambrian explosion until the 1984 discovery of the slightly older Maotianshan Shales in Chengjiang, China. Because of their excellent preservation, the Chengjiang fauna (many of which were soft-bodied) document the Cambrian explosion in exquisite detail, and J.-Y. Chen was the world expert. In his February lecture at the Burke Museum of the University of Washington, Chen described many of the Chengjiang fossils and argued that their abrupt appearance in the early Cambrian was a problem for Darwinian evolution. Darwin’s theory predicts that minor taxonomic differences (such as species and genera) gradually evolve into larger differences (such as classes and phyla), whereas the fossils show that the phyla and many classes appeared first and then diversified into a variety of genera and species. Chen called this “top-down” evolution, to contrast it with the “bottom-up” evolution required by Darwin’s theory. Afterwards, scientists in the audience asked him a lot of questions about specific fossils, but they completely avoided the topic of Darwinian evolution. When Chen later asked me why, I told him that perhaps they were just being polite, because most American scientists disapprove of criticizing Darwinism. At that he laughed, and said: “In China we can criticize Darwin, but not the government; in America, you can criticize the government, but not Darwin.”
""In China We Can Criticize Darwin": Prelude"
"In China We Can Criticize Darwin": Prelude | Evolution News


Darwinian theory explains why we see a radiation of taxa evolving when something critical changes in the population or the environment that opens up new niches for life. In this case, it seems to have been the evolution of full body armor in the form of sclerites. That was followed by a radiation of all sorts of body forms and taxa.
“It is easy enough to make up stories of how one form gave rise to another, and to find reasons why the stages should be favoured by natural selection. But such stories are not part of science, for there is no way of putting them to the test.”
Dr. Colin Patterson, from a letter to Sunderland.
 
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RogerDC

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Darwin didn't publish a history of life on earth.
I’m not talking about Charles Darwin himself. I’m talking about the cult of Darwinism and it’s claim that it understands the process that was responsible for the history of life on earth.
genetics has been greatly aided by evolutionary development, explaining much about the way humans develop in utero.
Please explain how this scientific knowledge “has been greatly aided” by the belief that all life on earth evolved from a common ancestor via process of mutation and natural selection.
Sir Alexander Flemming comes to mind. He discovered the first antibiotic. And he cautioned that it should be used sparingly and carefully, lest natural selection quickly lead to the evolution of resistant varieties. He was of course, correct.
Please explain how our knowledge of antibiotic resistance is dependent on the belief that all life on earth evolved from a common ancestor via a process of mutations and natural selection.

If all scientists believed life on earth was created in six days, 6000 years ago, for example, I can’t see how that would prevent them from discovering what we know about antibiotic resistance (by the way, I’m not a YEC). As far as I can tell, beliefs about what was responsible for the history of life on earth are irrelevant and useless in any practical scientific sense.
A cautionary tale is the Soviet Union. Because Darwinian theory conflicted with Marxist thought, Stalin banned Darwin from the Soviet Union. He elevated an anti-Darwinian crank to the head of Soviet biology, and his crackpot beliefs caused crop failures and famines.
Devastating argument! The only problem with it is, humans were growing and developing (“evolving”) crops very successfully for thousands of years before anyone had even heard of Darwin.

The fact of the matter is, a biologist doesn’t even have to be aware of the history of life on earth - let alone the Darwinian explanation for it - to be a competent biologist. Animal and plant breeders don't need to know Darwinian theory or history to be competent breeders.
Russian biology is still catching up from that disaster.
Hilarious.
Fortunately , there are numerous series of fossils showing how this happens. YE creationist Kurt Wise discusses a number of such examples, and explains why they are "very good evidence for macroevolutionary theory." Would you like to learn about them?
It doesn’t matter how good a evolutionary sequence of fossils is, it won’t tell you what process was responsible for that sequence. Nevertheless, just for fun, please show me what Kurt Wise has to say on the matter.
 
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RogerDC

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God said that the earth brought forth living things. Science is coming to the same conclusion.
God does not say the earth ALONE brought forth life; on the contrary, God COMMANDED the earth to bring forth life - in other words, scripture implies that God directed the creation of “evolution” of life on earth.

God said he fashioned Adam from clay. Science says Adam evolved from some lower creature.
God says not. The initial creation was a miracle. But God does most everything by natural means in this world, and has since the beginning.
Really? How could you possibly know that? Where does God say he used natural means to create all the life-forms on earth? And if “God does most everything by natural means in this world”, they are no longer “natural”, are they?

Furthermore, there is no way of determining if the evolutionary history of life was a natural process or a divine (miraculous) process. All we can see are some of the results.

It makes sense that since the appearance of the first life-form was miraculous, the “evolution” of subsequent creatures was also miraculous - which is why science does such a poor job of explaining what happened.
Fortunately, God does most things by natural means, which we can learn about and understand.
We cannot “learn about and understand” how fossil B evolved from fossil A, or how a bird allegedly evolved from a reptile, for example - we can only speculate about how that might have happened, and none of which can be tested. Hypotheses that can’t be tested hardly qualify as learning and understanding!

If you take a reptile and evolve it into a bird, only then will I believe you can “learn about and understand” how evolution happens.
 

RogerDC

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Science is not about applications. The truth of evolution is not dependent on what you might use it for. However agronomists and others have applied it well to make our crops more productive and resistant to pests and disease.
I'm not talking about the "evolution" we can observe - not one disputes that empirical "evolution" has many practical uses. I'm talking about the history of life on earth according to the pseudo-scientific cult of Darwinism; a history that is completely useless in any practical sense
 

Yehren

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I'm not talking about the "evolution" we can observe - not one disputes that empirical "evolution" has many practical uses.

Like understanding why our embryonic development appears to recapitulate evolutionary history. It doesn't really, but we have lots of ancient genes that mutated to functions that are important to our own development, and sometimes it looks that way. We have branchial arches, for example, but we never develop gills or gill rakers. Instead, they form other things. This is important in medicine.

I'm talking about the history of life on earth according to the pseudo-scientific cult of Darwinism; a history that is completely useless in any practical sense

Another creationist superstition. There is no such thing. The history of life on Earth, is primarily known from the fossil record. But genetics has given us a lot of insight into it, and other disciplines such as geology and geochemistry has added information. This is why YE creationist (and PhD paleontologist) Kurt Wise admits that the fossil record is "very good evidence for macroevolutionary theory." Would you like to know why he knows this?
 
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Yehren

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I’m not talking about Charles Darwin himself. I’m talking about the cult of Darwinism and it’s claim that it understands the process that was responsible for the history of life on earth.

Ah, that's just a creationist superstition. We have a lot of insights into the history of life on Earth. See above. Even honest and informed creationists admit there is very good evidence for that.

Please explain how this scientific knowledge “has been greatly aided” by the belief that all life on earth evolved from a common ancestor via process of mutation and natural selection.

Evolutionary development (evo-devo, in slang) informs medicine of many important characteristics of human development and genetics:


The great opportunity: Evolutionary applications to medicine and public health
Randolph M Nesse 1 , Stephen C Stearns 2
...To address these questions, we review current and potential applications of evolutionary biology to medicine and public health. Some evolutionary technologies, such as population genetics, serial transfer production of live vaccines, and phylogenetic analysis, have been widely applied. Other areas, such as infectious disease and aging research, illustrate the dramatic recent progress made possible by evolutionary insights. In still other areas, such as epidemiology, psychiatry, and understanding the regulation of bodily defenses, applying evolutionary principles remains an open opportunity.



Please explain how our knowledge of antibiotic resistance is dependent on the belief that all life on earth evolved from a common ancestor via a process of mutations and natural selection.

That depends on a more basic premise of evolutionary theory. In fact, it depends directly on the four points of Darwinian theory.

Rapid reproduction and natural selection
Because bacteria and viruses reproduce rapidly, they evolve rapidly. These short generation times — some bacteria have a generation time of just 15 minutes — mean that natural selection acts quickly. In each pathogen generation, new mutations and gene combinations are generated that then pass through the selective filter of our drugs and immune response. Over the course of many pathogen generations (a small fraction of a single human lifetime), they adapt to our defenses, evolving right out from under our attempts to rid ourselves of them.


bacterialgrowth.gif



Applying our knowledge of evolution
But that doesn't mean that we should stop trying to win these battles. By understanding these pathogens as evolving entities, subject to the same processes of evolution that we can study in fruit flies or the fossil record, we may be able to identify ways to slow their progress.
The Escape of the Pathogens: an evolutionary arms race

If you've ever been given antibiotics to take at home, you probably got some detailed instruction on intervals to take them, and to be sure to take all of them. That's because antibiotic protocols (designed to reduce bacterial adaptation to antibiotics) are based on Darwin's four points. It's how Sir Alexander Flemming accurately predicted overuse of antibiotics would lead to the evolution of resistance.


If all scientists believed life on earth was created in six days, 6000 years ago, for example, I can’t see how that would prevent them from discovering what we know about antibiotic resistance (by the way, I’m not a YEC). As far as I can tell, beliefs about what was responsible for the history of life on earth are irrelevant and useless in any practical scientific sense. Devastating argument! The only problem with it is, humans were growing and developing (“evolving”) crops very successfully for thousands of years before anyone had even heard of Darwin.

2008 Feb;1(1):28-48. doi: 10.1111/j.1752-4571.2007.00006.x.


The fact of the matter is, a biologist doesn’t even have to be aware of the history of life on earth - let alone the Darwinian explanation for it - to be a competent biologist.

No, that's false. He'd be back in the early 1800s, as far as his understanding of biology goes.

"Nothing in Biology Makes Sense Except in the Light of Evolution"
Theodosius Dobzhansky - world class biologist and Christian

Animal and plant breeders don't need to know Darwinian theory or history to be competent breeders.

That's what this guy said:
iu


Trofim Lysenko was a quack scientist in the Soviet Union. Because Darwinian theory contradicts Marxist philosophy, Stalin banned Darwinism from the Soviet Union. Many geneticists and other biologists were imprisoned or killed. Lysenko's anti-Darwinian ideas were implemented throughout the Soviet Union, leading to crop failures and famines. The damage to Soviet biology took decades to overcome after Stalin's death.

Hilarious.

Would have been if millions hadn't died because of his hare-brained attacks on Darwinism.

It doesn’t matter how good a evolutionary sequence of fossils is, it won’t tell you what process was responsible for that sequence.

That's directly observable. Mutation and natural selection. Even many creationist organizations now admit that much. Many even admit the fact of speciation, and sometimes, even a limited amount of common descent. They can hardly deny it, since it's observable, and testable.

Nevertheless, just for fun, please show me what Kurt Wise has to say on the matter.

Evidences for Darwin’s second expectation — of stratomorphic intermediate species — include such species as Baragwanathia27 (between rhyniophytes and lycopods), Pikaia28 (between echinoderms and chordates), Purgatorius29 (between the tree shrews and the primates), and Proconsul30 (between the non-hominoid primates and the hominoids). Darwin’s third expectation — of higher-taxon stratomorphic intermediates — has been confirmed by such examples as the mammal-like reptile groups31 between the reptiles and the mammals, and the phenacodontids32 between the horses and their presumed ancestors. Darwin’s fourth expectation — of stratomorphic series — has been confirmed by such examples as the early bird series,33 the tetrapod series,34,35 the whale series,36 the various mammal series of the Cenozoic37 (for example, the horse series, the camel series, the elephant series, the pig series, the titanothere series, etc.), the Cantius and Plesiadapus primate series,38 and the hominid series.39Evidence for not just one but for all three of the species level and above types of stratomorphic intermediates expected by macroevolutionary theory is surely strong evidence for macroevolutionary theory. Creationists therefore need to accept this fact. It certainly CANNOT be said that traditional creation theory expected (predicted) any of these fossil finds.
Kurt Wise Toward a Creationist Understanding of Transitional Forms
Dr Kurt P. Wise has a B.A. from the University of Chicago, and an M.A. and a Ph.D. in palaeontology from Harvard University, Massachusetts, USA. He now serves as Associate Professor of Science and Director for Origins Research at Bryan College, Dayton, Tennessee. He is actively involved in various creationist organisations in North America.
[/quote]
 

Yehren

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Here's another opinion from a YE creationist who is familiar with the evidence:


SPECIES VARIABILITY AND CREATIONISM


by

Todd Charles Wood

Center for Origins Research Bryan College Dayton, Tennessee

ABSTRACT

Before and after the publication of Origin of Species, creationists have held a diversity of opinion regarding the origin of species. Studies of species in the sixteenth century began with numerous suggestions of wide variability, but after Francesco Redi helped to falsify spontaneous generation, scholars began to view species as essentially fixed. This was reinforced by prominent natural theologians, who endorsed a static creation. Despite the popularity of fixity, even Linnaeus himself doubted it. After Darwin, many Christians instinctively defended the fixist definition of creationist that Darwin himself popularized in Origin. Only in the early twentieth century did creationists return actively to developing models of limited speciation or polyphyletic evolution. The independent recurrence of these ideas suggests that they have some intrinsic appeal to those seeking an alternative to monophyletic evolution.

And also from Dr. Wood:

I hope this doesn't turn into a rant, but it might. You have been warned.


Evolution is not a theory in crisis. It is not teetering on the verge of collapse. It has not failed as a scientific explanation. There is evidence for evolution, gobs and gobs of it. It is not just speculation or a faith choice or an assumption or a religion. It is a productive framework for lots of biological research, and it has amazing explanatory power. There is no conspiracy to hide the truth about the failure of evolution. There has really been no failure of evolution as a scientific theory. It works, and it works well.

I say these things not because I'm crazy or because I've "converted" to evolution. I say these things because they are true. I'm motivated this morning by reading yet another clueless, well-meaning person pompously declaring that evolution is a failure. People who say that are either unacquainted with the inner workings of science or unacquainted with the evidence for evolution. (Technically, they could also be deluded or lying, but that seems rather uncharitable to say. Oops.)

Creationist students, listen to me very carefully: There is evidence for evolution, and evolution is an extremely successful scientific theory. That doesn't make it ultimately true, and it doesn't mean that there could not possibly be viable alternatives. It is my own faith choice to reject evolution, because I believe the Bible reveals true information about the history of the earth that is fundamentally incompatible with evolution. I am motivated to understand God's creation from what I believe to be a biblical, creationist perspective. Evolution itself is not flawed or without evidence. Please don't be duped into thinking that somehow evolution itself is a failure. Please don't idolize your own ability to reason. Faith is enough. If God said it, that should settle it. Maybe that's not enough for your scoffing professor or your non-Christian friends, but it should be enough for you.
The truth about evolution
 

Yehren

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God said that the earth brought forth living things. Science is coming to the same conclusion.

God does not say the earth ALONE brought forth life

Of course not. For one thing, the Earth would not have even been there, if not for God. Nature is not the creator; it's the tool by which God created life. He does most things by natural means in our world.

God said he fashioned Adam from clay.

Figuratively. God doesn't have hands and fingers, and He didn't literally dig up some clay and make Adam. Adam was brought forth from the Earth like other animals, but his living soul was given directly by God, which makes all the difference.

Science says Adam evolved from some lower creature. Really?

Yep.

How could you possibly know that?

As your fellow YE creationist, Kurt Wise, says, the transitional series of hominids is "strong evidence for macroevolutionary theory."

Where does God say he used natural means to create all the life-forms on earth?

Gen. 1:24 And God said: Let the earth bring forth the living creature in its kind, cattle and creeping things, and beasts of the earth, according to their kinds. And it was so done.

And if “God does most everything by natural means in this world”, they are no longer “natural”, are they?

So, if I use a router to put an edge on furniture, the edge is no longer router-cut? That seems just absurd to me. You and I for example, are creatures of God, but our bodies are entirely natural, and were produced by natural means.

Furthermore, there is no way of determining if the evolutionary history of life was a natural process or a divine (miraculous) process.

Evidence. The router leaves traces that a knowledgeable person can find to know how it happened. So does evolutionary change. Creation of the universe was miraculous and ex nihilo. Much of what goes on in God's creation is natural. Why do you think He created nature?

It makes sense that since the appearance of the first life-form was miraculous,

Notice that God says the appearance of living things was natural, as He commanded.

We cannot “learn about and understand” how fossil B evolved from fossil A,

Actually, we can. For example, Ambulocetus natans, tells us why Dorudon has horizontal flukes instead of vertical flukes like fish. Would you like to learn about that? There are many, many other such cases, if you'd like to see more.

or how a bird allegedly evolved from a reptile, for example

Yes, we can tell about that, too. Exaption has a lot to do with it. If you like, I'll start a new thread; there's a lot of information about how that happened. Would you like to see that?

If you take a reptile and evolve it into a bird, only then will I believe you can “learn about and understand” how evolution happens.

"If you take Mount Everest and erode it into a hill, only then will I believe you can "learn about and understand" how erosion happens."

Do you see how transparent that dodge is?
 

Yehren

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Who is Gunter Bechly?

Günter seems completely unaware of the data I showed you. So I'm wondering why you think he's an expert. He's got religious objections to the fossil record, gentics, and evolutionary development. Which is the usual reason for rejection of evolution. It's always religious.

At least Drs. Wise and Wood are honest enough to admit the evidence. Let's check some of Günter's claims:

"And it shows no sign of insect evolution."

Sphecomyrma is an extinct genus of ants which existed in the Cretaceous approximately 79 to 92 million years ago. The first specimens were collected in 1966, found embedded in amber which had been exposed in the cliffs of Cliffwood, New Jersey, by Edmund Frey and his wife. In 1967, zoologists E. O. Wilson, Frank Carpenter and William L. Brown, Jr. published a paper describing and naming Sphecomyrma freyi. They described an ant with a mosaic of features—a mix of characteristics from modern ants and aculeate wasps. It possessed a metapleural gland, a feature unique to ants. Furthermore, it was wingless and had a petiole which was ant-like in form. The mandibles were short and wasp-like with only two teeth, the gaster was constricted, and the middle and hind legs had double tibial spurs. The antennae were, in form, midway between the wasps and ants, having a short first segment but a long flexible funiculus.
Sphecomyrma - Wikipedia

Note the date it was first found. Günter is 53 years behind the curve. And he's an "insect expert?" There are more insect examples, if you want to see them.

Here, the Cambrian Explosion has been documented in fine detail; all the major animal phyla appear in the early Cambrian without precursors.

These, as your link says, are Cambrian, not Precambrian. As you learned, complex animals appeared long before the Cambrian. And even in the Cambrian, we see evolutionary changes from the early Cambrian to later Cambrian.

Would you like me to show you, again?
 
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Yehren

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well i would lean more toward nature abhorring a vacuum, so to speak, i guess the oxygen ^ would more likely just make bigger flora and fauna? So for the PC explosion i would maybe contemplate that in light of 99% of all the species that have ever existed being extinct now maybe? Seems equally hard to get ones head around anyway.

One interesting thing we now know, is that birds are here, because there were lower oxygen levels back in the Jurassic. Dinosaurs seem to have dominated niches that required high levels of activity, because they had evolved pneumatized bones, and a highly-efficient repiratory sytem which was better than that of mammals today. They thrived in lower oxygen levels.

Today, their descendants still have that adaptation,and some of them are capable of flying high over the Himalayas. They are birds. And yes, they still have much better repiratory systems than we do.
 
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RogerDC

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Well, let's test your belief...
iu

iu


Which of these do you think are Cambrian, and which are Precambrian?
The first image could be that of Spiggina floundersi, a preCambrian organism. As for the second image, I have no idea - they look like single-cell organisms with a nucleus.
Chordates and vertebrates (chordates with skeletons) are all soft-bodied, like us.
Human beings are not classed as “soft-bodied” organisms. A “soft-bodied” organism is one which lacks an endoskeleton or an exoskeleton. So some chordates are “soft-bodied” and some are not.
A good description of the evolution of chordates to vertebrates (chordates with skeletons) can be found in Leonard Radinsky's The Evolution of Vertebrate Design. It's rather detailed and informative, but simplified enough to be readable for a non-biologist.
Thank you for the reference. I will look that one up.
Technically, evolution is an observed phenomenon.
Name one person who has observed a bird evolve from a reptile, for example, via the neo-Darwinian process of mutations and natural selection.
There's no huge gap. The first true vertebrates from the Cambrian were not "fully formed" at all, lacking most elements now found in all vertebrates. But they did have ossified segments (all chordate bodies are divided into segments, something we retain in our nerves and vertebrae) supporting the notochord and spinal chord.
My understanding is that vertebrates with fully-formed backbones appeared suddenly in the Cambrian and there is no fossil evidence of evolutionary ancestors with partial backbones.
 

RogerDC

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Moot point. There wasn't a dramatic increase in oxygen levels in the Cambrian. The one key cause seems to be the evolution of full exoskeletons. That allowed many new ways of life, and the evolutionary radiation that followed is known as the Cambrian explosion.
My understanding is, there are no evolutionary links between the exoskeleton and the endoskeleton, there is no evidence that both lines share a common ancestor, and that the endoskeleton has no evolutionary history at all. Creatures with fully-formed endoskeletons appear suddenly in the Cambrian ... in which case, Darwinian theory is left wanting, to say the least.
I suspect that since such organisms are much more efficient predators, there followed an arms race between predator and prey species.
Sounds suspiciously like another case of Darwinist science-fiction to me. There is no empirical evidence whatsoever that competition for survival between predators and prey produces new body shapes and organs. All that has been observed is, some creatures survive and dominant and some don’t, producing at most a change in gene frequency or extinction.

”The theory performs well with regard to the issues it concentrates on, providing testable and abundantly confirmed predictions on the dynamics of genetic variation in evolving populations, on the gradual variation and adaptation of phenotypic traits, and on certain genetic features of speciation. If the explanation would stop here, no controversy would exist. But it has become habitual in evolutionary biology to take population genetics as the privileged type of explanation of all evolutionary phenomena, thereby negating the fact that, on the one hand, not all of its predictions can be confirmed under all circumstances, and, on the other hand, a wealth of evolutionary phenomena remains excluded. For instance, the theory largely avoids the question of how the complex organizations of organismal structure, physiology, development or behavior — whose variation it describes — actually arise in evolution.”
Gerd Muller, Austrian evolutionary theorist, “Why an extended evolutionary synthesis is necessary."
Evolutionary Theorist Concedes: Evolution “Largely Avoids” Biggest Questions of Biological Origins | Evolution News
 

RogerDC

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First, the data is available to anyone.
Get real. Millions of fossils have been discovered and it would take a life-time to study them all, not to mention needing to travel the world to examine the whole collection - assuming you will be granted access to them (which is unlikely). You have zero first-hand knowledge of the fossil record - very few people do - so like 99.99% of people on the planet, you rely on paleontologists for your “data”. Even paleontologists themselves rely on other paleontologists for data, as no one paleontologist can become an expert on the entire fossil collection - it’s too vast.
I have some knowledge of biology and general science, and I'm quite capable of looking at the evidence for myself.
Firstly, what makes you qualified to look at the evidence for yourself? Do you have a degree in paleontology? Your first-hand knowledge of the fossil record probably amounts to handling a few fossils during your college days.

Secondly, the only “evidence” you have been exposed to is that presented by paleontologists who examine the fossil record only from a scientific perspective - and more specifically, the Darwinian perspective. Fossil evidence that doesn’t support the Darwinist perspective is either ignored or explained away with some lame excuse. For a balanced view of the fossil record, I advise you to study the articles published at evolutionnews.org
Sorry, that fails, simply because I can read the evidence and see for myself. The dodge "they are lying, all of them!" is a loser for that, and other reasons.
I never stated that any paleontologist is a liar, much less that “all of them” are liars.
Well, let's ask an honest and knowledgeable YE creationist:

Evidences for Darwin’s second expectation — of stratomorphic intermediate species — include such species as Baragwanathia27 (between rhyniophytes and lycopods), Pikaia28 (between echinoderms and chordates), Purgatorius29 (between the tree shrews and the primates), and Proconsul30 (between the non-hominoid primates and the hominoids). Darwin’s third expectation — of higher-taxon stratomorphic intermediates — has been confirmed by such examples as the mammal-like reptile groups31 between the reptiles and the mammals, and the phenacodontids32 between the horses and their presumed ancestors. Darwin’s fourth expectation — of stratomorphic series — has been confirmed by such examples as the early bird series,33 the tetrapod series,34,35 the whale series,36 the various mammal series of the Cenozoic37 (for example, the horse series, the camel series, the elephant series, the pig series, the titanothere series, etc.), the Cantius and Plesiadapus primate series,38 and the hominid series.39Evidence for not just one but for all three of the species level and above types of stratomorphic intermediates expected by macroevolutionary theory is surely strong evidence for macroevolutionary theory. Creationists therefore need to accept this fact. It certainly CANNOT be said that traditional creation theory expected (predicted) any of these fossil finds.
YE creationist Kurt Wise, Toward a Creationist Understanding of Transitional Forms
You’re barking up the wrong tree - I agree that there is fossil evidence that God created life via an evolutionary process. But an evolutionary sequence of fossils does not prove that that evolution proceeded according to the neo-Darwinian model of mutations and natural selection - fossils tell us nothing about what caused evolution or what process was responsible for it.
Evolutionary theory assumes life began and explains how it changes.
You've still got it wrong - evolutionary theory attempts to explain how it changes.

 

RogerDC

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well i would lean more toward nature abhorring a vacuum, so to speak, i guess the oxygen ^ would more likely just make bigger flora and fauna? So for the PC explosion i would maybe contemplate that in light of 99% of all the species that have ever existed being extinct now maybe? Seems equally hard to get ones head around anyway.

But i wonder now what your postulate is? Could you state it succinctly?
There is no empirical evidence that suggests an elevated oxygen level will produce the evolution of new body plans and novel organs, as seen during the Cambrian explosion, for example.

However, there is ample empirical evidence that suggests Darwinists have very vivid imaginations and often attempt to pass off pure fantasy as science.